Past Projects

Physical and Psychological Health Issues of Resettled Refugees in the United States

Rhonda Sarnoff
Eleanor A. Gladstone
Harvey Weinstein
2000

There are currently no systematic and reliable means of evaluating the incidence and prevalence of disease in United States refugee populations. Barriers include inadequate surveillance mechanisms and an inability to distinguish refugees from the foreign-born or ethnic groupings. A date set, created for administrative purposes, of a cohort of 2,361 adult refugees who sought health care services in a large US country health system from October, 1995 to February, 1998 was studied. A subset of 187 refugee medical records was reviewed to assess whether refugee status was documented and...

Justice, Accountability and Social Reconstruction: An Interview Study of Bosnian Judges and Prosecutors

Laurel Fletcher
Harvey Weinstein
2000

Breaking Bread with the Dead

Eric Stover
Molly Ryan
2001

The establishment of two international ad hoc tribunals for Rwanda and the former Yugoslavia, and the creation of an International Criminal Court within the next fi ve years, has increased the need for archaeologists who can assist in the exhumation of individual and mass graves associated with war crimes and genocide throughout the world. This work examines the efforts of teams of archaeologists and forensic scientists which have investigated forced disappearances, political killings, and war crimes in Argentina, Guatemala, Iraqi Kurdistan, and the former Yugoslavia since 1984. As more...

Asylum Evaluations—The Physician’s Dilemma

Eric Stover
Harvey Weinstein
2002

In the following paper, Annemiek Richters of the University of Leiden in the Netherlands addresses the dilemmas faced by health professionals who are asked to evaluate and provide supporting documentation for those refugees who seek political asylum in the countries of Europe. It is in the politically charged arena of asylum applications, government regulations, and public policy where bioethics, human rights, and health converge. Despite the 1951 Convention on Refugees, a treaty signed by nations around the world to safeguard the rights of those who are displaced, and other treaties...

The Missing in the Aftermath of War: When Do the Needs of Victims’ Families and International War Crimes Tribunals Clash?

Eric Stover
Rachel Shigekane
2002

The international war crimes tribunals for the former Yugoslavia and Rwanda have increasingly relied on forensic scientists to collect physical evidence of mass killings associated with acts of genocide and crimes against humanity. Typically, these investigations have resulted in only a small number of the deceased being identified because the tribunals lack the resources to conduct thorough investigations of the missing or because the evidentiary needs do not require that all of the victims be identified. Meanwhile, the families of the missing are left in a limbo of ambiguous loss...

Violence and Social Repair: Rethinking the Contribution of Justice to Reconciliation

Laurel Fletcher
Harvey Weinstein
2002

This article explores limitations of international criminal trials that assign accountability for mass atrocities to individuals, and offers a model to understand the contribution of trials to social reconstruction. In the last decade, there has been a burgeoning interest in the question of how countries recover from episodes of mass violence or gross human rights violations. This interest has focused on the concept of transitional justice, a term used to describe the processes by which a state seeks to redress the violations of a prior regime. Despite the fact that military and...

Exhumation of Mass Graves in Iraq: Considerations for Forensic Investigations, Humanitarian Needs, and the Demands of Justice

Eric Stover
William D. Haglund
Margaret Samuels
2003

Across war-torn Iraq, Iraqis have begun to reveal the horrors of nearly a quarter century of repressive rule. Former political prisoners have led journalists and human rights investigators to prisons where torture and summary executions reportedly were routine. Municipal grave diggers, shepherds, and farmers have publicly disclosed the whereabouts of mass graves believed to hold the bodies of those who disappeared during the rule of Saddam Hussein.1...

Bosnian and Soviet Refugees’ Experiences with Health Care

Juliene G. Lipson
Harvey Weinstein
Eleanor A. Gladstone
Rhonda H. Sarnoff
2003

Studies of refugees in the United States rarely address health the first few years following resettlement in part because the refugees become subsumed under the foreign-born or immigrant category. A national study reaffirmed the so-called healthy immigrant effect, but fewer sick days and less physician use may actually reflect access problems, economic concerns, and health beliefs or practices that clash with American health care. Because statistics may mask differences in health and why people seek professional care, it is important to combine qualitative and quantitative approaches. This...

Trauma and PTSD Symptoms in Rwanda: Implications for Attitudes Toward Justice and Reconciliation

Phuong Pham
Harvey Weinstein
Timothy Longman
2004
Context:

The 1994 genocide in Rwanda led to the loss of at least 10% of the country's 7.7 million inhabitants, the destruction of much of the country's infrastructure, and the displacement of nearly 4 million people. In seeking to rebuild societies such as Rwanda, it is important to understand how traumatic experience may shape the ability of individuals and groups to respond to judicial and other reconciliation initiatives.

Objectives:

To assess the level of trauma exposure and the prevalence of posttraumatic stress disorder (PTSD) symptoms and their predictors among Rwandans and...

Bremer’s ‘Gordian Knot’: Transitional Justice and US Occupation of Iraq

Eric Stover
Hanny Megally
Hania Mufti
2005

Shortly after the US invasion and occupation of Iraq, L. Paul Bremer III, in his capacity as the chief administrator of the Coalition Provisional Authority (CPA), introduced several transitional justice mechanisms that set the course for how Iraqis would confront the legacy of past crimes for years to come. In developing these mechanisms, Bremer consulted with a select group of Iraqi exiles that had returned to Iraq or were still living abroad. However, he failed to solicit the opinions and attitudes of the Iraqi people as a whole. He also failed to consult many of the governmental...