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International Human Rights Clinic LW5110

International Human Rights Clinic 2019-2020

This course introduces students to the concept of ‘movement lawyering’ (or,
‘social change lawyering’), and prepares and enables students to contribute
their skills to movements for human rights-based social change in Ireland and
internationally.
 
On successful completion of this course, you will:
  • Understand how grassroots/community-based movements tend to work to achieve systemic social change;
  • Be aware of a range of strategies and skills that those with legal training and knowledge of human rights law can employ as part of a movement for social change;
  • Have developed an ethical sense of how lawyers should approach and understand their work as part of a movement for social change;
  • Have developed a critical perspective on the limitations of law as a tool for social change and of the positionality of lawyers vis-à-vis institutional, structural and societal oppression and discrimination;
  • Have a basic knowledge of some of the key legal issues arising in areas of systematic human rights violations in Ireland (through the State’s treatment of victim-survivors of ‘historical’ abuse, and people seeking international protection) and internationally (through the impact of climate change and responses to it); 
  • Have contributed practical assistance to existing movements for social change, guided by the needs and advice of those already working within those movements.