Please note that this is an on-going project.
Project Description
This project is based on an in-depth longitudinal study of 3,894 children’s cases dealt with by customary justice systems in Lebanon, Jordan, the Palestinian Territories (West Bank, and the Gaza Strip), Afghanistan, Egypt, and Burkina Faso between 2013-2019. The report explores the complex ways in which customary or informal justice systems impact the children who participate in them, either as victims or perpetrators. Contemporary approaches to child-centered justice point to the need to engage with customary justice systems. The ability to access justice for all, including children, is a crucial component of securing peaceful, just, and inclusive societies. In order to measure impact and change particularly about issues relating to children’s participation in customary justice procedures, a longitudinal approach was used through field surveys, with a total of 3,894 cases collected between 2013 and 2019.
Project Personnel and Beneficiaries
This project was a collaboration with Terre des Hommes, a leading Swiss child rights organisation, and Griffith University’s Disrupting Violence Beacon. As we move closer to 2030 and as the need to achieve the targets contained in SDG 16 grows even more pressing, there is more focus on customary justice systems and the mechanisms needed to incorporate them into the justice landscape as a ’valid’ justice solution. This project complements and reinforces this growing movement to establish and provide child-centered justice for children, while recognising the need to work collaboratively with plural justice systems. The aim is to turn the complexity of reconciling customary and formal justice systems into an opportunity, by focusing on key elements that guarantee and provide access to justice forums to justice seekers, specifically to children.
Outcomes to Date
Upon completion of the project it has been found that contrary to a general belief that would imply that customary justice systems are used by those who cannot, for whatever reason, resort to formal justice, evidence shows that in fact children and adults from different backgrounds, positions, and status use customary justice systems as a preferred choice to resolve disputes. Customary justice systems are deeply rooted in local cultures and history, being a part of the fabric of society. The spontaneous legal order is endogenous to the group, because “it comes from the society in which it is respected“. In 67% of the 3,341 cases analysed, children were able to give an account of the facts during the proceeding. It also reinforced the collaborative opportunities that exist between customary and formal justice systems rooted in evidence, development, and evaluation of convergent justice solutions
Project Significance
There is now an unprecedented ’momentum’ to reinforce customary justice systems within the Child Rights’ and Sustainable Development Goal 16’ agendas.’ This project brings focus to the search for effective justice practices that can, on the one hand, situate customary justice systems as undeniably relevant to the advancement of accessible and effective justice. A child-centered approach to justice demands that justice seekers are the primary focus. This calls for children to be heard meaningfully, both by providing their narrative of accounts and their views about the justice outcome or solution. Being able to participate in this way requires that children are well informed about the justice process and feel safe in engaging with the process without coercion, violence, or retaliation. Children’s participation is one of the four core principles of the Convention on the Rights of the Child (Article 12, Right to be heard). While children’s participation in justice proceedings has improved in the last decade, the notion of child participation and acting in a child’s best interest remains ambiguous, and not sufficiently comprehensive when implemented within plurality justice systems. Customary justice systems are generally assumed to lack that participative option for children. This project shows that customary justice systems, while still far from providing the due place to children in terms of participation in the conflict resolution process, do not ignore their relevance in the process.