Shadi Sadr, a lawyer, is the founder and an executive director of Justice for Iran (JFI). Sadr, who is a member of Volunteer Lawyers Network, has won at least six prestigious awards for her human rights activism.
On the 10th anniversary of the Human Rights Activists (HRA), we asked Sadr about the structural differences that led to a perpetual existence of the human rights organization and its continuous activism. She noted that the 10-years survival in the scope of human rights regardless of all its ups and downs is the most important achievement of HRA. She told Peace Mark Monthly, “The organizations and groups which could possibly survive in this field are the ones that understand that the field is not only their job, but it’s a part of their lives.”
How do you describe HRA, and if you want to highlight a positive attribute of the impact of this group, what would it be in your opinion?
In describing HRA after 10 years of activism I have to say, in particular, your news agency (HRANA) is an established outlet in the field of human rights, and it is one of the main sources of news in this field; on one hand, 10 years of experience and permanence, and on the other hand, the volume, range and diversity of the news you report on daily basis make it easy to say we don’t have an example like HRANA; I think that HRA is tied to HRANA and are somewhat considered as one. We do not see HRA separately from HRANA, at least not now.
The most important attribute of the organization is its permanence. The 10 years of survival in the scope of human rights, regardless of all the ups and downs, is the most important achievement of this organization; we are aware of some of these ups and downs and do not know about others. Despite all the hardships and difficulties that there have been and there will continue to be, this organization has survived and has continued its main focus, which is delivering human rights news.
As you mentioned, for HRA and, overall, for the civic society and for any group or organization that is defending human rights in Iran, there are many ups and downs and difficulties; this results in many of these groups and organizations not being able to survive for long. With that being said, what do you think are the structural differences that lead to perpetual activities of a human rights organization and its continued activism? In this regard, what difference could you mention specifically about HRA?
As an outsider, I would not know the exact reason for this survival and permanence. It’s just like an orchard where the trees give great fruits, but I’m not the gardener; I can only see and enjoy the fruits and comment on how tasty and fresh they are. I would not know why the gardener has succeeded, what kind of soil, fertilizer, water or method of gardening he has used. This is an internal matter and, obviously, it’s the organization itself that knows the best answer to this question; how it has faced its problem, which difficulties it has overcome and which ones it has failed to overcome.
I have never been in contact with all members of HRA, and I do not know them all. But of the few of them that I know, their most important attribute is that they are highly motivated to help others and to continue regardless of all the difficulties. In my opinion, this is more important than anything else— people who have this amount of motivation and commitment to even sacrifice their own lifestyle and sleep in order to make the voice of victims of human rights violations heard by the world and to do something about it.
Without people who have this kind of motivation, perhaps no organization could survive. As I mentioned before, this is a very important issue, and it’s becoming even more important especially in the scope of human rights and exclusively human rights in Iran. There might be many objections theoretically to this, but practically speaking, I have seen that groups and organizations whose core members have not personally experienced serious violations of human rights in Iran have either faded, not survived or even left this field. The reason is because human rights activism in Iran is not a field one could enter for business purposes. Many might enter this field as a business, but they cannot survive as a business. Usually those who have personally experienced human rights violations in Iran and dealt with the issue of human rights violations as a personal concern are those who remain in this field. In other words, they are fed up with the human rights violations and want to make the world a better place for those in similar situations. The motivation that I talked about in most cases (of course there are exceptions and we can’t formulate this) and according to my observation of Iranian human rights groups and organizations over the past years, especially the ones in which I have been outside of the country, is that members of the groups and organizations that have been successful and have had a continuous and lasting impact are the ones who feel that human rights activism is not only their job, but a major part of their lives. To be this way, people have to have personal concern and personal experience of violations of human rights. As I mentioned before, because of their personal experiences, they will stand next to the victims of human rights violations and would look at the issues from a higher level as an expert of human rights.
This is true about the people I know from HRA. However, because I do not know all the members, I cannot make a judgment on all of them.
Is there anything you would like to tell the members and colleagues who have been with HRA in the past decade?
First of all, I want to congratulate you all for surviving 10 years in human rights activism because it’s not easy, and we all know that retaining a collective work, especially in this difficult field, is more difficult than starting and forming a new group.
Considering my journalism background, let me give some general advice because I know the news and the importance of fast coverage. It is very important to point out that for a news station or newspaper, the news needs to quickly reach the audience. Having that in mind, this is human rights activism, and it has to do with people’s lives. When we are working as human rights activists—unlike journalists—we have to always keep in mind that speed and accuracy don’t weigh the same. Accuracy is more important because we are dealing with people’s lives!
