Race and Indigeneity
We seek to engage honestly with the ways racism shapes and reshapes the law — so that human rights law may be an avenue for overcoming racial inequality and further promoting human dignity.
Advancing Indigenous Housing Rights in Los Angeles: International Best Practices and a Legal Framework
We’re excited to join the Los Angeles City/County Native American Indian Commission in announcing the release of a pivotal new report authored by our Human Rights in Action Clinic students, led by Prof. Joseph Berra.
Los Angeles County is home to the largest population of American Indians and Alaska Natives in the United States, and due to the legacy of systemic racism and genocide, this population endures disproportionate homelessness – a risk that is increasing with each passing year.
This report presents and analyzes frameworks for the advancement of the rights of Indigenous people experiencing homelessness; frameworks that are applicable in places like Los Angeles County. It contains a human rights framework (predominantly drawn from the United Nations Declaration of the Rights of Indigenous Peoples) and real-world examples for the advancement of Indigenous rights from other settler-colonial societies with large Indigenous populations, such as New Zealand and Canada as well as practical examples within the United States.
Indigenous Land Defenders of Brazil: In Memoriam (2019-2022)
Our November 2023 report looks at the deaths of thirteen Indigenous leaders along with emerging regions of risk in Brazil, and is unique in the way that it maps the threat Indigenous land defenders face as they stand up to extractivists.
The Promise Institute Assistant Director and head of our Digital Investigations Lab, Prof. Jess Peake noted “The report is a powerful advocacy tool which highlights a small fraction of the deaths of Indigenous Peoples in Brazil, many of which remain otherwise invisible to outside communities.”
Race & Human Rights Reimagined Initiative
Bringing together our expertise in human rights, Critical Race Theory and Third World Approaches to International Law, we strive to uncover how race and empire operate within the international human rights system.
We’re also exploring the potential of law to dismantle national and trans-national structures of racial and colonial subordination.
Supporting Indigenous Land Defenders
The violence against Indigenous land defenders is as pervasive as it is shocking. Through our Reimagining Rights in the Americas Project, we are helping a number of Central American communities protect their environment.
Human Rights in the Courts
The Human Rights Litigation Clinic is the engine driving our domestic human rights litigation. From fighting corporate sanctioning of torture and slavery in the Global South, and tech collaboration with repressive regimes, to the racially entangled issues of homelessness and for-profit-detention, the Clinic’s cases each work to expand domestic understanding and protection of human rights.
Clinic DetailsCritical Perspectives on Race and Human Rights
Our 2019 Symposium situated human rights law between global racial justice conversations including Critical Race Theory and Third World Approaches to International Law.