History

This year the Colloquium completes its tenth year!

The event, created in São Paulo in 2001 and held annually, has been a training and networking opportunity for human rights activists and scholars. The event takes place wholly in three languages (English, Portuguese, and Spanish) and promotes spaces of dialogue between different work agendas of the human rights movement. The gatherings have brought together, as of today, over 600 activists and scholars from 53 countries in Latin America, Africa and Asia.

During its first three years, the Colloquium was organized by the Human Rights University Consortium – a cooperation agreement between the Pontifical Catholic University of São Paulo, the University of São Paulo (PUC-SP), and Columbia University - New York.

Since the IVth Colloquium, the event has been conceived and organized by Conectas Human Rights (www.conectas.org) together with SUR - Human Rights University Network.

How to continue working together after the Colloquium?

The HRDialogue Network is a network of human rights activists and professionals from the Global South (Africa, Asia and Latin America) who have participated in the International Human Rights Colloquium and who seek to:

"Strengthen the voice and impact of human rights advocates from the Global South by exchanging experiences and supportively collaborating between its members."

Members promote ongoing dialogue, exchange experiences and act to:

• Enhance activities and capabilities of human rights advocates
• Strengthen the impact of human rights organizations
• Stimulate collaborative action and articulation in the Global South

Evaluation of the Colloquium:

Every year, Conectas has carried out evaluations with the participants of the Colloquium during and after the event and has taken the results into consideration for the implementation of changes and improvements in its format and content.

The IX Colloquium, held last year, gathered together participants from all of the Colloquia and carried out an evaluation of the previous eight editions. The participants made a very positive evaluation of the Colloquium, made concrete comments suggesting activities for upcoming editions and recommended that Conectas continue working in order to create an instrument for measuring the impact of the event within the human rights movement.

Some comments from the participants of the IX Colloquium:

Carlo Cleofe, Task force Detainees of the Philippines, Philippines:
The Colloquium experience really was actually the kick start of our own international work. Because of that we established networks, because of that we thought of making our work serious about international work. And because of experiences we saw, I saw my work on a different context with all of the experiences of others. So that’s very positive. (…)
María Esther Mogollón, Broad Women’s Movement, Foundational Line, Perú:
The Colloquium brings us closer to scholars and experts from the United Nations and other organizations; it brings us closer to people in flesh and blood who, before, we had only known by their name or texts somehow.
Enrique Gauto, Paraguayan Society for Human Sexuality Studies, Paraguay
For me, the Colloquium broadened my view of many aspects in the area of human rights. Aspects related to human rights that one already knew, in a declaratory way, acquired a more specific and more in-depth character. Thus, I think that the Colloquium has very interesting potential for constituting a space for exploring new topics of human rights and to propose how issues that don’t habitually enter into the sphere of human rights can be addressed and understood within this vision.

The presentation of photos from 2009 edition.