Indigenous rights’ relationship to ecological justice in Amazonia has not been explicitly explored in the literature. As social scientists rarely talk about violence against non-humans, this case study of conservation in Amazonia will explore this new area of concern. Ethical inquiries in conservation also engage with the manifold ways through which human and nonhuman lives are entangled and emplaced within wider ecological relationships, converging in the notion of environmental justice, which often fails to account for overt violence or exploitation of non-humans. Reflecting on this omission, this chapter discusses the applicability of engaged social science and conservation to habitat destruction in Amazonia, and broader contexts involving violence against non-humans. The questions addressed in this chapter are: is the idea of ecological justice sufficiently supported in conservation debate, and more practical Amazonian contexts? Can advocacy of inherent rights be applied to the case of non-humans? Can indigenous communities still be considered 'traditional' considering population growth and increased consumptive practices? Concluding that the existing forms of justice are inadequate in dealing with the massive scale of non-human abuse, this chapter provides directions for conservation that engage with deep ecology and ecological justice in the Amazonian context. doi: 10.1007/978-3-030-29153-2 LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/helenkopnina/
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The 6th International Human Rights Education Conference is about teaching human rights. The purpose of this convention is to protect and promote the right of people with disabilities to participate equally in societal life. Implementation of the convention is a responsibility of the national government. At the Utrecht University of Applied Sciences a social work course now includes an introductory lecture on human rights using objects and a game that addresses the UN Convention on the Rights of Persons with Disabilities.
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Social work policy and practice all over the world continue to face the impact of the neoliberal agenda. Similarly, social work education has been subject to the economic and political changes, with an increasing emphasis on a discourse of ‘evidence-based practice’. However, it is the core of social work programs in higher education to initiate students in the fundamental values of social work, as they are recognized in the global definition of social work. In order to prepare future social workers for their assignment, human rights should be given an explicit place in the social work curricula at Universities and Universities of Applied Sciences. For human rights to gain more attention in social work programs in higher education, a Manifesto was written by lecturers’ social work in the Netherlands and Flanders, with a 5-point program to include human rights in the social work curricula. In this article, we elaborate on the five objectives that are presented in the Manifesto. Throughout the paper, we introduce small ‘case examples’ of how human rights can be integrated in education. These experiences show the importance of developing a particular social work perspective on human rights that is found in the idea of ‘human rights from below.’.
Smart city technologies, including artificial intelligence and computer vision, promise to bring a higher quality of life and more efficiently managed cities. However, developers, designers, and professionals working in urban management have started to realize that implementing these technologies poses numerous ethical challenges. Policy papers now call for human and public values in tech development, ethics guidelines for trustworthy A.I., and cities for digital rights. In a democratic society, these technologies should be understandable for citizens (transparency) and open for scrutiny and critique (accountability). When implementing such public values in smart city technologies, professionals face numerous knowledge gaps. Public administrators find it difficult to translate abstract values like transparency into concrete specifications to design new services. In the private sector, developers and designers still lack a ‘design vocabulary’ and exemplary projects that can inspire them to respond to transparency and accountability demands. Finally, both the public and private sectors see a need to include the public in the development of smart city technologies but haven’t found the right methods. This proposal aims to help these professionals to develop an integrated, value-based and multi-stakeholder design approach for the ethical implementation of smart city technologies. It does so by setting up a research-through-design trajectory to develop a prototype for an ethical ‘scan car’, as a concrete and urgent example for the deployment of computer vision and algorithmic governance in public space. Three (practical) knowledge gaps will be addressed. With civil servants at municipalities, we will create methods enabling them to translate public values such as transparency into concrete specifications and evaluation criteria. With designers, we will explore methods and patterns to answer these value-based requirements. Finally, we will further develop methods to engage civil society in this processes.
INCLAVI will address the skills mismatches that exist in the aviation sector related to the freedom of movement of persons with disabilities and accessibility requirements in line with the EC Strategy for the Rights of Persons with Disabilities 2021-2030.The project accomplishes this through rigorous cooperation between key global industry and labour market actors combined with a world-class HEI and VET consortium. INCLAVI will also further improve the collaboration between HEIs and VET.INCLAVI will design and co-create a new training curriculum utilising expertise from HEI, VET and Industry Actors to support the reskilling of aviation sector employees and key target groups who have a role in the passenger journey of PwDs from door to door. The training will address students and professionals in areas of work related to travel agencies, airports, and airlines.
Het aantal winkelbezoekers loopt in Europa al jaren terug, vooral in economisch zwakkere regio’s. Dit geldt in het bijzonder voor ouderen, waarvan de verwachting is dat ze in de toekomst fysieke winkels nog meer de rug zullen toekeren. Om de winkelervaring te verbeteren, investeren winkeliers steeds meer in opkomende digitale technologieën zoals apps, interactieve en digitale schermen, sociale robots en zelfscankassa’s. Deze instore technologieën slaan vooral bij jongere klanten aan, oudere klanten blijken door hun beperkingen (o.a. zien, horen, mobiliteit, informatieverwerking en digitale vaardigheden) nog steeds veel barrières te ervaren bij het bezoek aan winkels en het gebruik van instore technologieën. Dit is niet alleen nadelig voor winkeliers omdat ouderen een substantieel, stijgend, en koopkrachtig deel van de bevolking vertegenwoordigen dat relatief trouw is aan regionale winkelgebieden, maar het zet ook de inclusie van ouderen in Europa onder druk omdat winkelbezoek bijdraagt aan hun sociale welbevinden. Met dit onderzoeksproject onderzoekt het nieuwe consortium van twee hogescholen en drie buitenlandse universiteiten hoe instore technologieën ouderen in Europa kunnen helpen bij het wegnemen van barrières om tot een goede winkelervaring te komen. Het project brengt de onderzoeksprogramma’s van het lectorenplatform Retail Innovation Platform (Hogeschool van Amsterdam, Hogeschool Saxion), de Retail en Marketingtechnologie groep (University of Bristol), de human-computer interaction groep (University of Calabria), en de engaging co-design research group (Aalto University) samen. Het project sluit aan bij nationale en Europese initiatieven zoals de Kennis- en Innovatieagenda Sleuteltechnologieën 2024-2027, The DIGITAL Europe Programme en de Strategy for the rights of persons with disabilities 2021-2030. Door de relaties tussen ouderen, opkomende digitale technologie, en winkelgedrag over verschillende Europese regio’s te onderzoeken, sluit het project tevens aan bij Interreg Europa en het Europees Fonds voor Regionale Ontwikkeling.
