Some armchair travelers have an entire shelf of Houghton Mifflin Harcourt's Best American Travel Writing annuals and there is no mystery why. Each year, this trade paperback features superlative writing chosen by a standout editor. Previous editors include Simon Winchester, Frances Mayes, Susan Orlean, and Jamaica Kincaid. In the 13th installment, editor William Vollman presides over an assemblage by standouts including Paul Theroux, Bryan Curtis, Lynn Freed, Robin Kirk, and Kimberly Meyer. Editor's recommendation.
This includes original translations by me.
An examination of why American Protestant churches have a higher likelihood to support torture
Preventing sweeping human rights violations or wars and rebuilding societies in their aftermath require an approach encompassing the perspectives of both human rights advocates and practitioners of conflict resolution. While these two groups work to achieve many of the same goals—notably to end violence and loss of life—they often make different assumptions, apply different methods, and operate under different values and institutional constraints. As a result, they may adopt conflicting or even mutually exclusive approaches to the same problem. Eileen F. Babbitt and Ellen L. Lutz have collected groundbreaking essays exploring the relationship between human rights and conflict resolution. Employing a case study approach, the contributing authors examine three areas of conflict—Sierra Leone, Colombia, and Northern Ireland—from the perspectives of participants in both the peace-making and human rights efforts in each country. By spotlighting the role of activists and reflecting on what was learned in these cases, this volume seeks to push scholars and practitioners of both conflict resolution and human rights to think more creatively about the intersection of these two fields.
My essay on Colombia, “Colombia and human rights,” is included in this volume.
I translated this from the Spanish and included a forward. First published in Peru in 1990, The Shining Path was immediately hailed as one of the finest works on the insurgency that plagued that nation for over fifteen years. A richly detailed and absorbing account, it covers the dramatic years between the guerrillas' opening attack in 1980 and President Fernando Belaunde's reluctant decision to send in the military to contain the growing rebellion in late 1982. Covering the strategy, actions, successes, and setbacks of both the government and the rebels, the book shows how the tightly organized insurgency forced itself upon an unwilling society just after the transition from an authoritarian to a democratic regime. One of Peru's most distinguished journalists, Gustavo Gorriti first covered the Shining Path movement for the leading Peruvian newsweekly, Caretas. Drawing on hundreds of interviews and an impressive array of government and Shining Path documents, he weaves his careful research into a vivid portrait of the now-jailed Shining Path leader Abimael Guzman, Belaunde and his generals, and the unfolding drama of the fiercest war fought on Peruvian soil since the Chilean invasion a century before.
