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Chapter 10
Chemists Contributing to Human Rights: Enhancing Research, Teaching and Global Impact Jeffrey H. Toney* Division of Academic Affairs, Kean University, 1000 Morris Avenue, Union, New Jersey 07083, United States *E-mail:
[email protected] As chemists, we focus on research or teaching hoping to open new vistas, creating new questions and to inspire our students. Contributing to human rights issues, such as access to clean water, food or medicine might seem daunting in our busy schedules, perceived by some as requiring extraordinary effort or even as political activism. I believe that integrating human rights perspectives into your work can enhance your research and teaching by adding global impact to benefit humanity, sparking interest in students who often ask: Why do I need to learn this? I will discuss efforts led by the American Association for the Advancement of Science (AAAS) Science and Human Rights Coalition, representing over a half million professional scientists and engineers, of which the American Chemical Society is a member organization. This Coalition offers a range of opportunities for chemists to enhance research, teaching and global impact of their work.
“The SOCIETY shall cooperate with scientists internationally and shall be concerned with the worldwide application of chemistry to the needs of humanity .” (1) Every Chemist seeks to apply their skills to help solve global challenges, ranging from improving public health, mitigating climate change, or enhancing
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the quality of life. The impact of our work can be broadened and enriched if we are mindful of human rights issues. The Universal Declaration of Human Rights, adopted by the United Nations General Assembly in 1948, articulated a vision of inherent human dignity and achievement, including the right “to share in scientific advancement and benefits” (Article 27). The right to enjoy the benefits of science was later enshrined in Article 15 of the International Covenant on Social, Economic, Cultural and Social Rights in 1966 (2). Reflecting upon the human right to the benefits of science can enhance chemistry’s contributions to society by highlighting what we often take for granted, such as access to clean water, food and medicine, safety and security as well as freedom of information, including the internet, necessary for education. Chemists can apply their skills to each of these fundamental issues without losing focus of their primary research interests. In this Chapter, I describe a range of opportunities that can be pursued through volunteering with organizations such as the American Association for the Advancement of Science (AAAS) Science and Human Rights Coalition (3), through the use of innovative pedagogy in the classroom (4, 5) or by more effective science communication and public advocacy (6, 7).
Research Science and human rights is an emerging field of research, exemplified by the pioneering work of Richard Pierre Claude (8, 9) that established a foundation on which scientists have built to combat human rights abuses, and to teach the next generation of scientists to become global ethical citizens. While scholarly works focused on science and human rights have been increasing since Claude’s seminal work, there is a paucity of literature on chemistry and human rights, offering chemists an opportunity to address their research projects through a rights-based perspective (10). Such approaches can complement funding proposals submitted to agencies such as the National Science Foundation, which includes benefits to society as a component of the broader impacts criteria used to evaluate merit (11). Incorporating the value of your research to human rights issues fosters interdisciplinary approaches otherwise not typically considered, such as collaboration with attorneys, social or political scientists, artists, writers, including journalists, as well as physicians, health professionals, engineers and scientists outside of chemistry. Scholarly inquiry at the intersection of these disparate fields offers rich opportunities to reveal new perspectives on issues at the heart of human dignity and achievement. Human rights organizations are predominantly focused on the application of local, national and international law to address allegations of human rights abuses, often relying upon victim testimonies as the primary evidence. The strength of such cases can be bolstered significantly if analysis of scientific data independently supports violation of human rights (12). Chemical research can be applied to a wide variety of cases. For example, tracking of environmental contamination depends upon reliable chemical analysis of samples and comparative analysis to regulatory safety standards. Such environmental forensics is critical in the case of 150
disaster relief of affected communities. Testing of groundwater for arsenic prior to installation of tube-wells in Bangladesh, intended to provide clean drinking water, could have prevented the poisoning of 35 to 77 million people (13). Chemists also played a key role in revealing lead contamination in water supplies in Flint, Michigan (14). Chemists are well equipped to address these issues and many more, limited only by our imagination.
Teaching and Learning The pedagogy of chemistry has evolved along with the research of teaching and learning that highlights best practices focused on active engagement of students and problem-based learning relevant to everyday life (15). Use of case studies can engage students to apply chemical principals to human rights issues. The AAAS Science and Human Rights Coalition (see below) offers a range of teaching and learning materials, including course syllabi connecting science and human rights (16) as well as an extensive annotated bibliography (17). While these courses include social and political science, as well as medicine and philosophy, the physical sciences are underrepresented, offering an opportunity for chemistry educators to develop and share case-based course materials with a wide audience. This approach will improve teaching and learning through the use of current content connected to the curriculum, engaging students with problems related to everyday life on a global scale. Assessment of student learning outcomes in the chemistry curricula will be a welcome addition to the scholarship of teaching and learning. A human rights-based approach to teaching and learning could be critical to inspire the next generation of chemists to pursue their work in an ethical manner to support human dignity on a global scale.
Global Impact through Volunteering Human rights organizations, including non-governmental organizations (NGOs) such as Amnesty International, Human Rights Watch and Scholars at Risk, welcome contributions from chemists to advance their mission. Chemists can offer data analysis, analytic measurements of field samples such as water, sample preparation, literature research as well as preparation and interpretation of technical reports to enhance science communication for use in litigation and to the public (see below). The AAAS Science and Human Rights Coalition, established in 2009, brought together a wide range of professional science and engineering organizations recognizing the essential role of scientists and engineers in support of human rights issues. This Coalition currently includes 24 member organizations representing over a half million scientists and engineers, including members of the American Chemical Society. Members can propose or participate in Coalition Projects, collaborating across disciplines, as well as partipate in biannual meetings held at the AAAS Headquarters in Washington, DC. The Coalition offers webinars, campus tool-kits designed to introduce human rights issues to academic communities, as well as annual student and poster competitions. 151
The On-Call Scientists program coordinated by the AAAS Scientific Responsibility, Human Rights and Law Program matches volunteer scientists and engineers with Human Rights Organizations, offering a unique opportunity to volunteer, whether remotely or in the field. Multilingual chemists can serve as translators of technical documents and of interviews if needed when NGO’s are pursuing projects in non-English speaking cultures. This network has expanded to over 1,000 volunteer scientists, engineers and health professionals, contributing to projects in 58 countries speaking 38 different languages (18). Currently 86 chemists have joined On-Call Scientists. Highlighted projects include investigation of chemical weapon attacks in Syria, environmental impact of a proposed dam in Mexico and investigation of war crimes. In each case, these volunteers have made a major impact in the documentation of human rights abuses, critical for holding perpertrators accountable.
Global Impact through Science Communication and Public Advocacy Effective communication to the public about the value of what we do as chemists, and public advocacy of human rights issues, is becoming increasingly important to help guide public policy makers towards data-driven decisions. Explaining the relevance of chemistry, and of science in general, to everyday life to the public remains a challenge (19). For example, climate change remains a controversial topic, exemplified by a geographic dependence in the United States on whether citizens believe that global warming is happening, ranging from 43 to 80% (20). The gap between findings in the scientific literature and effective communication to the public is widening. The likelihood of the results of scientific studies reaching a wide audience through traditional media such as television, radio and print is extremely small, estimated to be at most three out of every 1,000 published articles (21). Reaching a wide audience does not necessarily lead to an understanding, or acceptance, of the message we as chemists wish to send, or its broader implications to society. As the public relies more on the internet and mobile devices for instantaneous fact-checking, more scientists are sharing their findings directly through blogs and social media, or through the use of lay summaries of scholarly research that can be shared with traditional mass media (21). This fundamental shift in science journalism offers an opportunity for chemists to use blogging and social media intentionally to enhance an intelligent discourse on scientific issues impacting the public. Such public advocacy is an important service both to the profession and to society. Chemists can share their findings as well as their informed perspectives in response to the news media, and on topics impacting public policy and human rights issues. This may seem to be a daunting task amid the 24 hour, seven days per week, frenetic coverage of news by mass media, while balancing the responsibilities of chemists working in industry or in academia. However, a concerted, mindful approach by the chemical community can make a significant impact by highlighting human rights issues that are too often lost in the news of the day. Representation of informed, rational 152
perspectives by chemists, whether in the form of a blog or social media post, a Letter to the Editor or an OpEd in a newspaper, is an important opportunity to help guide public opinion, and policy makers, towards informed decisions that will help make the world a better place – the very reason why we chose to become chemists in the first place.
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