Of Rights Without Guarantees: Friction at the Borders of Nations, Digital Spaces, and Classrooms

This essay details the development of The Twiza Project, an initiative designed to allow students in the United States and Algeria to engage in on-line dialogues on issues such as human rights and democracy. At a time when there is a global crisis in democratic institutions, the goal was to enable students to collaboratively develop frameworks and responses which would address the crises of their specific contexts. It soon became clear, however, that while “social media” might allow terms, such as “human rights,” to circulate back and forth in their conversations, when embedded in the materiality of their lives these same terms seem to lead to unavoidable conflicts amongst them. It is out of such conflicts, out of such contradictions, we argue, that new democratic strategies and human rights practices much emerge.