Human Rights, Environmental Justice, Social Justice, Faith Values and Ethics: Building Stronger Partnerships for the Common Good by Understanding the Differences

Partnerships between human rights practitioners, local communities, scientists, engineers, and health professionals have shown potential to address deeply rooted, systemic human rights concerns. These collaborations are essential for achieving the UN Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs), and for engaging the perspectives and expertise of all constituents. However, even when the individuals in these partnerships or the organizations they represent have common goals, their motivations, analyses, and solutions often come from different perspectives. Members of good will can inadvertently alienate one another when attempting to work together. The fields of human rights, social justice, environmental justice, and ethics have each developed their own language, frameworks, and movements independent of each other. There are many synergies, but also important differences such as in the approaches, level at which they are applied (from the individual or local to global) and the resources available. Successful partnership building will also be enhanced by respecting the influences of culture (including faith communities) and other social movements. In order to work together more effectively and to have the impacts we want to see on both human rights and sustainability, we must understand the similarities and distinctions between the movements and their applications to achieve global goals. In this panel we will explore the histories of these movements as they apply to the complementarity and potential for collaboration at the intersection of human rights and environmental sustainability. Four panelists will share perspectives, success stories, challenges and hopes from each of their vantages. a) Human Rights & Science/Engineering (Theresa Harris - AAAS) b) Environmental Justice/SDGs, Ecologists and Faith Communities (Leanne Jablonski - Ecological Society of America & UD HSI) c) Union of Concerned Scientists - Community Partnerships/practitioners with Scientists on climate justice/sustainability issues (Melissa Varga, Union of Concerned Scientists) d) Engineering and Technology: Challenges from International Practice (Malcolm Daniels, ETHOS Center, University of Dayton