The International Map of Threatened Rights (MIDA) is an instrument for political observation and reflection built by the Mobilization and Democracy team at CELS.
It aims to compile information on Argentina, Brazil, the United States, Spain, and Germany, with the intention of continuing to add more countries.
The MIDA database records, on one hand, regressive government measures — decrees, legislation, resolutions, and statements in multilateral bodies — that affect or threaten a set of human rights at the national level:
- labor rights,
- sexual and reproductive rights,
- rights of migrants and religious minorities,
- freedom of expression and the right to social protest.
On the other hand, it is also a map of resistance. MIDA compiles information on popular demonstrations and legal injunctions carried out by civil society organizations that push back against — and sometimes manage to reverse — government measures that attack human rights.
What is MIDA for?
We envision MIDA as a useful tool for labor, feminist, migrant, and human rights activism. It is not a diagnostic database, but rather a resource for learning:
- about the strategy of the far right to erode democracy by undermining the space and value of human rights;
- about the ways in which progressive governments seek to reverse or contain the far-right agenda;
- about the key role played in a dynamic and open democracy by social mobilization, organizations working for social justice and human rights, and a free press that is critical of those in power.
We are aware that each nationally-grounded experience has something peculiar and unrepeatable about it; but we also know that the far right organizes internationally, sharing tactics and strategies to dismantle ideas of the common good and stigmatize all kinds of activism. From a progressive, internationally-minded perspective, we believe there is value in observing countries that are at different stages of this contemporary “film”: nations with far-right governments in both the global north and south, countries with right-wing governments but a growing far-right presence within legislative bodies and provincial powers, progressive governments that came after far-right governments, and progressive governments making efforts to contain the threat of a far-right executive.
If you’d like to learn more about how we build MIDA, we suggest reading our methodology section.