The Carr Center for Human Rights Policy serves as the hub of the Harvard Kennedy School’s research, teaching, and training in the human rights domain. The center embraces a dual mission: to educate students and the next generation of leaders from around the world in human rights policy and practice; and to convene and provide policy-relevant knowledge to international organizations, governments, policymakers, and businesses.
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Latest Publications
On the Role of Solar Geoengineering in Combatting Climate Change: Harvard University vs. Indigenous Voices
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In 2021 the Saami Council asked Harvard to suspend research related to stratospheric aerosol injections, a form of geoengineering. Their intervention raises far-reaching questions regarding the appropriateness of geoengineering as a response to climate change, but also regarding the status of indigenous voices in this debate. I make two main points. Firstly, it behooves us to engage indigenous voices as a way of addressing one type of moral corruption in climate change, namely that only voices from the present can engage on what to do about it. Absent actual representation of future generations, engaging with the ecological stance typically associated with indigenous groups (who display remarkable commonality in this regard) is the best we can do. Secondly, while critics rightly associate geoengineering with the mindset that caused climate change, it still seems wise to continue research into stratospheric aerosol injections. But advocacy in this domain has performative dimensions and itself might trigger reactions and counter-reactions. So, taking this stance entails follow-up obligations to ensure geoengineering is not used to defeat efforts at emission reductions.
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Automation Anxiety and a Right to Freedom from Automated Systems and AI
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Rapid advances in AI have created a global sense of urgency around the ways that automated systems are changing human lives. Not all of these changes are necessarily for the better. On what basis, therefore, might we be able to assert a right to be free from automated systems and AI? The idea seems absurd, given how embedded these technologies already are and the improvements they have generated in contemporary life when we compare with prior periods in human history. And yet, there are good grounds for recognizing a general entitlement to protect at least three important human abilities: i) to work; ii) to know and understand the source of the content we consume; and iii) to make our own decisions. Understood comprehensively, a right to freedom from automated systems and AI could mean that individuals and communities are presented with alternative options and/or leverage to keep them from losing these abilities long cherished in the history of human development. Such a right does not call for dismantling the technological age, but rather designates what we ought to contest and protect in a world with a precarious dependence on technology.
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Carr Center 2022-23 Annual Report
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Full Text
The past year has brought to light many of the challenges we still face in advancing and evolving the human rights landscape. The continued conflict between Russia and Ukraine; closing civic space and attacks against media freedom throughout the African continent; the dire situation for women’s rights in Afghanistan and Iran; racial injustices across the United States; and the birth of ChatGPT and the subsequent re-envisioning of how AI will forever alter our lives—these events are only a small subset of radical recent changes that have made worldwide human rights advocacy and research more important than ever.
Our 2022-2023 annual report highlights the Carr Center’s growing research and programming efforts over the past year to encourage and ensure a future of more robust worldwide human rights policies. Our latest research, publications, books, podcast episodes, and webinars over the course of the year—created in tandem with our faculty, fellows, and Harvard Kennedy School students—have reached hundreds of thousands of people in over 160 countries, widening the Carr Center’s positive impact in the global human rights policy sphere. To learn more about what the Carr Center accomplished during the 2022-2023 academic year, click the link below.
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“The Carr Center is building a bridge between ideas on human rights and the practice on the ground. Right now we are at a critical juncture. The pace of technological change and the rise of authoritarian governments are both examples of serious challenges to the flourishing of individual rights. It’s crucial that Harvard and the Kennedy School continue to be a major influence in keeping human rights ideals alive. The Carr Center is a focal point for this important task.”
- Mathias Risse