Member institutions
AHRI currently consists of 41 member institutions. Please visit their home pages for information about their institutional activities.
- Belgrade Centre for Human Rights, Serbia
- Centre for Human Rights, Central European University, Budapest, Hungary
- Centre for Human Rights, University of Pretoria, South Africa
- Centre for International Human Rights, Institute of Commonwealth Studies and Human Rights Consortium, School of Advanced Study, University of London
- Centre for the Study of Global Ethics, University of Birmingham, UK
- Centre for the Study of Human Rights, London School of Economics and Political Science, UK
- Chr. Michelsen Institute, Norway
- Danish Institute for Human Rights, Denmark
- Erik Castrén Institute of International Law and Human Rights, University of Helsinki, Finland
- European Inter-University Centre for Human Rights and Democratisation, Venice-Lido, Italy
- European Training- and Research Centre for Human Rights and Democracy, Graz, Austria
- German Institute for Human Rights, Germany
- Human Rights and Globalization Research Group, University of Seville, Spain
- Human Rights and Social Justice Research Institute, London Metropolitan University
- Human Rights Centre, University of Essex, UK
- Human Rights Centre, Queen’s University, Belfast, Northern Ireland, UK
- Human Rights Law Centre, University of Nottingham School of Law, UK
- Human Rights Observatory / Observatoire des Droits de l'Homme, University of Luxembourg
- Human Rights Programme at the University of Sydney, Australia
- Newcastle Forum for Human Rights and Social Justice, Newcastle Law School, University of Newcastle, United Kingdom
- Icelandic Human Rights Center, Iceland
- Institute for Human Rights, Faculty of Law, University of Iceland
- Institute for Human Rights, Åbo Akademi University, Finland
- Institute of Human Rights, Catholic University of Leuven, Belgium
- Institute of Human Rights, University of Latvia
- Institute for Minority Rights, European Academy (EURAC) Bozen/Bolzano, Italy
- Interdepartmental Centre on Human Rights and the Rights of Peoples, University of Padua, Italy
- Irish Centre for Human Rights, National University of Ireland, Galway
- Ludwig Boltzmann Institute of Human Rights, Austria
- Maastricht Centre for Human Rights, Maastricht University, Faculty of Law, The Netherlands
- Nansen Center for Peace and Dialogue, Norwegian Humanistic Academy, Lillehammer, Norway
- Netherlands Institute of Human Rights (SIM), University of Utrecht, The Netherlands
- Norwegian Centre for Human Rights, University of Oslo, Norway
- Pedro Arrupe Institute of Human Rights, University of Deusto, Bilbao, Spain
- Poznan Centre for Human Rights, Polish Academy of Sciences
- Raoul Wallenberg Institute of Human Rights and Humanitarian Law, Lund, Sweden
- Swiss Centre of Expertise in Human Rights, Bern, Switzerland
- The Research Group Law and Development, University of Antwerpen, Belgium
- Riga Graduate School of Law, Latvia
- Transitional Justice Institute, University of Ulster, Jordanstown/Magee, UK
- University of Zürich Competence Centre for Human Rights, Switzerland
Contact us
AHRI Secretariat
Executive Secretary: Ms Maria Sommardahl
Email: This email address is being protected from spambots. You need JavaScript enabled to view it.
Postal address:
The Norwegian Centre for Human Rights
P.O Box 6706
St. Olavs plass
0130 OSLO
Norway
About AHRI
The Association of Human Rights Institutes - AHRI, consists of 41 member institutions that carry out research and education in the field of human rights. The objective of AHRI is to promote research, education and discussion in the field of human rights.
AHRI Co-operation Agreement
The AHRI Co-operation Agreement (pdf) was signed in Reykjavik 22 September 2000. Bjarney Friðriksdóttir, former Director of the Icelandic Human Rights Center, was elected as AHRI's first Chair. The Netherlands Institute of Human Rights accepted to host the Secretariat with Peter Malcontent as Executive Secretary.
The Constitution for the Association of Human Rights Institutes (AHRI) was adopted in April 2011.
Secretariat (2009-2011)
The Secretariat is elected for three-year periods, and the present Chair will end its term in 2011.
- Chair, Director Nils A Butenschøn, NCHR
- Executive Secretary Ms Maria Sommardahl, Principal Executive Officer/Research Consultant, NCHR
Executive Committee (2009-2011)
The Executive Committee is elected for three-year periods. The present members will end their term in 2011.
- Manfred Novak (University of Vienna)
- Margot Salomon (London School of Economics)
- Vesna Petrovic (Belgrade Centre for Human Rights)
- William Schabas (Irish Centre for Human Rights)
Funding
AHRI's main source of funding is through COST (European Cooperation in Science and Technology). COST is one of the longest-running European instruments supporting cooperation among scientists and researchers across Europe.
Today several AHRI member institutions participate in the COST project The Role of the EU in UN Human Rights Reform. See the Activities section for more details about this project.
Strengthening human rights as an academic field
The initiation of AHRI was motivated by the growing number of human rights institutions with a research agenda and the opportunity this created for developing and strengthening human rights as an academic field of study. The main purposes of the association are to coordinate research projects and applications for research funding, and organise seminars and conferences.
Several AHRI member institutions participated in the COST funded academic programme Human Rights, Peace and Security in EU Foreign Policy. This project's main objective was to increase and deepen knowledge on the functions of national and international instruments devised to pursue human rights, peace and security objectives in order to recommend modifications of the foreign policy of the European Union.
Founding history
AHRI was established in 2000 at a founding meeting in Iceland hosted by the Icelandic Human Rights Centre.
All active European academic human rights institutes were invited to join and the following founding members met in Iceland:
- Norwegian Centre for Human Rights (NCHR), Faculty of Law, University of Oslo
- Institute for Human Rights at Åbo Akademi University
- Raoul Wallenberg Institute of Human Rights and Humanitarian Law
- Danish Institute for Human Rights
- Icelandic Human Rights Center
- Netherlands Institute of Human Rights (SIM)
- Ludwig Boltzmann Institute of Human Rights
Activities
The Association of Human Rights Institutes(AHRI) is involved in three types of activites:
- Annual AHRI conference
- Assembly meeting during the AHRI conference
- Working groups for the COST Action participation
Annual AHRI conference
The AHRI conference is where members and other interested parties within the human rights field gather to work on current issues in defined research areas.
Assembly meeting
The assembly meeting is held during the annual conference. Minutes from the assembly meeting are published on the conference pages.
Working groups for the COST Action participation
The COST Actions enables AHRI members to co-operate on research topics of common interest. AHRI is currently involved in the COST Action IS0702.
COST is one of the longest-running European instruments supporting cooperation among scientists and researchers across Europe. It is supported by the EU RTD Framework Programme.
COST Action IS0702: The Role of the EU in UN Human Rights Reform
The main objective of the Action is to increase and consolidate knowledge of the ongoing process of institutional, structural, and procedural reforms of the United Nations human rights system, so as to recommend standpoints for the European Union in this process working towards strengthening the protection of human rights world-wide.
Previous COST Action participation
AHRI participated in the COST project A28: Human Rights, Peace and Security in EU Foreign Policy.
The main objective of the Action was to increase and deepen knowledge on the functioning of national and international instruments devised to pursue human rights, peace and security objectives in order to recommend modifications of the foreign policy of the European Union.