Angela Bain represents the law school and the nation at the UN Human Rights Council
Osgoode is known by many to have an excellent international law program. From courses in international human rights law and international trade regulation to the International and Transnational Law Intensive Program (ITLIP), Osgoode provides concrete means for interested students to engage in the theoretical and practical aspects of cross-border and cross-cultural lawyering. Just ask Osgoode student and current ITLIP student Angela Bain, located 6,392 km away from the law school.
“I’ve since done some research [of] my friends at other law schools and it looks like Osgoode [is] really unparalleled in giving this opportunity, especially to so many students,” said Angela.
Currently situated in Geneva, Switzerland – where a Starbucks latte costs the equivalent of $9.63 – Angela works as a junior policy analyst at the Canadian Permanent Mission to the United Nations (UN) World Trade Organization (WHO).
“My supervisors let me go to interesting meetings with them and on my own and represent Canada,” said Angela. Most recently, Angela was the mouthpiece for the nation at the 35th Session of the Universal Periodic Review [UPR], where the African kingdom of Lesotho presented its progress towards improving domestic human rights situations and took recommendations from other member states on meeting obligations.
“It was very strange and surreal. I’m just looking around thinking, how do you work the mic? How do you pronounce Lesotho?” Angela said.
Canada, through Angela, called for increased access to potable water and sanitation, increased efforts to end child marriage, and for the repeal of a section of the Lesotho Constitution that discriminates against women. Captured within those recommendations is the inherent trouble with an international organization such as the UN. Access to water and sanitation are, at least superficially, persuasively universal values—what parts of the world don’t place a premium on clean drinking water? But calling for the repeal of part of a foreign nation’s Constitution, the textual embodiment of its sovereignty, strays closer to imperial imposition of Western values. Angela was intimately aware of this conflict.
“You’re sitting there representing Canada, as someone who’s just started three weeks ago, telling Lesotho to change their constitution. You sit back and think, how did I get here? This feels so out of body,” she explained.
But an abundance of lived experience working with marginalized groups and raising awareness about women’s issues seems to have established a foundation of what values are worth fighting for, even on an international level. Prior to Geneva, Angela spent a year working at a youth homeless shelter involved in community level change.
“You know all the youth there and you feel very connected to the local politicians and very connected to the overall surrounding community and the neighbors to the shelter. You see levels of discrimination at a very personal level” Angela said.
Reflecting on those times from Geneva, Angela described going from “seeing human rights issues and violations at such an individual, local, intimate level to working at this huge organization with so many layers.”
But the vast scale and often clumsy touch of the UN doesn’t mean the organization is completely tone-deaf to accusations of predatory imperialism disguised as international cooperation.
“I think one benefit of the UPR is that every country gets the same amount of time to talk—every country is given the opportunity to present what they’ve done. So I think there are a lot of mechanisms built in to try and avoid that trap of the cultural relativism argument.”
“It’s easy to say, ‘oh it’s so bureaucratized’ and point to things that don’t get done or that countries don’t follow, but at the end of the day it’s the best we have right now,” Angela added.
With buildings across five continents, 193 member states, and a 2020 operating budget of over three billion US dollars, the UN is undeniably the world’s largest intergovernmental organization. Its Secretariat in Manhattan is like a giant cereal box, towering over the East River in steel and glass. The single-storey UN headquarters in Nairobi blends into the verdant green of its baobab backdrop. The UN building in Geneva, the Palais des Nations, reflects European grandeur with impressive marble columns, stately lawns, and snowy peaks in the distance.
But any notions of global glitz and glamour should be disposed of.
“The UN is crazy underfunded. The escalators in all the buildings have been turned off to save money, so you’re reminded every single time you’re walking up the escalators that this can’t be an exorbitant thing,” Angela noted.
Besides, life as an unpaid intern in an expensive country has its own challenges.
“There’s no spicy food here, or even food with any spices. We just eat bread and eggs for every meal because everything is too expensive. And you can’t go anywhere because Uber is so expensive.”
Dietary monotony aside, Angela recommends the international law intensive to anyone interested in global justice, WhatsApp diplomacy, and not knowing whether to give a handshake or three kisses on the cheek to everyone you meet.