I am thrilled to share a new book with you: Community Paralegals and the Pursuit of Justice.
Community paralegals demystify law and empower people to advocate for themselves. They are at the heart of our movement for justice. But they have been largely ignored by scholars and writers.
This book starts to fill that void. It’s been a long time coming — it’s the product of 8 years of research and writing by 14 authors across 6 countries: Indonesia, The Philippines, South Africa, Kenya, Sierra Leone, and Liberia.
Each chapter is rich with vivid accounts of paralegals helping communities to take on injustice, from domestic violence to unlawful mining to denial of wages. From these stories emerges evidence of what works and how.
The book explores questions like:
This book is for all of us. I hope it will make us better at what we do, and bring attention to our cause.
You can download a PDF copy of the book for free from the Cambridge University Press website.
We’d love to hear what you think. Do the lessons the book draws about paralegals and legal empowerment ring true to you? How do the experiences described compare with your own? Share your thoughts with our community here.
By: Vivek Maru, Namati CEO
“A must-read… If ‘access to justice’ is an abstraction to you, it won’t be once you read the stories in these pages of paralegals and clients seeking justice. Those stories are unforgettable. They hold lessons for all of us.”
– Mary Robinson, former President of Ireland, former UN High Commissioner for Human Rights, current chair of The Elders
“Thoroughly original…Anyone interested in the future of law and justice will have to reckon with this book.”
– Pratap Mehta, Vice-Chancellor, Ashoka University
“Frontline legal advocates can help people turn law into the guarantor of equality it is supposed to be. This book shows us how.”
– Bryan Stevenson, founder of the Equal Justice Initiative
“[A] powerful … guide to understanding one of the most promising emerging fields in the world today… Each individual story is inspiring, and the global potential of this profession to change countless lives is thrilling.”
– Ricken Patel, Founder and CEO, Avaaz – The World in Action.