Spotlight on….The Oxford Human Rights Hub

The guiding principle of the Oxford Human Rights Hub is that by sharing knowledge and best practice of human rights, we can advance human rights everywhere. Through our lively and interactive website, we bring together human rights practitioners, researchers and policy-makers to share cutting-edge new human rights law developments from across the globe. The OxHRHub is a collaborative space. Our blogs, published daily, are written by contributors from numerous different countries, and edited to a high standard by our student editors. Blogs are less than 700 words and written in straightforward language, ensuring that each post is intellectually engaging and accessible to legal and non-legal audiences. It is also a democratic space: our authors range from senior academics, lawyers and UN Special Rapporteurs, to young researchers, NGOs, and students.

But we are not limited to written analyses. Our podcasts showcase interviews with leading human rights lawyers on key issues, whether it is Black Lives Matter, the impact of Covid on human rights, or the death penalty in India. Our podcasts are very popular, attracting tens of thousands of listens.

Added to this, we are committed to dissolving the walls of the classroom in Oxford and reaching beyond, creating video interactions through themed conversations between human rights practitioners facing the same challenges in different locations. Most recently, we partnered with the World Health Organization to create a video series on sexual health and reproductive rights, which is promoted worldwide by the WHO. Our stunning follow-up series brings together experts from countries as far afield as Mexico, Brazil, South Africa, India, Poland, the UK, the US, Kenya, Ghana and the Philippines to share best practice of using human rights to achieve the SDG goals on reproductive justice.

Central to our commitment to providing high quality legal materials is our academic journal. Unlike other journals, which are behind pay-walls and inaccessible to all but the best resourced universities, the University of Oxford Human Rights Hub Journal (U OxHRH J) features peer reviewed articles free online.

And we contribute actively through submissions to legislatures and UN bodies, many of which have been cited and relied on.

The result is an organic development of comparative human rights law. Our new website, launched this month, has multiple pathways into our rich archive. If you’re interested in free speech, education, health, equality, or any other right, you will easily find a host of contributions from everywhere in the world. Or you can follow the interactive map on our website, which takes you to all of our materials from any of the countries we cover.

We are a global presence. Our students leave Oxford but do not leave the Hub. They keep writing for us and disseminating our work. Our materials have impact: our blogs and submissions are cited in courts and reports. Our small team, under the leadership of Professor Sandra Fredman in the law faculty, works on a very small budget and a great deal of energy and imagination. We hope you will visit our website and join our community.