China needs more human rights education
- By Zhu Liyu
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E-mail China.org.cn, January 13, 2015
"China will encourage and promote the publicity of human rights knowledge in enterprises and public institutions, and develop corporate cultures that honor and protect human rights.
"China will encourage the dissemination of human rights knowledge via the media. It will enhance human rights awareness among the whole populace to create an atmosphere of public opinion that human rights is emphasized by all.
"China will give full play to the role of national human rights education and training bases. By 2015, at least five new such bases will be opened."
Reviewing the National Human Rights Action Plan of China (2012-2015) now, the tasks appointed by the plan have been accomplished ahead of schedule. The Ministry of Education and the Information Office of the State Council have organized experts to examine and evaluate the building of human rights education and training bases and finally approved human rights research centers to be established in Renmin University, Fudan University, Wuhan University, Shandong University, and Southwest University of Political Science & Law as national human rights education and training bases. There are eight such bases in total in China if these three, which were established in Nankai University, China University of Political Science and Law and Guangzhou University under the 2009-2010 action plan, are counted. The bases cover north, east, south and southwest China and will effectively ensure human rights education and training nationwide. But there are no bases in the northeast and northwest regions, so the new bases should be established during the 2012-2015 plan and later new plans in the future.
The bases' major tasks are integrating talents, courses, research and the infrastructure of universities and colleges, and then promoting education and training, research and social services, compiling teaching textbooks and organizing training for teachers and the public, as well as providing consultation for society and government departments regularly to push forward the development of China's human rights causes and promote exchanges and cooperation among international communities in the human rights domain.
I have to note that the current eight national bases are developed from original human rights research centers that once only belonged to the universities themselves. In the future, they should not only strengthen human rights theory research, but also pay more attention to human rights education and training targeting the whole of society, because the spread of human rights consciousness will take long-term and constant efforts.
Human rights education is not only a process of promoting the laws, but also a process of enlightenment. It should focus more on the establishment of the concept and culture. From this, we can also see that human rights education is not just the right to have education, human rights education itself is a human right. For an individual, human rights education does not just provide information, but also educate people for a long time and even a whole lifetime. Everyone will learn tolerance and how to respect others' dignity, and learn approaches and measures by which to ensure such respect.
The writer is deputy director of the Human Rights Research Center, Renmin University of China.
The article was written in Chinese and translated by Zhang Rui.
Opinion articles reflect the views of their authors, not necessarily those of China.org.cn.
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