CA23103 - Life, liberty and health: ensuring universal protection of human rights at sea (BlueRights)

While the oceans are attracting growing attention, people at sea still receive little consideration by stakeholders, scholars and the public at large. The frequent violations of their most basic human rights, which safeguard their life, liberty and health, often go unseen and unpunished. This happens all over the world, including in European seas. Thus, death, slavery, unlawful arrest and other human rights violations result in practical negation of the universality of human rights – the idea that all persons are equally entitled to human rights – advocated by the European Union and the United Nations. The Action aims to assess, from a legal perspective, how human rights can be enjoyed also by people at sea and by all people at sea. It will answer two fundamental questions: What is the content and scope of the rights to life, liberty and health when applied at sea and who is responsible for protecting them and how? The Action will create an international, multidisciplinary, cross-sectoral and cross-institutional network, which will engage in depth with the conceptual and practical issues that arise from the need to protect these human rights of people at sea. Using the most appropriate means, including conferences, open and closed workshops, Training Schools and Short-Term Scientific Missions, the Action will bring together scholars and stakeholders working in this area, raising awareness about people at sea and their most basic rights, elaborating the theoretical framework within which to locate legislative efforts, and producing ready-to-use tools for governments, industry and civil society.

­PeopleAtSea is the first interdisciplinary, cross-sectoral network that brings together legal scholars and lawyers working for stakeholders to address the numerous and flagrant breaches of human rights at sea. Human rights are a core value of the modern international community. However, death, torture, slavery, unlawful arrests and other human rights violations happen on an everyday basis, in the European seas as well as in all other seas and oceans. This is due, to a significant extent, to the fragmented and incomplete legal framework, the gaps in academic research and the isolation in which scholars pursuing dedicated research find themselves. PeopleAtSea will bring together researchers and stakeholders from across Europe and beyond, representing the relevant disciplines and the various maritime interests and concerns, to build an epistemic community, develop a common vision and the related methodological approach, and elaborate legal tools to address this societal concern. The Action will enhance legal scholarship on human rights at sea in qualitative and quantitative terms and will amplify its impact on both the policy and operational levels. PeopleAtSea will overcome the fragmented, occasional and monodisciplinary approach pursued so far by (1) developing a novel, holistic concept, (2) producing an unprecedented open-access database, (3) operationalizing academic knowledge through ready-to-use tools for stakeholders, and (4) creating teaching modules for sharing knowledge. Through a number of events, including conferences, open and closed workshops, Training Schools and Short-Term Scientific Missions, PeopleAtSea will contribute to raising awareness about people at sea and their rights and enhancing their protection.

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