Comments on Bahey eldin Hassan’s ‘Defending Human Rights in the Time of COVID-19’

Eberhard Kienle (1)

1 CERI - Centre de recherches internationales (Sciences Po, CNRS)

In a recent contribution, Bahey eldin Hassan discusses three broad dynamics that alone or in partial combination could shape global affairs and therefore human rights work in the (post-) COVID-19 period: the further slow erosion of the international order and its mechanisms of cooperation and conflict resolution such as the United Nations; the definite demise of this order including the states on which it partly rests; and its renovation to better translate into reality past promises of peace, cooperation, freedom, and equity. Based on a clear preference for the third scenario, the following pages address the conditions and dynamics likely to affect future human rights work. A brief account of recent events will show that the pandemic compounded rather than created obstacles and difficulties...

Keywords: Covid-19; Bahey eldin Hassan; Human Rights; authoritarianism; MENA

Domains: Humanities and Social Sciences; Political science

Eberhard Kienle. Comments on Bahey eldin Hassan’s ‘Defending Human Rights in the Time of COVID-19’. Rowaq Arabi, 2020, The Influence of Covid-19 on the Already Vulnerable Rights and Freedoms in the MENA Region, 25 (4), pp.65-72. ⟨hal-03079599⟩