Justice for all

So…I’m graduating tomorrow! And I suppose that means that I need to write an obligatory blog post reflecting on my college years. As I sit in my bedroom packing all my belongings into two suitcases and two boxes (yet again), I can’t help but look back on the person I was when I stepped foot on Northwestern’s beautiful campus. I’ve changed and grown immensely in the past 4 years, and while I may never be fully content or satisfied with myself, I do think I’m proud of the woman I’ve transformed into through the course of my college experience.

And transformed, I think, is certainly the right word. As a freshman, I was shy, almost painfully so. I even tried to avoid taking discussion-based classes because I knew I’d be too afraid to open my mouth and contribute. I was also utterly confused about my professional interests and future career path. At first I chose to major in Mathematical Methods in the Social Sciences (MMSS), a program that was essentially an accelerated math and economics-focused major. I quickly realized it wasn’t right for me, and decided to take a political science class instead - Law in the Political Arena. I fell in love, and changed my majors to Political Science and Economics. Professionally, I tried to pursue finance at first - like every other clueless Economics major - but eventually realized that wasn’t my passion. While I’d always enjoyed volunteering, I’d never truly analyzed this impulse, nor had I realized that one could work full-time for a non-profit. This awareness, too, came with time.

While the classes I took certainly helped me discover what I wanted to pursue for my future career, I think I learned far more out of class. I took advantage of so many opportunities on and off campus. I reported for The Daily Northwestern, joined student volunteerism groups like OASIS, LIFT, and Campus Kitchens, studied abroad in London, traveled across Europe, attended trials in the Hague with the ICC Student Network, helped start a student-run microfinance and development institute, interned in New York, Geneva, and Chicago for human rights non-profits, lead our university’s chapter of Amnesty International, and wrote a Political Science senior thesis on international justice and reconciliation in Rwanda and Sierra Leone. In the past couple of years, I think I’ve learned as much (if not more) from blogging and tweeting, than from all my other more ‘formal’ extracurriculars put together!

The lesson I can impart is that what you do outside the classroom is truly what defines you. You can have academic debates all you want, but it is through student groups that you learn how to work as part of a team and how to manage others. It is through individual research experiences that you learn to choose and define your own research question, collect your own data, and come to your own conclusions. It is through your study abroad semester or year that you broaden your mindset, adopt new viewpoints, and dramatically expand your understanding of different cultures and the world as a whole. It is through summer internships that you discover your passion for a specific field (or lack thereof), learn the skills needed to succeed professionally, and embark on a fulfilling career path. I’ve learned so much from my involvement outside the classroom - particularly regarding what I wanted from my future career - and I only wish I had done even more!

People often say that a liberal arts education is simply not worth it - that it is too expensive, and too theoretical. It’s true that liberal arts degrees often don’t prepare you very well for the real world in terms of providing concrete vocational skills, but I have personally found it an invaluable experience. Being forced to speak out in class, participate in discussions, debate, think critically, conduct original research, write long and cohesive papers, and present a logical and strong argument have all helped me grow into someone more confident and more knowledgeable. I enjoyed my liberal arts education, and while it’s certainly not for everyone, I think it has certainly strengthened a number of my weaknesses.

The next step of my life will be centered around adjusting to a non-university atmosphere. My next challenge lies in going from a situation where I’m constantly engaged in intellectual debate and surrounded by five different activities to one in which I’ll be thoroughly focused on one thing: my job. Having a restless personality, I will likely take up side projects as well, but still - all my attention will be focused on work. So I certainly hope I love what I do! Another challenge will be figuring out my long-run career path. I am interested broadly in public interest law, but within that I am interested in immigrant rights (particularly immigrant detention), asylum law, civil legal aid, public defense, and international legal aid/access to justice work. This sounds like a wide range of areas, and it is, but I hope to more concretely explore these fields in the next few years, prior to law school.

I’ve grown and changed a lot throughout undergrad, and I think I’m happy with the person I am today - someone dedicated to social change and to advocating on behalf of poor and marginalized populations. That was not the person I was as a naive freshman, and this was not my philosophy at the time. However, I’ve arrived at this belief again, through my extracurricular activities, social media, and the people I’ve met passionate about similar work - not through anything I learned in school. I’m still figuring out which is the best route for me to achieve change and justice, but the fact that this is now what I’m fighting for means, hopefully, that I’m on my way to finding something more than a job or a career - a calling.

Thanks Northwestern for a great four years, and I can’t wait to see what happens next!

Hope you have all had a great week(end)! The past few days have been absolutely perfect one for me - delicious cupcakes from Molly’s, a friend’s birthday celebrations, Dillo Day (annual day of fun, sun, and concerts from Regina Spektor, Guster, and Nelly at Northwestern), a trip to the Lincoln Park Zoo (although I am still not a fan, morally, of zoos…this did confirm this viewpoint), and the excitement of another close friend visiting NU from out of town.

After I handed in my thesis on April 30th, I’ve just been trying my best to enjoy the time I have left in Chicago. Now that I’ve finally found the time to relax and explore, it’s just begun to sink in how very much I am going to miss this place and the people I love. I am, of course, excited to graduate and move on to a new chapter in my life. I haven’t really mentioned this on my blog, but I’ll be doing an internship with the ACLU’s National Prison Project in D.C. and then I’ll be working full time for a civil rights law firm - also in D.C. And while I am eagerly anticipating exploring my chosen field of public interest law in the nation’s capital - the perfect environment for public interest work - I am incredibly sad to leave behind the life I’ve built here in my three years at NU. But what would life be without change and growth, right?

Since this weekend has been busy, I thought I’d start the week off with some of the articles I’ve been seeing around this week. Lots of news here, so enjoy!

• Hunting for Liberia’s Missing Millions - How much money did Charles G. Taylor, the deposed president of Liberia, siphon out of his destitute, war-shattered country, and where is it?
• The Scarlet Letters: HIV and Adolescent Life in Africa - A great example of how to write about Africa, by the Atlantic. h/t Texas in Africa.
• Amnesty International - Report 2010, State of the World’s Human Rights. Make sure to check out Amnesty’s annual report; I find the topic of the “global justice gap” particularly fascinating.
• LGBT Legal Status Around the World - Great website & resource I ran across via Twitter. Reflects the growing gay rights movement not just in the U.S. but worldwide (or rather, this type of information helps to bolster the activist movement).
• Behind the logo: different takes on the BP logo in light of the recent oil spill. Pretty fascinating! I think I like this one best..
• Zimbabwe says, we can imprison gay people too! A frustrating trend… except it’s not really a trend. Many governments have had harsh laws, even the death penalty, for being gay for years. Only NOW is the world noticing!
• International justice drama to open in Kampala - the ICC review conference!
• Another article about the ICC which is particularly interesting, talking about the crime of aggression. What do you think? Should this be included in the ICC statute?

That’s it for now. More blog posts coming soon. Happy Monday & Memorial Day to all!

I’m a graduating senior. June 2010. Those words hang ominously in the air, haunting me, frightening me, and at the same time, exhilarating me. Thankfully, I’ve managed to secure some exciting opportunities for post-graduation despite the lackluster economy, and I’m grateful to the universe for that. Yet, I’m finding - for the first time - the need to balance idealism and realism.

It’s difficult. I’m young, so I want to head off to Africa and pursue my lofty idealism, putting it into action somehow. But the realities are that I want to gain practical experience in litigation - which is where I’d like to end up after some time. The realities are that I have to study for the LSAT, because I want to be a lawyer. The realities are that going abroad for a long time now might not be the most practical option.

But just because something is a “reality” doesn’t mean it’s not exciting and full of passion. It is!

The field of “development” is extremely broad. You can work on education, health, microfinance, or human rights. But I can’t do all that. After taking a class this quarter on aid and development, I realize that most development projects don’t actually succeed. It’s muted my idealism quite a bit. Even if I do go abroad, most likely my work there wouldn’t leave behind much of an impact. I’d learn and gain a cross-cultural understanding, sure, but is that enough?

That’s why I’m choosing something more specific - human rights law. Law is still viewed as a monstrous creation, particularly in western countries where we are constantly drowning in the threat of lawsuits. Indeed, this dark cloud has prevented so many from living their lives. But I want my career to show that law can be transformative, positive, and empowering. That lawyers aren’t all greedy, but that the law can be used to advance social justice and truly help communities solve their problems. That the law can empower women to seek redress for gender based violence - and that it allows them to speak out where they would have been silent before. I want to use the law to bring justice to communities affected by torture, rights violations, environmental abuses, and discrimination. In particular, I want to focus on legal systems of developing countries - which are often in dire need of reform and capacity-building.

The good thing about being a senior is that it really forces you to distill. I have had to look at my diverse range of interests and really draw out what I ultimately want to do. The days are running out - and I have to make a decision. Through this process, I’ve found the idea of a career in impact litigation of some sort followed by broader reform of legal systems to be highly compelling. And far more so than “development” work, in which you can never be sure of success. It seems more fulfilling to look a client in the eye and say “We’ve done it!” than almost anything else. And after years of working on abstract things like communications or research, I want that badly. I want to work with individuals, hear their stories, and work on their cases. Change - but incremental, concrete, tangible change.

But there are more realities. The reality is that this field of human rights law - particularly justice reform and access to justice issues - does not have any clear career path, per se. The reality is that I’ll have to make it up as I go along. And maybe I’ll fail or falter. But perhaps, also, this reality will be the most fulfilling one.

(A quick note: Starting now, I’m challenging myself to write something every day that isn’t related to my thesis or my internship. This could be a blog post here, a blog post for another online outlet, a poem, or a personal journal entry. Regardless of what it is, I want to get back into writing! That also means that you’ll be seeing more posts here!

Another note: I’m sorry if this post is extremely cryptic. I’ll let you know what I’m up to as soon as I make a decision!)

I haven’t posted in quite a long time, so this isn’t going to be your “typical” Justice for All blog post. Instead, I’m going to ramble on about my thoughts. Please bear with me, people!

First of all, I want to say I’m sorry! I don’t think this blog is all that popular, but I’m still sorry to anyone who follows these posts. I’ve just been incredibly busy with schoolwork, my senior thesis (my first draft is due very soon…too soon! I’m completely freaking out.), my school activities, and job hunting/flying across the country for interviews. It’s all getting to be a bit much, and I simply have put this blog aside for the time being. I think my sanity is a bit more important, as is figuring out what I’m going to be doing after graduation. The application and interviewing process is incredibly tiring, and I haven’t even really gotten started yet! This is absolutely insane, and I’m simply trying my hardest and praying to get my dream opportunities.

I’m also getting a bit “disillusioned” with this entire blogging and social media business. There are days when I just want to make this anonymous and get rid of my Twitter, Tumblr, and any other social media platform I post on. Why? I’m tired of the game of “personal branding.” I’m tired of people, including myself, focusing on pumping out online content without putting in the same effort into achieving change or results offline. I’m tired because I don’t want to have a resume full of fluff, and no real accomplishments. I’m very ambitious - I have great dreams to better the world, and to change the status quo. Part of this certainly is increasing awareness of human rights online, but this, I have realized, is a very minute part of my “mission,” if you will. Far more important for me is actually doing good work to ensure that I’m making a difference in some concrete manner. I’m tired of trying to change people’s minds online. To be honest, there is no way in which some random stranger reading my blog will suddenly start caring about human rights or development issues. No way. People gravitate towards content they already care about. The people who read this blog already care. Those who don’t care simply aren’t going to start caring by reading this blog. I’m pretty much preaching to the choir. What am I accomplishing by doing that? Maybe, instead, I should dedicate my time and efforts to some way in which I can achieve concrete change. If I volunteered for every hour I used to spend on my blog, I’m pretty sure that would be way more beneficial to the world. I’m not saying I’m going to stop blogging, but I am cautioning against putting so much effort into something that does not yield many concrete benefits to the world.

Finally, I’ve also been thinking quite a bit about my own role in this vast world. Perhaps this existentialist crisis of sorts stems from my current status as a graduating senior, seeking to make sense of her next steps. As I plan to jump into the real world, I have to have a clear sense of what I want to accomplish, what I want to work towards — what my ultimate goal is. Is my ultimate goal a world where torture does not exist? A world without poverty? One where each individual is guaranteed access to legal representation? Or perhaps, one in which the global South has joined India and China on the developmental path (i.e. high growth rates, “pro-poor” growth)? One in which there is no more violent conflict? Of these multitudes of questions, which one is the real one I seek to answer and dedicate my life path towards?

Since I’m currently taking a class called “Aid, Governance and Development in Africa,” the question about growth rates jumps out at me. It seems like the ultimate question we as human beings have to grapple with is the question: why are some countries rich and some countries poor? What happened in between to allow some countries to achieve high growth rates, ultimately resulting in high development and low poverty rates — while others have been left behind to struggle with stagnant or even decreasing growth? How can we ensure that ultimately, all developing countries are able to consistently achieve levels of growth high enough such that they are slowly but surely able to reduce poverty and stay on the “train” to development?

But I’ve realized that this question is so immense and so vast, and so important, that while I can dedicate my life to it, I’m not going to. Why not? I can’t. I’m not a development economist, and I don’t intend to be solely a scholar. Simply put, economics and statistics isn’t my biggest strength. But whoever you are - if you’re reading this, and you’re out there - please listen. If you’re good at math, please take up this question. Dedicate your life to it. We need to solve this question of paramount importance in order for humanity to survive, and I want you, anonymous person out there reading this, to study this.

Since my strengths really do lie in writing and the legal arena, I think this is the cause I will take up. I know it’s a peripheral cause. I know that economic growth can help solve problems related to human rights and related to the development of legal systems. But, I will take up this secondary cause nonetheless. Why? I know the formula economic growth isn’t going to be cracked anytime soon. In the meantime, it makes sense to dedicate effort to ensuring that all men, women, and children have access to justice and are safe from the vagaries of a malfunctioning justice system. If I can go through my life knowing I have made some contribution to this area, perhaps it will be enough — even if I know I haven’t altered the underlying structures allowing poverty and human rights violations to occur (i.e. economic growth or lack thereof).

So, that was a brief snapshot of what’s going through my mind. There’s the big picture things - like which question should I dedicate myself to? And the detailed little things - like finding a job.

Again, I’m sorry this post isn’t incredibly thorough or eloquent or peppered with statistics about some human rights violation. But what it is, is directly from the heart. From my addled brain directly to this blank Wordpress page. I haven’t forgotten my dear blog, and I will return to it soon. Until then, cheers! Don’t forget about me either.

This is the time of year for reflections, and I’m certainly no exception to the rule. So here goes (though I don’t usually talk much about myself on this blog):

In 2009, I finished studying abroad at the London School of Economics and fell even more deeply in love with London and LSE. I also continued working with the Student Microfinance Development Initiative (SMDI), a student-run nonprofit which I helped start up. SMDI connects student volunteers with microfinance institutions, and spending so many late nights and long strategy meetings working on the organization was one of the best experiences of the year - I learned so much about microfinance, became part of a team, and met some incredibly passionate and intelligent students. While at LSE, I also visited The Hague, Netherlands with the ICC Student Network. There, we met with representatives from the Coalition for the ICC and Special Court for Sierra Leone. We sat in on the trials of Thomas Lubanga and Momcilo Perisic (at the ICTY). We even met with Chief Prosecutor Moreno-Ocampo. This incredible trip immersed me into international justice, which has become one of my main passions today. While abroad, I also traveled to Spain, Ireland, Scotland, Greece, and within the UK to Oxford, Bath, Canterbury, Leeds Castle, Brighton, Windsor, Stonehenge, and Stratford-upon-Avon. And at LSE, I got to see the Queen from afar, as well as hear lectures from Navanetham Pillay, Bernanke, and Paul Collier! It was the most amazing time of my life!

Over the summer, I got an internship grant from Northwestern and moved to Geneva, Switzerland - the world’s peace capital - for a summer internship with International Bridges to Justice (IBJ), an amazing non-profit that works to reform malfunctioning justice systems and end torture in the developing world. I worked on so many exciting things, mostly related to online communications. I got to visit the UN headquarters in Geneva, learn a teeny bit of french, visit the Alps and some beautiful Swiss towns like Montreux and Aigle, lounge by Lac Leman, and experience the beautiful Fete de Geneve! I somehow got featured on Fortune for my internship (believe me, it was sheer luck - but still cool!). It was an amazing experience, and I have become very passionate about access to justice issues. More recently, I raised $1,274 for IBJ for their fundraising campaign, and was very happy with the outcome (thanks to all that donated!).

The Swiss Alps (taken by me)

After that, I returned to the U.S., experienced reverse culture shock (or maybe I just missed London!) and started working on my political science senior thesis, which is on transitional justice mechanisms in Sierra Leone and Rwanda. It’s challenging but fascinating. Last quarter I also took an amazing class on Sudan with the former US Special Envoy to Sudan! I also became the Co-President of Amnesty International’s NU chapter, so that has been exciting and also time-consuming. As the year wraps up, I’m applying to jobs and fellowships in the hope that I’ll have some exciting options for after graduation.

In 2009 I bought my own domain name and created this website! This year, I also fell in love with social media. I really became addicted to Twitter and to blogging, and learned the value of an online community. Never before have I been able to connect with so many other intelligent young people who share the same passions and interests. Social media has really impacted my life and taught me a lot - and I have made some great friends and met some wonderful people through the process! I started the Be the Change series, in which so many Gen Yers came together to share their thoughts on social change issues. It was an inspirational affirmation of the fact that my generation does care about the world.

Of course, there have been some failures too, but all in all this year was an amazing one. All my experiences have helped me figure out what I ultimately want to accomplish in life and have made me much more independent. I have truly grown as a person. But for some reason, it feels like this year has gone by too fast. I’m not ready for the next year - which will bring with it uncertainty and numerous challenges. I have only one wish for 2010: to find a job I love! If this happens, all will fall into place

Wishing you all a happy 2010 with more successes and growth!