Rights mean little if those entitled to them are not aware they exist. Due process is of doubtful value when you are illiterate, or unable to understand the proceedings. Courts are next to worthless for those who cannot afford the bus fare to reach them. Nor should justice be about courts alone. For all these reasons, legal empowerment is crucial. Part of IDLO's bottom-up (or demand side) approach, it involves equipping people with the knowledge, confidence and skills to realize their rights. Even as we work to improve the functioning of justice systems, we strengthen citizens' capacity to press for justice from below.
The rule of law only exists to the extent that it works for all.
Mali’s crisis of 2012-2013, in which two-thirds of the country was occupied by Tuareg rebels and Islamic extremists, was accompanied by brutal rule in the North and a near-collapse of the state. Many victims have yet to see redress for the abuses they suffered; justice remains elusive.
Experts from nine countries have gathered in Lima, Peru to create a regional access-to-justice model for vulnerable groups. Held over the three days to May 28, the meeting is the first step in a process facilitated by IDLO under the EU-sponsored EUROsociAL II program.
In a recent interview with Spanish daily El País, star footballer Carlos Tévez confessed that, as a child growing up on the streets of the ominously-named Fuerte Apache estate just outside Buenos Aires, his biggest fear was to be detained by police.
On 20 February 2014, in the Bruno Volta district of Santiago del Estero, Argentina, youths working for the local “Access to Justice Center” kicked off their own campaign against institutional violence, and in particular against the ill-treatment young people from impoverished backgrounds may suffer at the hands of the police.
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La Ministra de Justicia de Paraguay, Sheila Abed, el Viceministro de Justicia Ever Martínez y el Director de Acceso a Justicia, Weldon Black Zaldívar, presenciaron el acto de presentación de los avances en la orientación y asistencia legal a personas en situación de vulnerabilidad, en el marco del Proyecto Servicio de Orientación Legal (SOL)<
Durante los días 6 y 7 de noviembre se presentaron en Lima, Perú, los resultados del proyecto de acceso a la justicia llevado a cabo en el país por IDLO con el apoyo del Programa EUROsociAL II de la Unión Europea.
While the justice sector in Afghanistan has progressed since the fall of the Taliban in 2001, legal awareness and access to justice throughout the country are still lagging behind. A 2016 World Justice Project report found that only 23 per cent of Afghan citizens used the formal justice system to settle disputes, and less than half reported to have trust in the state courts. As a result, and combined with the pressure of social norms, potential justice users, particularly women, are deterred from using the formal system and are often unable to obtain fair remedies for grievances
