Principled Engagement: Negotiating Human Rights in Repressive States

Morten B. Pedersen is Senior Lecturer in International and Political Studies at the University of New South Wales/Canberra (the Australian Defence Force Academy). He previously worked as Senior Analyst for the International Crisis Group in Myanmar (2001-06), and has held academic positions at the United Nations University in Tokyo and Australian National University. He has also served as a policy advisor for a number of governments and international organisations, including the UN, the World Bank, the European Commission and the Australian Government. His publications include some 40 titles on Burma/Myanmar, international statecraft and human rights, including Promoting Human Rights in Burma: A Critique of Western Sanctions Policies (Rowman & Littlefield, 2008), and (with Anna Magnusson) A “Good Office”? Twenty Years of UN Mediation in Myanmar (New York: International Peace Institute, 2012). He is currently working on a book on the dynamics and prospects of Myanmar’s democratic transition process.

David Kinley holds the Chair in Human Rights Law at the University of Sydney, and is an Academic Panel member of Doughty Street Chambers in London. He has worked for nearly 20 years as a consultant and adviser on international and domestic human rights law in Vietnam, Indonesia, South Africa, Bangladesh, Thailand, Iraq, Nepal, Laos, China, the Pacific Islands, and Myanmar/Burma. He has worked for a wide range of international organizations, including the UN High Commissioner for Human Rights, the World Bank, the Ford Foundation, AusAID, and the Asia Pacific Forum of National Human Rights Institutions, as well as a number of transnational corporations and NGOs. He has also previously worked for three years with the Australian Law Reform Commission and two years with the Australian Human Rights Commission. His recent publications include Civilising Globalisation: Human Rights and the Global Economy (Cambridge University Press, 2009), as well as Corporations and Human Rights (Ashgate, 2009) as editor, and The WTO and Human Rights: Interdisciplinary Perspectives (Edward Elgar 2009), and, Human Rights: Old Problems and New Possibilities (Edward Elgar 2013) as joint editor. He is currently working on two new books: one examining the intersections between global finance and human rights, and the other, a textbook on economic, social and cultural rights.

Morten B. Pedersen, David Kinley, Chris Sidoti, Pierre Gentile, Ann Kent, Richard Horsey, Jolyon Ford, Joel Negin, Justine Nolan, Auret van Heerden, James Cockayne, Mac Darrow.