Global Campus Open Knowledge Repository

Our Open Knowledge Repository is a digital service that collects, preserves, and distributes all digital materials resulting from the rich and varied production of the Global Campus of Human Rights. It is an ever growing collection which aims to give visibility to our research outputs, educational content, and multimedia materials; sustain open access for knowledge transfer; and foster communication within and beyond academia.

 

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Transitional justice and the construction of collective memory. A comparison of the Holocaust and the Rwandan genocide
(2026) Pallagrosi, Chiara; Ferrara, Anita
This thesis examines how transitional justice mechanisms contribute to the production and public legitimation of collective memory in post-genocide societies. To address this question, the research compares two well-documented cases of twentieth-century genocide, the Holocaust and the Rwandan genocide, in which radically different transitional justice mechanisms were adopted. The comparative analysis demonstrates that such mechanisms shape different regimes of collective memory, while also revealing common structural patterns. In both cases, processes of memorialisation were marked by exclusion and selectivity, with official narratives reflecting the interests of dominant political actors and systematically excluding uncomfortable aspects of their own past. The research further shows that, once institutionalised, collective memory tends to become a political resource mobilised to legitimise power and shape collective identities. At the same time, competing memories persist at the margins of the official narrative, resisting complete suppression. This thesis therefore concludes that the challenge facing post-conflict societies is not to replace oblivion with a single authoritative memory, but to preserve the coexistence of competing memories while preventing any one of them from monopolising public understanding of the past. Keywords: Transitional Justice; Collective Memory; Comparative Analysis; Holocaust; Rwandan Genocide; Post-Conflict Societies; Memory Politics.
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In loving memory of Giorgio and Antonio: state inaction as active violence. Italy’s compliance with its positive obligations under the European Convention on Human Rights regarding LGBTQIA+ protection from hate crimes: the national context and the case of Sicily
(2026) Orlandi, Andrea Antonio; Farkas, Lilla
This dissertation examines whether and why the Italian State has failed to protect its queer citizens from institutionalized-violence-supported hate crimes, and asks whether it bears a heightened responsibility to do so in Sicily. Through a sociolegal, mixed-methods approach, it combines doctrinal analysis of the POs arising under the ECHR with qualitative research consisting of sixteen semi-structured interviews with activists, civil society representatives, jurists, and academics engaged with LGBTQIA+ rights in Italy and beyond. As per Sicily, the thesis contends that economic underdevelopment, the continued influence of organized crime, and anti-Southern prejudice foster conditions of heightened vulnerability. The assessment sets Italy’s record against the tripartite structure of the State’s POs, encompassing the requirement to put in place an adequate legislative framework, to take operational measures against known risks, and to investigate effectively, unmasking any discriminatory motive. The findings argue that the deliberate exclusion of SOGI from Italian hate crime law leaves anti-queer violence processed as ordinary crimes, disables proactive risk assessment, and limits the investigation of bias failings the State knew of, contributed to, and could have remedied, but has insufficiently tackled largely due to lack of political will. For Sicily, measures of protection and recognition need to take into consideration structural, state-attributable conditions when providing the tailored measures it owes. The overarching conclusion obtained entails that Italy's protective failures amount not to neutral inaction but to active violence, therefore State complicity to hate crimes; throughout the thesis, this claim is grounded in the memory of two Sicilian martyrs of mafia-backed anti-queer violence and forefathers of the Italian queer movement: Giorgio and Antonio. Contains references and explicit remarks on homotransphobia discrimination, derogatory language, physical aggression, sexual violence, murder, and suicide. KEYWORDS: hate crimes; LGBTQIA+; positive obligations; Sicily; ECtHR.
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Restrictive migration strategies: a study of externalization taxonomy of policies and impacts on protection seekers and analysis of the Italy-Albania agreement
(2026) Ohanian, Natalia; De Stefani, Paolo
In recent years, the externalization of migration management has become an increasingly common practice among Global North states seeking to manage migration flows by relocating aspects of their responsibility for processing asylum claims beyond their territory. Despite its growing relevance, there is no consensus definition of the term. Moreover, the concept is primarily discussed in academic literature, the media, reports by non-governmental organizations, and some international organizations. It is notably absent from governmental discourse and is not formally recognized in either international or domestic legislation, making the phenomenon particularly difficult to define and study. This thesis addresses this conceptual gap by reviewing the existing literature on externalization with the aim of developing a comprehensive and operational definition of the concept. It then assesses whether Italy’s recent attempts to carry out asylum procedures in Albania constitutes or not a form of externalization, by applying the proposed framework to the Italy–Albania Agreement signed in 2023 to determine if it can be classified as an externalization measure. The findings of this research are twofold. First, the study develops a comprehensive and practical framework for conceptualizing migration externalization. Second, the analysis demonstrates that the Italy–Albania Agreement can indeed be classified as a form of externalization, although it represents a novel variation of the concept. Two distinctive features characterize this model: the instrumentalization of the Safe Country of Origin concept as a filtering and non-entry mechanism, and the reliance on an ambiguous legal framework that weakens procedural safeguards and creates conditions that may ultimately jeopardize substantive rights, including the right to seek asylum. Key words: Externalization, legal responsibility, asylum processing, Italy-Albania Agreement, safe country of origin, procedural rights.
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Ecstatic profits. A socio-legal analysis of the commodification of indigenous peoples’ knowledge in the era of the ‘psychedelic renaissance’
(2026) Nyländen, Helene; Kuppe, René
Western biomedicine is currently witnessing the peak of the second wave of psychedelic science. Due to the re-establishment of system-supported experimentation, increased state and private funding, legislative momentum, and cultural normalisation, this new phenomenon has gained itself a name reflecting its notable comeback – the psychedelic renaissance. But much like the historical Renaissance did not happen in a vacuum, neither does the contemporary one. Although academic and legal debates extensively address clinical trials from the biomedical perspective, they largely neglect the socio-legal consequences that this commercialisation imposes on Indigenous peoples who possess centuries-old wisdom regarding practices involving psychedelic plants. The following study aims to identify the extent to which the commercialisation of psychedelic-assisted therapies exploits the regulatory gaps between international access and benefit-sharing (ABS) frameworks and intellectual property law. Additionally, this thesis examines what the economic, social, and cultural implications of said commercialisation are for Indigenous communities’ self-determination. For this purpose, the thesis employs a qualitative, socio-legal lens that combines a doctrinal analysis of legal instruments with a critical evaluation of policy documents and Indigenous position papers. The study concludes that due to the highly imbalanced intellectual property regime and the administration-oriented, passive ABS mechanisms, the economic, social, and cultural self-determination of Indigenous peoples is weakened. The thesis also provides concrete policy proposals regarding the expected decriminalisation of psychedelic substances and the unfolding of the ‘psychedelic renaissance’. Key words: Indigenous knowledge, Indigenous rights, psychedelic renaissance, intellectual property rights, patent law, access and benefit sharing, biotechnology
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From ‘la ghalib wa la maghloob’* to the right to truth: enforced disappearances, state amnesia and the unsilenced families of Lebanon's disappeared. *no victor, no vanquished
(2026) Nuran Yüksel, Dijan; Yabancı, Bilge
Lebanon's 1975–1990 civil war left behind an estimated 17,415 persons missing and forcibly disappeared. Successive governments have denied the families of these victims the right to truth and justice for decades. In pursuit of the principle of 'la ghalib wa la maghloob' ('no victor, no vanquished'), the Lebanese state declared a blanket amnesty in 1991, thereby precluding any genuine transitional justice process and imposing a culture of impunity. This thesis explores the nexus between international human rights law, transitional justice, and psychosocial consequences of enforced disappearances experienced by the families of missing and forcibly disappeared persons in Lebanon. The thesis raises two main arguments. First, analysing Lebanon's international obligations under several treaties, including the ICCPR, the ICESCR, the CAT, and the ICPPED, it critically assesses the effectiveness of the first Lebanese law on missing and forcibly disappeared persons, Law No. 105/2018, which grants families the right to know the fate of their missing relatives. Based on doctrinal legal analysis, qualitative literature review, and interviews with experts, the thesis concludes that Law No. 105/2018 was a major milestone for Lebanon's legal system; its implementation has nevertheless been greatly hindered by the ongoing lack of political will and the country’s regional and domestic challenges. Second, drawing on Pauline Boss’ theory of ambiguous loss, this thesis argues that legal failures by the state have created profound psychological and social consequences for families, manifesting as ongoing, unresolved grief that permeates many aspects of their daily lives. State-sponsored amnesia in Lebanon not only breaches its international obligations but also continues to cause families who have never received reparations, rehabilitation, or the truth about their loved ones to suffer long after the civil war has ended. 2