By Han Dayuan

The Ministry of Education and the State Council Information Office have named Renmin University of China as one of the human rights national education and training bases. This shows the full affirmation and trust in the university’s education, research and training work and also represents encouragement for its future work.

Establishing national human rights education and training bases at institutions of higher learning is an important measure for implementing the National Human Rights Action Plan and pushing forward the construction of the rule of law. The approval of the university as one of the bases will be conducive to promoting human rights education and academic construction, building an exchange platform for human rights education and research, sharing research results in the field, constructing a shared social conscience that values human rights, and safeguarding the mainstream values of the society. We are going to live up to expectations of the Ministry of Education, the State Council Information Office and the China Society for Human Rights Studies, creating good conditions for developing the base, making more efforts in academic construction, research team building, student training and social training, building the base at the university into a talent base and a research platform, continuously performing the base’s policy consultation and social service roles, and contributing more to the development of human rights education in China.

The Human Rights Education and Training Center at Renmin University of China, in accordance with the targets set forth in the National Human Rights Action Plan, plans to focus on the following four areas.

First, in the area of human rights education, the university will improve its second-tier discipline of human rights law, enrolling students for advanced degrees in human rights law, and offering general education on human rights to bachelor’s degree students in order to popularize human rights knowledge. The university will satisfy the demands of social development in China by creating new human rights courses. For example, in order to further the development of the cause of the disabled in China and respond to rising calls for protecting the rights of the disabled, the university, in cooperation with Harvard University, jointly offers a video course, “Rights Clinics for the Disabled.” The university collaborated with the European Court of Human Rights this year, inviting European judges to teach the court’s classic cases. The university is also going to offer courses such as Commerce and Human Rights, Environment and Human Rights, and Food Safety and Human Rights.

Second, regarding human rights research, the university will deeply study the human rights theory system with Chinese characteristics, systematically exploring the theoretical system, specific content and topics including the rights to existence and development, and summarizing the China experience in human rights theory and practice. The university will stick to multidisciplinary research methodologies, emphasizing both theoretical research and applied research with practical solutions. A series of research studies on economic, social and cultural rights will also be conducted, with a current focus on the rights to food safety and social security, which will be further expanded to include research on other economic, social and cultural rights.

Third, regarding human rights training, the university will provide training on various human rights topics to various groups, such as government officials, judges, prosecutors and religious workers, in a bid to increase their human rights awareness.

Fourth, regarding international exchange, the university will expand international cooperation and exchange in the human rights field, continuing to work with the United Nations human rights agencies, the European Court of Human Rights, and human rights research institutions at universities on human rights dialogues and cooperative research. The university will expand its partnership to new collaborators such as human rights research institutions in Asia and Africa, jointly planning new topics for human rights research and education, which will be a new boost to international human rights development.

Human rights education, research and training are a lofty social responsibility for a university, particularly a law school and are significant to the construction of the rule of law and maintenance of peace in human society. We should work hard to live up to the expectations of the whole society and build the base at the university into a first-rate platform for the country.

(This is a speech by Han Dayuan, Dean of the Law School of Renmin University of China, delivered at the ceremony announcing the second group of national human rights education and training bases.)