Postgraduate Course: Human Rights and Conflict Resolution (LAWS11318)
Course Outline
| School | School of Law | 
College | College of Arts, Humanities and Social Sciences | 
 
| Credit level (Normal year taken) | SCQF Level 11 (Postgraduate) | 
Availability | Not available to visiting students | 
 
| SCQF Credits | 20 | 
ECTS Credits | 10 | 
 
 
| Summary | The course will examine the ways in which mediated peace agreements have interfaced with international human rights law. In particular, the course will examine whether and how international human rights law governs and constrains the negotiation of settlements aimed at ending intra-state conflict.  
 | 
 
| Course description | 
    
    The course will be delivered as a series of seminars that will cover the following topics: 
 
Week 1: Introduction to human rights and conflict resolution 
Week 2: Peace agreements as legal and political texts 
Week 3: Areas of international law - human rights, humanitarian, and criminal 
Week 4: How peace agreements fit with international law on self-determination 
Week 5: Power-sharing and conflict resolution 
Week 6: Gender justice and peace processes 
Week 7: Architecture of peacekeeping and peacebuilding 
Week 8: Amnesty and the justice v peace debate 
Week 9: Transitional justice mechanisms 
Week 10: Peace process simulation
    
    
 | 
 
 
Entry Requirements (not applicable to Visiting Students)
| Pre-requisites | 
 | 
Co-requisites |  | 
 
| Prohibited Combinations |  | 
Other requirements |  None | 
 
| Additional Costs |  printing and photocopying of materials for own use | 
 
 
Course Delivery Information
 |  
| Academic year 2024/25, Not available to visiting students (SS1) 
  
 | 
Quota:  33 | 
 
| Course Start | 
Semester 1 | 
 
Timetable  | 
	
Timetable | 
| Learning and Teaching activities (Further Info) | 
 
 Total Hours:
200
(
 Seminar/Tutorial Hours 20,
 Programme Level Learning and Teaching Hours 4,
Directed Learning and Independent Learning Hours
176 )
 | 
 
| Assessment (Further Info) | 
 
  Written Exam
0 %,
Coursework
100 %,
Practical Exam
0 %
 | 
 
 
| Additional Information (Assessment) | 
This course will be assessed by a 1000-word outline of the essay (25%) and the 4000-word essay (75%). | 
 
| Feedback | 
Feedback on the formative assessment may be provided in various formats, for example, to include written, oral, video, face-to-face, whole class, or individual. The course organiser will decide which format is most appropriate in relation to the nature of the assessment. 
 
Feedback on both formative and summative in-course assessed work will be provided in time to be of use in subsequent assessments within the course. 
 
Feedback on the summative assessment will be provided in written form via Learn, the University of Edinburgh's Virtual Learning Environment (VLE). | 
 
| No Exam Information | 
 
Learning Outcomes 
    On completion of this course, the student will be able to:
    
        - Identify the contested areas of peace negotiations in protracted social conflict;
 - Understand the relationship between moral and political arguments over how to end conflict, and legal arguments over the requirements of human rights law;
 - Demonstrate knowledge of the new mechanisms which have been generated to deal with tensions between the political constraints on mediation peace and the legal demands of human rights law;
 - Understand arguments about the relationship between the various international legal regimes which apply during transitions from conflict;
 - Demonstrate knowledge of the relevant human rights standards relating to power-sharing, gender, refugees and displaced persons, and third party accountability, in conflict and post-conflict settings.
 
     
 | 
 
 
Additional Information
| Graduate Attributes and Skills | 
» Knowledge of human rights law. 
» Knowledge of specialist regimes applying in situations of conflict. 
» Ability to apply human rights law to complex fact patterns. 
» Ability to argue with respect to how far human rights law should be attenuated to reflect complex local circumstances. 
» Capacity to engage with multi-disciplinary materials. | 
 
| Keywords | Human Rights,Conflict Resolution,Peace,Politics,Social Conflict,Postgraduate,LLM,Level 11 | 
 
 
Contacts 
| Course organiser | Dr Kathryn Nash 
Tel: (0131 6)50 2008 
Email:  | 
Course secretary | Ms Susanna Wickes 
Tel:  
Email:  | 
   
 
 |    
 
  
  
  
  
 |