Tactic case studies provide first-person, detailed information on the use of a tactic and how it may be adapted to other situations.
The authors -- from diverse walks of life and human rights issue areas -- recount their personal experiences in these detailed tactical notebooks. Although their backgrounds and situations differ, all used innovative tactics to help address an urgent human rights situation. Read these case studies to learn how a tactic was actually implemented, what factors influenced its use, and the challenges that surfaced along the way. We hope these examples of how tactics were used in sometimes dangerous, real-life situations will help you think tactically, to consider adapting these tactics to your own context, and adding these tactics to your own tactical repertoire.
The Ruta Pacífica is a movement of Colombian women who have directly confronted the violence of the armed actors with large mobilizations of caravans, marches, and public events, crossing the country and entering conflict zones under military control. There, the women of the Ruta have broken the silence in order to mobilize the voices for peace in their country.
Forensic science has been a powerful tool in the scientific documentation of human rights violations around the world, and especially in Latin America. The Argentine Forensic Anthropology Team has been in the forefront of efforts to train human rights NGOs to use forensic tools to advance their investigations, to provide more support for victims and to strengthen the credibility of their work against impunity.
Peru’s Coordinadora Nacional de Derechos Humanos (CNDDHH) is globally recognized as one of the most successful and effective coalitions in the world. The importance of bringing ourselves together in order to have more strength and greater impact is often discussed, but few have been able to achieve this as well as Peru. The global experience of the human rights movement, unfortunately, is filled with coalitions that have failed both because of divisions as well as a lack of advocacy.
Human rights practitioners are often located in the Non-governmental Organizations (NGOs) of big cities, while most of the crisis situations, the need for monitoring and defense of human rights are located in rural areas. In Chiapas, Mexico, the rural indigenous communities have been confronting years of repression and harassment. This tactic case study describes the model of the Network of Human Rights Defenders, organized in Chiapas by Miguel Angel de los Santos.
The Truth and Reconciliation Commission (TRC) of Peru is one of the most recent examples of the processes of transitional justice, institutionalized with the aim of exploring the truth hidden behind a past characterized by massive abuse of human rights. One of the central activities in this process is the Public Audiences, created with the aim of legitimizing and dignifying the personal experiences of the victims in order to support the therapeutic and recuperative work on their behalf.
Year of Publication: 2004
Author(s): Sofia Macher
Documentary Heritage is a program of Memoria Abierta (Open Memory), whose goal is to improve the use of and access to the documentation stored in the institutional archives of participating human rights organizations. The Documentary Heritage Program seeks to make all of the documentation related to the period of state terrorism and its present consequences accessible for research and educational purposes, thereby increasing knowledge and contributing to a social conscience about what occurred in Argentina.
Until a few years ago, there were no legal firms in Brazil that offered free services to people in need. The Pro-Bono Institute has created a new legal tradition in São Paulo, convincing major law firms to donate their legal services and connecting them with NGOs in need of legal services. The Institute has recruited about 140 lawyers and is offering a variety of free services to all kinds of NGOs, including support for important human rights cases. It has achieved a rapid change in attitude in the legal community and pro bono work has become steadily more popular.
The Legal Defense Bureau for National and Ethnic Minorities (NEKI) in Hungary learned about a testing tactic from a U.S. group that had successfully proved instances of housing discrimination by sending in “testers” of different races to apply for apartments. Similar discrimination was also occurring in Hungary against the Roma population – in housing, employment, access to public spaces and public services and other areas. NEKI adapted the tactic of testing to fit into its strategy of using lawsuits to challenge human rights violations.
The Otpor! student movement in Serbia built a broad constituency of support by continuously innovating and combining tactics to ensure the safety of their volunteers and break down the fear of its people to speak out against the government. The content of the notebook focuses on “Plan B,” one tactic they used to do this. When Serb authorities began arresting demonstrators, Otpor!’s support base could have disintegrated due to fear.
The ICAR Foundation mobilized public resources for a socially marginalized group – victims of torture. The Foundation recognized that many citizens had suffered torture during the communist regime, and created an organization to provide treatment and care to the thousands of torture survivors.
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