13:00 - 14:30 (CET)

Working Sessions are concurrent workshops, interactive dialogues and facilitated discussions hosted by a wide variety of global and local institutions around pressing issues and opportunities related to the Forum’s theme of “Realizing Justice for All.”

Social impact bonds have emerged as a promising vehicle for mobilizing public and private financing for social progress. Growing in popularity in areas such as health, education, and workforce development, they have not yet been deployed in the justice sector. During this session, participants shared findings from a recent feasibility assessment of outcomes-based financing for civil legal aid and discussed how justice sector actors might pursue social impact investing to scale-up access to justice interventions. Session presenters highlighted the Pay for Success model, which focuses on long-term outcomes that go beyond specific program outputs and social impact bonds that provide upfront working capital that allows service providers to scale-up their services. To further take advantage of these resources, speakers encouraged legal aid providers to be willing to rigorously test their services, accept contradictory results, and be flexible enough to iterate their programs based on findings. Identified examples of outcomes-based financing models in practice included: the Medical-Legal Partnership in Washington, D.C., the International Committee of the Red Cross Humanitarian Impact Bond, and PeaceNexus’s Peace Investment Fund.  

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Artificial intelligence is a subset of computer science that is trying to emulate human behavior, and presents numerous opportunities for solving justice problems. In a data-driven world, data transformations that integrate AI are a crucial way for organizations to enhance speed and accelerate time to value. Hewlett Packard Enterprise proposed the following road map for undertaking any data transformation: 1) Implement a modern data foundation (ingest, process, and manage a high velocity data pool.) 2) Transform data collected into insights 3) Predict and anticipate possible future events and support or automate decisions and actions applying AI. Once AI has been integrated into existing applications, it is fundamental that organizations do not allow their AI systems to remain static. The data used for AI processes needs to consistently be re-trained and supported. Finally, at the core of data transformation initiatives are ethical principles, such as the European Commission for Efficiency of Justice Ethical Charter, which organizations must refer to and abide by when integrating artificial intelligence into their work.

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This session explored emerging evidence of how legal technologies can be made both used and useful in expanding access to justice. It drew on research and practice experience, and discussed the key elements that separate effective technology-based justice interventions from those that are less effective. JustFix.nyc and Haqdarshak served as case studies to showcase how organizations can successfully integrate technological platforms in their work with clients to serve their justice needs in the housing and public benefits contexts. Haqdarshak, for example, trains local entrepreneurs to operate the platform, who collect service fees for its operation, making a sustainable model for the system. JustFix.nyc has an online platform that uses data and technology to fight displacement and expand access to justice. It can automate formal complaints against landlords for neglected repairs or to report harassment, with the aim to correct the legal imbalance between tenants and landlords. The idea behind both start-ups was to use technology to solve problems that everyday citizens face. Not to change laws, but to facilitate access to services, build accountability, and empower citizens.  

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How does the implementation and enforcement of environmental laws address the severe health effects of environmental pollution? This session explored current laws and standards, and outlined how efforts to train lawyers and judges in various countries have helped bridge the gaps between laws and health outcomes for affected populations. Speakers highlighted the importance of empowering local populations through environmental litigation, and emphasized the need to build tools and skills that can be transferred, such as learning to collect information and document health harms, legal education, and legal assistance and council. International training of lawyers in environmental law was also flagged as an important practice, particularly for private legal practitioners, who have been excluded in the past. Speakers also highlighted the significant work that must be done to establish environmental protection as a fundamental right, and to broaden the development community’s appreciation of the impact of law and justice on human development.

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There is growing evidence of links between law and health demonstrating that social problems with a legal dimension can exacerbate or create ill health and, conversely, that ill-health can create legal problems. Public health experts have identified social factors as important determinants of health, even more than genes or clinical care. This session discussed the international development of integrating social welfare legal services with health services to address both health and legal needs. Health professionals and legal practitioners have been working to combine their respective services in order to provide more integrated services, such as Medical-Legal partnerships that can help train doctors to identify legal needs and bring legal advice into health provision. Still, there is a need for sustainable resources in the long term. We need to be able to demonstrate the benefits of health justice partnerships, as well as rigorous evidence and an impassioned argument to advance the agenda.

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In their work to increase access to justice for communities around the world, the Working Group on Transitional Justice and SDG16+ released a report urging policymakers and donors to support transitional justice as one important way to reduce the justice gap. In cases of extreme injustice—including in Syria, Myanmar, and Yemen—decreasing the justice gap is often primarily about stopping, addressing, and preventing the recurrence of large-scale human rights violations. To advance the 2030 Agenda for Sustainable Development in these extraordinary circumstances, extraordinary responses, including transitional justice, are needed so progress toward the SDGs does not leave behind communities with legacies of human rights violations. Transitional justice efforts can put victims at the center of the work and make sure that victims are included in the justice process. Transitional justice can be adapted to different situations and contexts and is flexible about the form that justice takes. Moreover, it can also be designed to tackle problems of scale, address structures of injustices in the form of legacies of violations, and emphasize nonrecurrence. These characteristics make these mechanisms uniquely capable of addressing the justice gap in communities that have experienced repression and conflict.

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The business community undoubtedly has a significant interest in justice and strong rule of law. But how can the business community take a leading role in achieving the SDGs and closing the justice gap? This working session explored the business case for greater engagement by business on justice and the rule of law, including the need for SDGs to be translated and explained in business language (e.g. in terms of risk factors of non-participation and legal implications) and the crucial role for lawyers in arguing why rule of law is in businesses’ self-interest. The session also identified ways champions in the business community can promote those efforts such as by developing standards for corporate compliance with the rule of law, ensuring supply/value chain responsibility, respecting existing laws and regulations, and leveraging the voices of local communities.

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This session proposed key categories of data needed to properly assess national trends relating to Pretrial Justice  and to report on the Agenda 2030 Goals to the UN. Recommendations regarding the specific SDG indicators on pretrial detention (PTD) included keeping the current indicator so that comparisons can be made over time, but fine-tuning it to make it more meaningful, and developing new indicators that are simple, do not create perverse incentives (e.g. arrest quotas), and focus on the quality of decision-making as opposed to the outcome of the decision. During the session several initiatives in countries that prioritized implementation of the Goal 16 pretrial detention indicator, such as Brazil, Sierra Leone, and South Africa, were showcased. Links to other Sustainable Development Goals and issues were also discussed, including the need to implement smart policies—such as not using PTD for crimes with a punishment of less than five years or for women who are pregnant or have children under 12—to reinforce the other SDGs.

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