Human Rights Clinic
The Human Rights Clinic is an experiential learning program in which students gain practical human rights lawyering experience in domestic and international settings, while critically reflecting on the role of law and lawyers in advancing human rights at home and in our region.
Attending the clinic on campus two (or one) days each week, students have significant responsibility working for, or in collaboration with, individual clients or organisations in Australia and Asia, under the Clinic Director’s supervision. The clinic’s casework and projects involve law, clients, partners or rights violations that extend beyond Australia’s borders, and focus primarily on advancing the human rights of noncitizens including migrant workers and refugees in Asia and Australia.
Typical clinic projects may involve, for example, supporting organisations in Asia and Australia to bring or intervene in public interest litigation within national courts to implement international human rights standards; drafting communications to UN human rights bodies on behalf of individual noncitizen clients or communities; documenting systemic rights violations, and producing an advocacy report; drafting rights-based guidelines, manuals or other educational materials for lawyers and/or communities; drafting white papers and law reform submissions; or filing freedom of information requests.
The clinic’s partners include community groups and civil society organisations, legal aid offices, legal centres, private lawyers, and university legal clinics in South East Asia and Australia.
The clinic’s current casework and projects focus on (1) the human rights implications of Australia’s anti-people smuggling laws and policies, particularly in relation to Indonesian fishermen and boys prosecuted and detained in Australia for smuggling offences, and (2) access to justice for migrant workers in the Asia Middle East Corridor, with a particular focus on improving Indonesian migrant workers' access to redress for rights violations.
The clinic seminar focuses on ethics and accountability issues in human rights work. It develops students' capacity for critical reflection as well as their practical skills in areas such as interviewing; human rights report-writing; law reform submission-writing; advocacy and the media; international and comparative legal research; working within different cultures and legal systems; and working with disadvantaged clients as well as with culturally diverse clients and partners.
For further information please consult the Handbook or contact Student Services.
