This June 2025, several German Studies faculty and colleagues from other departments and partner universities will present talks at “Human Rights in the Balance: Safeguarding Social and Environmental Sustainability”, a new Human Rights and Research Consortium conference taking place in Freiburg, Germany:

“On the occasion of its 4th conference, the Connecticut/Baden-Württemberg Human Rights Research Consortium (HRRC) invites its members to gather in person for a two-day conference aimed at grappling with the topic “Human Rights in the Balance: Safeguarding Social and Environmental Sustainability”.

Safeguarding human rights is a perennial challenge, rendered more difficult by growing social polarization, widening inequality, new technological developments, and a deepening environmental crisis. Human rights can inform our understanding of these issues, and should shape our path toward action to address them. This idea of a human-rights based approach is central also to the 17 United Nations Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs) launched in 2015 and to be achieved by 2030, which are a “universal call to action” to improve the lives and prospects of everyone, everywhere.

Acknowledging that human rights are essential to achieving sustainable development, the conference aims to address the following themes:

• The multiple dimensions of sustainable development and human rights: social, economic, and environmental
• “Leaving no one behind” and how human rights function in an unequal world
• The concepts of individual and collective human rights, and their role in paving the way for a sustainable future
• Emerging technologies as a source for good (or bad) in the fulfillment of human rights 
• Pathways to the participation of all nations, all peoples and all segments of society in decision-making towards sustainable development.”

The conference program is available here, and for more information please contact the organizers.