EuroMed Rights Shrinking Space Seminar Report 2018 EuroMed Rights, November 2018 Vestergade 16, 2nd floor 22, rue des Comédiens 80 Rue Palestine, 80 rue de Paris DK-1456 Copenhagen K 1000 Brussels Lafayette 2001, Tunis 6 93100 Montreuil Denmark Belgium Tunisia Paris, France Tel: +45 32 64 17 00 Tel: +32 2 503 06 86 Tel +216 71 840782 +33 1 48 18 06 86 [email protected] https://euromedrights.org — Bibliographic information Title: Shrinking Space Seminar Report 2018 Author: EuroMed Rights Date of initial publication: Dec 2018 ISBN: Pages: 19 Original Language: French EuroMed Rights Shrinking Space Seminar Report 2018 "Strengthening civil society to cope with repressive trends: what role for EuroMed Rights?" Table of Content 1. Report overview 6 2. The “shrinking space for civil society” in the Euro-Mediterranean region 7 3. The monitoring, delegitimisation or criminalisation of NGOs. Why discuss this now? 9 4. How going beyond the concept of “shrinking space for civil society”? 12 5. What interaction(s) between human rights organisations and other forms of protest and activism? 15 6. Prospects 17 Report This report is based on the exchanges and contents of the seminar “Strengthening civil society to cope with repressive trends: what role for EuroMed Rights?” which took place on 22 June 2018 in Brussels bringing together more than 70 participants from member organi- sations from 25 countries. Readers will find in this report a wealth of different points of view of a rich discussion in a context in which issues of repression of indi- vidual and collective freedoms and of political spaces of action and expression are worryingly topical in both the south and the north of the Mediterranean. Although the report does not claim to capture all the exchanges in their entirety and multiplicity, this report retraces the main lines of the participants’ questions as well as the testimonies gathered in the plenary session, or in individual interviews and finally by means of an online questionnaire. The questionnaire, which does not claim to be statistically representative, aggregates responses from a sample of 25 participants from organisations in 10 European and 8 Southern Mediterranean countries. 1. The “shrinking space for civil society” in environment for civil society stakeholders vis-à-vis the European institutions2 . It is also a concern for its member organisations in North Africa, the Middle East, and the Euro-Mediterranean region increasingly in Europe. Several reports from international organizations such as such as the Council of Europe3, European Union Agency for Fundamental Rights4 Associations, NGOs, social and civic movements in the Euro-Mediterranean region and the European Parliament5 have recently focused on this issue. face varying forms of restrictions on their space of action and expression. This is concretised by the promulgation of restrictive laws on associations and demon- Today, political and socio-economic contexts, state policies but also the weight strations, the instrumentalization of anti-terrorist policies to criminalise peaceful of movements close to the far right or other groups threatening society cause a dissent, the reduction, blockage or even demonization of foreign funding to asso- need to promote forms of solidarity and to develop strategies for counteracting ciations, but also by defamation campaigns that try to equate aid to migrants with the shrinking and closing of spaces. delinquency and criticism of government policies with terrorism. However, the very expression “shrinking space for civil society” can in turn be ques- In most southern Mediterranean countries, judicial systems are only tools in the tioned. What criticisms can we level at this concept and its use which appears to be hands of authoritarian regimes rather than guarantees of fundamental rights and increasingly used among donors, institutions and NGOs? How can we go beyond the rule of law. In European countries, the space for political action and expression this paradigm and integrate other forms of action? Is the “shrinking space” still an is undermined by the convergence of real or perceived threats, such as terrorism accurate description, or should we instead take into account the different forms and refugee flows, and the all-security response that the governments of Member of repression experienced by individuals or tied to methods of action, political States and the European Union put forward. contexts and the causes defended? These different paradigms were framed through the expression “shrinking space for civil society”. This expression, which has been used by several NGOs, is most often defined as the failure to observe three fundamental rights: freedom of association, freedom of assembly and freedom of expression - but also access to financing, free movement, access to information and dialogue with decision makers. Several reports describe an overall trend towards a shrinking of the space for civil society in authoritarian countries but also within democratic systems1. 2 In April 2016, EuroMed Rights published the report entitled “Shackled Freedoms: What Space for Civil Society in the EuroMed?” which studied the forms of repression or restriction which limit the freedom of association and assembly and Understanding and countering the “shrinking space for civil society” is also a top the freedom of expression. The report analysed, with cases studies to support its findings, the governmental and non-gov- ernmental mechanisms and strategies at work, proposing a spectrum of strategies and practices: 1) the legal measures priority for EuroMed Rights and its actions through the monitoring of the situation taken against those rights by the States; 2) the extra-judicial measures taken by the States; 3) the ambivalent roles played by stakeholders outside the State; 4) the use of “anti-terrorist” policies to restrict spaces. The report was a follow-up of the of civil society organisations in the region, supporting organisations defending hu- seminar organised by EuroMed Rights in Brussels on the topic of “Combatting the shrinking space for civil society”. man rights through solidarity actions, defending and promoting a more favourable 3 resolution 2226 (2018) "New restrictions on NGO activities in Council of Europe member States" adopted on June 27,2019 4 Report " challenges facing civil society organisations working on human rights in the EU”, January 1 See, for instance, the report of Kvinna till Kvinna, “Suffocating the Movement – Shrinking space for women’s rights”, 5 See, for instance, the report of the European Parliament, Directorate-General for external policies, “Shrinking space for 2018. civil society: the EU response”, April 2017. Shrinking Space Seminar Report 2018 PAGE 7 What is civil society? What is legtimacy? The spectrum of stakeholders claiming to be part of civil society is broad, extending from churches, to associations of anglers, to humane societies, and many more examples. All of these interme- diary bodies must indeed be taken into account when speaking of civil society. It is therefore necessary to defend an inclusive approach to all the fractions of the associative world, not to fall into the traps laid by opponents who seek to divide by excluding a given stakeholder who they consider to be “illegitimate”. The issue of legitimacy is mainly linked to the inalienable freedom of assembly, the freedom to reflect and propose solutions. Admittedly, this notion of civil society gives it legitimacy to express itself on behalf of those it brings together, but not a legitimacy that is representative of a popular will or expertise that would compete with the democratic legitimacy of elected representatives. In short, an ac- tion in the service of democracy and not the affirmation of an expert or popular legitimacy that can bypass democratic decision-making. Extracts from the speech by Michel Tubiana, President of EuroMed Rights We are still active; we soldier on regardless and we need the support of 2. Monitoring, delegitimisation or the human rights movement in Europe and the international mechanisms for the protection of human rights. We are still here! We are at your side! “ criminalisation of NGOs.Why discuss this Osman İşçi, Human Rights Association of Turkey now? The members of EuroMed Rights, being a network of civil society organ- isations, are primarily concerned by the limits placed on the freedom of association, the access to funds and the possibility of accessing decision-mak- ers as well as various forms of harassment, criminalisation, delegitimisation or repression, including obstacles to the freedom of movement. Many of them are directly affected by authoritarian trends in certain countries in the region. Osman İşçi, a representative of the Human Rights Association of Turkey (IHD), spoke remotely about his commitment, having been banned from traveling and dismissed from his position as associate professor and doctoral researcher at the University of Ağri in 2017 for the reason of having signed, in January 2016, alongside more than a thousand other academics, the petition for peace entitled “We will not be complicit in this crime”, which criticised the security policy pursued by the government in the Kurdish regions as well as the imposition of permanent curfews on entire cities.6 “It was inevitable that I would be forbidden from travelling because I work towards ensuring the freedom of association and expression in a context of shrinking space. For two years now, our fundamental rights