Shirin Ebadi and the Struggle for Human Rights in Iran
At the Conversations with History site, a recent interview with Shirin Ebadi has just been posted. The Nobel Laureate offers a moving account of her courageous life's work in behalf of women's and children's rights. The transcript and video on demand of the interview are here http://globetrotter.berkeley.edu/people6/Ebadi/ebadi-con0.html Here http://www.uctv.tv/cwh/ is information about its national broadcast on the EchostarDish network during the week of July 16th. Her new book, Iran Awakening, is a compelling, multi layered account that tells the story of her family, her country and the role of law in the conflict between tradition and modernity. The book vividly chronicles how U.S. intervention in the last fifty years has affected all three dimensions.This is a story not only of the rise of religious fundamentalism in her native land but also a story of the unintended consequences of U.S. intervention in Iranian affairs in the last fifty years--the overthrow of Mossadegh, the support of the Shah, the aid to Saddam Hussein during the Iran-Iraq War. Through Ebadi's narrative we learn how the United States is both a beacon of hope for the human rights struggle and a superpower whose intervention over the years has had the unintended consequences of setting back these efforts. Ebadi is an extraordinary human rights lawyer but also an Iranian patriot. Her book should be read for important insights into the contradictory role the United States plays in that troubled region.
Ian Lustick, Bess M. Heyman Professor of Political Science at the University of Pennsylvania, has just published a new book Trapped in the War on Terror (University of Pennsylvania Press). Lustick was a recent guest on Conversations with History. 
