William P Simmons

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Scholarly Contributions

Books

• Simmons, W. P. (2014). Binational Human Rights: The U.S.-Mexico Experience. Philadelphia: The University of Pennsylvania Press.
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  "A timely intervention, Binational Human Rights brings together works by a diverse array of scholars from U.S. and Mexican universities to provide a much-needed binational understanding of the political and economic forces that render poor citizens and migrants vulnerable to human rights abuse."—Alicia Schmidt Camacho, Yale University"Simmons and Mueller have assembled a great set of studies that use a mix of qualitative and quantitative evidence to provide solid explanation and understanding of the many complexities surrounding Mexico as a human rights outlier. This is a great contribution to a heated and controversial set of issues."—Todd Landman, University of EssexMexico ranks highly on many of the measures that have proven significant for creating a positive human rights record, including democratization, good health and life expectancy, and engagement in the global economy. Yet the nation's most vulnerable populations suffer human rights abuses on a large scale, such as gruesome killings in the Mexican drug war, decades of violent feminicide, migrant deaths in the U.S. desert, and the ongoing effects of the failed detention and deportation system in the States. Some atrocities have received extensive and sensational coverage, while others have become routine or simply ignored by national and international media. Binational Human Rights examines both well-known and understudied instances of human rights crises in Mexico, arguing that these abuses must be understood not just within the context of Mexican policies but in relation to the actions or inactions of other nations—particularly the United States.The United States and Mexico share the longest border in the world between a developed and a developing nation; the relationship between the two nations is complex, varied, and constantly changing, but the policies of each directly affect the human rights situation across the border. Binational Human Rights brings together leading scholars and human rights activists from the United States and Mexico to explain the mechanisms by which a perfect storm of structural and policy factors on both sides has led to such widespread human rights abuses. Through ethnography, interviews, and legal and economic analysis, contributors shed new light on the feminicides in Ciudad Juárez, the drug war, and the plight of migrants from Central America and Mexico to the United States. The authors make clear that substantial rhetorical and structural shifts in binational policies are necessary to significantly improve human rights.Contributors: Alejandro Anaya Muñoz, Luis Alfredo Arriola Vega, Timothy J. Dunn, Miguel Escobar-Valdez, Clara Jusidman, Maureen Meyer, Carol Mueller, Julie A. Murphy Erfani, William Paul Simmons, Kathleen Staudt, Michelle Téllez.
• Simmons, W. P. (2011). Human Rights Law and the Marginalized Other. New York: Cambridge University Press.
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  Description Contents Resources Courses About the Authors This is a groundbreaking application of contemporary philosophy to human rights law that proposes several significant innovations for the progressive development of human rights. Drawing on the works of prominent “philosophers of the Other” including Emmanuel Levinas, Gayatri Chakravorti Spivak, Judith Butler, and most centrally the Argentine philosopher of liberation Enrique Dussel, this book develops an ethics based on concrete face-to-face relationships with the Marginalized Other. It proposes that this ethics should inspire a human rights law that is grounded in transcendental justice and framed from the perspective of marginalized groups. Such law would continuously deconstruct the original violence found in all human rights treaties and tribunals and promote preferential treatment for the marginalized. It would be especially attentive to such issues as access to justice, voice, representation, agency, and responsibility. This approach differs markedly from more conventional theories of human rights that prioritize the autonomy of the ego, state sovereignty, democracy, and/or equality. One of the most extensive engagements between contemporary philosophy and human rights law to date Makes important contributions to recent ethical philosophies and then applies the resulting framework to a wide range of cases from around the globe Has well-developed critiques of prevailing deliberative and liberal approaches to human rights

Chapters

• Simmons, W. P., & LeBlanc, J. R. (2021). Terror, Nihilism, and Joy: Reconsidering Camus’s Confrontation with Political Violence. In Welcoming the Other: Student, Stranger, and Divine.
• Simmons, W. P., & Feldman, L. (2018). Critical Ethnography and Human Rights Research. In Research Methods in Human Rights(pp 114-133). London: Routledge.
• Simmons, W. P., & O'Leary, A. O. (2018). Reproductive Justice and Resistance at the U.S.- Mexico Borderlands. In Reproductive Justice. (Eds) Erika Derkas, Loretta Ross, Lynn Roberts, and Pamela Bridgewater(pp 306-325). NY/CUNY: Feminist Press.
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  Drawing on research of the reproductive healthcare strategies of women, this paper explores the creative and multiple forms of resistance employed by immigrant women to retain control of their sexual health and reproductive choices.
• O'Leary, A. O., & Simmons, W. P. (2017). Reproductive Justice and Resistance at the U.S.- Mexico Borderlands. In Reproductive Justice: An Anthology. NY/CUNY: Feminist press.
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  Drawing on research of the reproductive healthcare strategies of women, this paper explores the creative and multiple forms of resistance employed by immigrant women to retain control of their sexual health and reproductive choices.
• Simmons, W. P. (2017). Levinas’ Divine Comedy and Archbishop Romero’s Joyful Laughter. In Comedy Begins with Our Simplest Gestures: Levinas, Ethics, and Humor(p. 30). Duquesne University Press.
• Simmons, W. P., & Hammer, L. M. (2017). The Human Right to Dignity and Commodification of Prisoners: Considering Worldwide Challenges to Prison Privatization. In Privatization, Vulnerability, and Social Responsibility(p. 30). UK: Ashgate.
• Simmons, W. P. (2014). Binational Human Rights Violations, Structural Violence, and Pessimism. In Binational Human Rights: The U.S. - Mexico Experience(p. 12). Philadelphia: The University of Pennsylvania Press.
• Simmons, W. P., & Casper, M. J. (2014). Calculated Losses: Measuring Infant Mortality, Discounting Women’s Lives. In Counting on Marilyn Waring: New Advances in Feminist Economics(p. 25). Demeter Press.
• Simmons, W. P., & Mueller, C. (2014). Introduction. In Binational Human Rights: The U.S. - Mexico Experience(p. 24). Philadelphia: The University of Pennsylvania Press.
• Simmons, W. P., & Tellez, M. (2014). Sexual Violence against Migrant Women and Children in Arizona. In Binational Human Rights: The U.S. - Mexico Experience(p. 30). Philadelphia: The University of Pennsylvania Press.
• Simmons, W. P. (2012). Making the Teaching of Social Justice Matter. In Real Social Science(p. 19). New York: Cambridge University Press.
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  Simmons’ chapter is of particular interest for at least two reasons. First, because it is the only one in the book that addresses the problem of ‘teaching’ phronesis (aren’t we, after all, also teachers?). Second, and most importantly, because it offers an original take on phronesis itself, based on a notion of power derived from Paulo Freire’s Pedagogy of the oppressed (2007 [1968]). From this account, we learn that in order to defeat the ‘hegemonic power structures’ of our academic knowledge (and, I would add, paraphrasing Flyvbjerg, of our academic contexts), social scientists ‘must work with marginalized communities to call into question academic knowledge itself through the co-generation of new knowledge’ (p. 247). This is a point, as I will argue in the conclusions, which could really make a positive difference in the future of social science (which was Flyvbjerg’s main concern in introducing phronesis in the first instance). (Journal of Political Power 2013, 151)

Journals/Publications

• Simmons, W. P., Boynton, J., & Landman, T. (2021). Facilitated Communication, Neurodiversity, and Human Rights. Human Rights Quarterly.
• Simmons, W. P. (2016). Moments of Negation, Duration, and Human Rights Law without Judges. Teoria e Critica della Regolazione Sociale, 25.
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  Invited to submit by editor and then blind peer reviewed.
• Simmons, W. P. (2019). Problem-Based Learning beyond Borders: Impact and Potential for University-Level Human Rights Education. Journal of Human Rights.
• Simmons, W. P. (2020). he Gendered Effects of Local Immigration Enforcement: Latinas’ Social Isolation in Chicago, Houston, Los Angeles, and Phoenix. International Migration Review.
• Simmons, W. P., Menjivar, C., & Salerno Valdez, E. (2020). “The Gendered Effects of Local Immigration Enforcement: Latinas’ Social Isolation in Chicago, Houston, Los Angeles, and Phoenix”. International Migration Review.
• Simmons, W. P. (2019). Problem-Based Learning beyond Borders: Impact and Potential for University-Level Human Rights Education”. Journal of Human Rights, 18(3), 280-292.
• Simmons, W. P., Menjivar, C., Alvord, D., & Salerno Valdez, E. (2018). Immigration Enforcement, the Racialization of Legal Status, and Perceptions of the Police: Latinos in Chicago, Los Angeles, Houston, and Phoenix in Comparative Perspective. DuBois Review, 15(1), 107-128.
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  The immigration enforcement system today affects different subgroups of Latinos; it reaches beyond the undocumented to immigrants who hold legal statuses and even to the U.S.-born. States have enacted their own enforcement collaboration agreements with federal authorities and thus Latinos may have dissimilar experiences based on where they live. This article examines the effects of enforcement schemes on Latinos’ likelihood of reporting crimes to police and views of law enforcement. It includes documented and U.S-born Latinos to capture the spillover beyond the undocumented, and it is based on four metropolitan areas—Los Angeles, Houston, Phoenix, and Chicago—to comparatively assess the effects of various enforcement contexts. Empirically, it relies on data from a random sample survey of over 2000 Latinos conducted in 2012 in these four cities. Results show that spillover effects vary by context and legal/citizenship status: Latino immigrants with legal status are less inclined to report to the police as compared to U.S.-born Latinos in Houston, Los Angeles, and Phoenix but not in Chicago. At the other end, the spillover effect in Phoenix is so strong that it almost reaches to U.S.-born Latinos. The spillover effect identified is possible due to the close association between being Latino or Mexican and being undocumented, underscoring the racialization of legal status and of immigration enforcement today.
• Tellez, M., Simmons, W. P., & del Hierro, M. (2018). Border Crossings and the Legacy of Sexual Conquest in the Age of Neoliberalism in the Sonoran Desert. International Journal of Feminist Politics, 20(4), 524-541.
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  This article examines the liminal space of the desert borderlands as a scene of routinized sexualized and gendered violence against migrant women border crossers. We explore the human consequences of a philosophy of attrition that is the cornerstone of the US immigration system. Using border sexual conquest and the coloniality of power as lenses, we examine how global neoliberalism represents a form of contemporary conquest that normalizes sexual and gendered violence at transnational locations.
• Simmons, W. P., & Hammer, L. M. (2015). Privatization of Prisons and Immigration Detention Facilities in Arizona: A Per Se Violation of Human Rights?. Santa Clara Journal of International Law, 40.
• Simmons, W. P., Menjivar, C., & Tellez, M. (2015). Violence and Vulnerability of Migrants in Drop Houses in Arizona: The Predictable Outcome of a Chain Reaction of Violence. Violence against Women, 23.
• Simmons, W. P., & Casper, M. J. (2012). Culpability, Social Triage, and Structural Violence in the Aftermath of Katrina. Perspectives on Politics, 10(3), 12.

Presentations

• Simmons, W. P. (2015, April). The Joys of Political Theory. Annual Meeting of the Western Political Science Association. Las Vegas.
• Simmons, W. P., & Casper, M. J. (2015, June). Doing Justice for Human Rights Victims in Regional Tribunals. “Human Rights and Justice,” ISA Human Rights Joint Conference. The Hague: International Studies Association.
• Simmons, W. P., Simmons, W. P., Hammer, L. M., & Hammer, L. M. (2015, April). Commodifying Incarcerated Bodies in the U.S., Israel, and Beyond. Open Embodiments: Locating Somatachnics in Tucson. Tucson, AZ.
• Simmons, W. P. (2018, June). States of Exception, Governance, and Drug Trafficking Organizations along Human Smuggling Routes in West Africa and the US-Mexico Corridor. Annual Meetings of the Academic Council of the UN System. Rome, Italy: Academic Council of the UN System.
• Simmons, W. P. (2017, October). “Joyful Human Rights Activism”. at The Social Practice of Human Rights: Charting the Frontiers of Research and Advocacy.. University of Dayton.
• Simmons, W. P., & Hammer, L. M. (2017, June). “Implications of Pervasive Maltreatment and Mislabeling of Female Trafficking Victims and Consensual Sex Workers in Arizona, USA: Towards a Comparative Perspective”. Irregular Migrants, Refugees or Victims of Human-Trafficking? Analysis, Advocacy and Assistance between Categorizations and (Self-) Identifications, International Seminar on Mixed Migration,. Bangkok Thailand.
• Simmons, W. P. (2016, January). Doing Critical Civic Innovation Research. ISS Dialogue on Civic Innovation Research. The Hague, Netherlands: Erasmus University.
• Simmons, W. P. (2016, January). Migrant Women’s Vulnerabilities and Structural Violence A Comparative Analysis between the U.S.-Mexico and European-African Borderlands. Public Lecture. Vrjie University, Amsterdam: Co-organised by the Migration Diversity Centre (MDC) at the VU and UvA, and ACCESS EUROPE.
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  This talk is intended to open up a dialogue in comparative immigration studies that explores common causes, experiences, and forms of resilience in both the U.S.-Mexico and European-African contexts. William Simmons, together with his colleagues Cecilia Menjívar and Michelle Téllez, has developed the term “chain reaction of violence” to explain how policies, even some that are well-intentioned, have led to the tragic deaths of migrants in the Arizona desert and the shockingly high percentage of sexual violence against migrant women and children. Conducting etnographies in West African countries Gambia and Senegal, he observed similar mechanisms of violence.With discussion with Polly Pallister-Wilkins
• Simmons, W. P. (2015, October). Global Human Rights Direct: Disrupting Hegemonic Discourses through the Voices of the Marginalized. The Social Practice of Human Rights: Charting the Frontiers of Research and Advocacy. University of Dayton.
• Simmons, W. P. (2014, August). Navigating Fluid States of Exception at the U.S.-Mexico Border. Annual Meeting of the American Sociological Association. San Francisco.
• Simmons, W. P. (2014, June). Joyful Human Rights Martyrs. ISA Human Rights Joint Conference, Istanbul Turkey. Istanbul, Turkey: International Studies Association.
• Simmons, W. P. (2014, May). From Ethics to Justice: Phenomenologies of the Saturated and Joyful Other. Annual Meeting of the North American Levinas Society. Ocean City, Maryland: North American Levinas Society.
• Simmons, W. P. (2013, April). The Role of Sinister Joy in Human Rights Abuses: A Reconsideration of Evil in the Light of Joyful Human Rights. Annual Meeting of the International Studies Association. San Francisco.
• Simmons, W. P. (2012, August). Joyful Human Rights. American Sociological Association Pre-Conference: “Theories and Practices of Human Rights: An Interdisciplinary Dialogue. Denver.

Reviews

• Simmons, W. P. (2019. Book Review of Human Rights and Care of the Self. Perspectives on Politics.
• Simmons, W. P. (2012. Book Review of Liberalism without Perfection by Jonathan Quong(p. 3). Perspectives on Politics.

Others

• Simmons, W. P. (2012, Summer). CSO Strategy to Promote Child Rights in the African Commission on Human and Peoples’ Rights. International Research Report - submitted to the Swedish Development Agency and the Republic of the Gambia.