Human Rights Education for Psychologists

This ground-breaking book is designed to raise awareness of human rights implications in psychology, and provide knowledge and tools enabling psychologists to put a human rights perspective into practice.

Psychologists have always been deeply engaged in alleviating the harmful consequences human rights violations have on individuals. However, despite the fundamental role that human rights play for professional psychology and psychologists, human rights education is underdeveloped in psychologists’ academic and vocational training. This book, the first of its kind, looks to change this, by:

• raising awareness among professional psychologists, university teachers and psychology students about their role as human rights promoters and protectors
• providing knowledge and tools enabling them to put a human rights perspective into practice
• providing texts and methods for teaching human rights.

Featuring chapters from leading scholars in the field, spanning 18 countries and six continents, the book identifies how psychologists can ensure they are practising in a responsible way, as well as contributing to wider society with a clear knowledge of human rights issues in relation to culture, gender, organisations and more.

Including hands-on recommendations, case studies and discussion points, this is essential reading for professional psychologists as part of continuing professional development and those in training and taking psychology courses.

For additional electronic resources for students and teachers, see the support material tab on the Routledge book page: https://www.routledge.com/Human-Rights-Education-for-Psychologists/Hagenaars-Plavsic-Sveaass-Wagner-Wainwright/p/book/9780367222963

Polli Hagenaars is a licensed psychotherapist and trainer for diversity policy with her own institute, C5, in Amsterdam, The Netherlands. Diversity and non-discrimination have been major themes throughout her professional career, including combating racism in the educational system, and teaching transcultural pedagogy at university colleges.

Marlena Plavšić started her psychological career dealing with the consequences of human rights violations while working with refugees and displaced persons from Croatia and Bosnia and Herzegovina in the 1990s. She teaches at the Juraj Dobrila University of Pula, Croatia and takes part in various community projects.

Nora Sveaass is professor emerita at the University of Oslo, Norway with research focusing on refugees, rehabilitation of victims of torture and transitional justice. She was Chair of the Human Rights Committee in the Norwegian Psychological Association from 1998 to 2018 and currently is a member of the United Nations Subcommittee for the Prevention of Torture.

Ulrich Wagner is a professor emeritus of social psychology at the Philipps-University Marburg in Germany. His research focuses on the improvement of intergroup relations. It is especially concerned with the reduction of ethnic prejudice, discrimination and violence as well as the promotion of intergroup acceptance and tolerance.

Tony Wainwright is a clinical psychologist and senior lecturer at the University of Exeter, UK. His research interests are ethics, human rights, climate change and psychology. He is concerned with the effect that human activity has environmentally, and its impact on human rights and the lives of the plants and animals with which we share the world.