Newcastle Forum for Human Rights and Social Justice

Members come from, among others, Law, Arts & Culture, History, Business, Geography and Politics. We also have members from Northumbria University.

Our aims

The Forum aims to foster debate within and beyond Newcastle University. We look at concepts of human rights and their place within conceptions of social justice. We examine human rights as a foundation of wider inter-disciplinary social justice research.

The work of the Forum advances understanding of human rights and social justice. That's both within and beyond the United Kingdom.

We contribute to training and knowledge exchange within this important field. The Forum is a member of the Association of Human Rights Institutes (AHRI).

Achieving our aims

We achieve these aims in various ways:

1. Through events such as seminars and lectures with prominent speakers on specific issues. These reflect the teaching and research interests of each member of the Forum. We help with dissemination of knowledge of latest developments on human rights.
2. Through production of high quality teaching and research, reflecting interests of our members. We support critical thinking, academic initiative and freedom of thought.
3. Through the formulation of common teaching and research ideas. We intend to flesh these out with the support of external funding. We organise events which will assist in achieving our aims.

Responses to government consultations

Read our response to the Human Rights Act Reform

Response by the Human Rights and Social Justice Forum to the Human Rights Act Reform: A Modern Bill of Rights Open Consultation [PDF: 531 Kb]

Events 

Ghost of Nationalism in Bosnia

The Newcastle Forum for Human Rights and Social Justice (NFHRSJ) and the Bosnian Genocide Educational Trust invited two experts to speak on the current situation in Bosnia.

Whistleblowing, Human Rights and Social Justice

This event brought together a multidisciplinary panel of experts concerned with whistleblower protections from the fields of law and the social sciences. The workshop focused on the overlapping issues related to whistleblowing, human rights and social justice. These issues are of crucial importance in the development of whistleblower protections, as well as being relevant to the disclosures of whistleblowers who often reveal corruption that is of great significance for promoting both human rights and social justice. 

The speakers included Professor Robert Tibbo (Newcastle University, lawyer for refugee rights and Mr Edward Snowden), Professor Kate Kenny (NUI Galway University), and Professor David Lewis (Head of the Whistleblowing Research Unit at Middlesex University and convenor of the International Whistleblowing Research Network).