Human Rights in the Mediterranean

The current approach to migration across the Mediterranean and to sea rescue initiatives reveals the externalization of borders. It also highlights weaknesses in international law and human rights: the Mediterranean has become a mass grave.

As part of the Digital Lecture Series, international law expert Itamar Mann will discuss legal, political, and ethical issues still associated with this migration movement today with journalist Dinah Riese (taz). Drawing on a historical perspective of Jewish migration to Palestine, Vietnamese boat people, and Syrian refugees since 2015, he develops, with Hannah Arendt and Emmanuel Levinas, the utopian concept of a “right of encounter.”

The Digital Lecture Series

Human Rights as the Last Utopia? Migration and Jewish History reflects on the history, present, and future of human rights. Against the backdrop of Jewish migration history, five scholars, together with journalist Dinah Riese, examine the developments in international refugee protection from diverse perspectives.

In doing so, they highlight historical achievements that are increasingly being called into question today. Which experiences from the past and which legal or philosophical perspectives can help us transcend current limitations in thinking about migration? And where can we find approaches for a more open future in the here and now?

Itamar Mann

Itamar Mann is a professor of international law at the University of Haifa (on leave) and a visiting professor at the Faculty of Law at the University of Münster. His work spans legal doctrine, theory, and history.

His research focuses on maritime law, migration and refugee law, international criminal law, and the conceptual foundations of legal responsibility in crisis situations. In addition to his academic research, Mann is deeply committed to human rights. He is president of Border Forensics, an interdisciplinary collective that addresses violence at borders and state accountability.

He is currently working on his second book, *Liferaft Manifesto: Democratic Survivalism and the Sea*, in which he examines how democratic principles can be preserved under the conditions of climate change and mass displacement.

Dinah Riese

Dinah Riese heads the domestic affairs desk at taz. Prior to that, she was an editor there covering migration and integration. She has received multiple awards for her research and reporting on the so-called ban on abortion advertising, Section 219a of the German Criminal Code (StGB). Her interview with survivors of the attack in Halle was nominated for the Reporter Award. In March 2022, she co-authored the book *Selbstbestimmt. Für reproduktive Rechte* (Self-Determined: For Reproductive Rights) with Gesine Agena and Patricia Hecht, published by Klaus Wagenbach.

Supported by the Berthold Leibinger Foundation

IN ENGLISH