The MA in Human Rights is a two-year master's degree that offers students the opportunity to engage with a wide range of subjects including: rights, international law, critical approaches to rights, third world critiques of international law, human rights in Islamic law, human rights in the Arab World, human rights in Palestine, and comparative constitutional law. Each module of the program aims to develop the students' abilities to apply the knowledge and insights gained about human rights in a variety of contexts. This will be delivered through a range of teaching methods (including role-play simulations, case-study analysis, joint practitioner and academic-led seminars and lectures, and special guest workshops and student research and presentations).
The primary goals of the program include:
1. To provide students with a high-quality education concerning different themes in human rights.
2. To equip graduates with the necessary analytical skills to engage in basic research and apply it to solve a range of debates and dilemmas and examine existing gaps in knowledge.
3. To enhance the quality and increase the quantity of reflective human rights-minded scholars in the region.
4. To contextualize human rights, historically and politically, in order to address the challenges and issues that exist in the Arab region, and work toward establishing critical and suitable theories, explanations and policies.
5. To prepare graduates to assume careers relevant to human rights, and/or to pursue doctoral training in human rights or related professions/academic disciplines.
Human Rights Program Learning Outcomes:
1. Demonstrate in-depth theoretical and practical knowledge of international and regional protections of human rights.
2. Demonstrate in-depth theoretical and practical knowledge of human rights in the Arab and Muslim world, and the ability to apply and contextualise global and theoretical ideas.
3. Possess the skills and knowledge needed to access the academic literature in the fields of study associated with Human Rights.
4. Develop a rigorous analysis of human rights in different contexts.
5. Critically reflect on the extent to which specific states or actors comply with human right standards and best practices, and the necessary changes for meeting these standards, and/or the conditions required for these changes to materialize.
6. Critically reflect on the discourse of human rights, its historical evolution, its internal debates, and the ways in which it is deployed by a variety of parties to achieve different ends.
7. Develop inter-disciplinary and comparative knowledge of the intellectual and practical history of human rights, international law, and constitutional law.
8. Demonstrate an integrated understanding of the relation of human rights to policy-making: how it is influenced by policy-making, and how it influences policy.
9. Acquire critical skills to examine legal texts and claims.
10. Assess the significance of multidisciplinary concerns and questions for the protection, evolution, and scrutiny of human rights.
11. Develop research skills to locate relevant materials and assess their relevance and importance.
12. Develop the ability to develop research ideas, pursue independent research, and write a rigorous a substantial research paper demonstrating methodological, theoretical, and practical knowledge.
