Pro Bono Clearinghouse
The Cyrus Vance Center Global Pro Bono Clearinghouse is a mechanism to refer internationally public interest legal projects to volunteer lawyers. The Clearinghouse matches community-based organizations, not-for-profit institutions, and groups of attorneys working on a voluntary basis on behalf of the poor and marginalized with attorneys who provide free legal assistance. The Clearinghouse refers projects within four categories: Amicus Network, Analytical Legal Research, Public Interest Law Reform and Technical Assistance.
Foreign organizations interested in obtaining pro bono legal assistance in any of these four categories and law firms interested in international pro bono projects can email vance@nycbar.org.
Pro Bono Declaration for the Americas (PBDA)
The Pro Bono Declaration for the Americas is a statement of principle and a plan of action for expanding the commitment of lawyers to provide legal services to the poor and underprivileged in the Americas.
Pro Bono in the Americas
Global Network for Justice Initiatives (GNJI)
The Global Network is a web-facilitated network of lawyers and advocates working to enhance access to justice and public interest law in their countries and regions. The project aims to promote an expanded, global concept of the legal profession's civic responsibility and allow greater collaboration among access to justice activists including lawyers in private firms, law schools, NGOs and bar associations around the world.
http://www.gnji.net
South African Visiting Lawyer Program (SAVLP)
The Visiting Lawyer Program, which was set up to address the continuing effects of apartheid on the South African legal professions, brings South African lawyers from historically disadvantaged backgrounds to New York City for one-year fellowships at law firms and corporate legal departments. To date, the Vance Center has brought twenty-nine lawyers to New York under the Program. Returned alumni are making partner at their firms and assuming other leadership positions in the South African legal and business community. They are also beginning to form an alumni network to support the continuing development and expansion of the program.
South-South Network
Recognizing the similarities between the human rights situations and human rights systems in Latin America and African, the Vance Center is setting up a network that will enable lawyers in the two regions to share their experiences with one another and to collaborate on projects. The Center cosponsored a roundtable in Arusha, Tanzania, in the spring of 2008 at which lawyers and other human rights advocates, including experts in the Latin American human rights system as well as judges, commissioners, lawyers and NGO representatives from Africa, discussed strategies for making the new African Court on Human and Peoples' Rights accessible and effective. The Roundtable was the first phase of a long-term initiative by the Vance Center to create linkages between human rights lawyers in the two regions.
Conferences & Seminars
The Vance Center has played a leadership role in organizing several international conferences on pro bono and access to justice. These conferences provide a forum for the diffusion of knowledge and the building of partnerships across borders among leaders in the private and non-profit sectors working on issues of access to justice and public interest law.
Examples of past meetings and conferences
Technical Assistance
The Vance Center organizes technical assistance projects to support law firms, bar associations, law schools and social justice organizations in Latin America and Africa that use law in service of the public good. These projects have used telephone and videoconferencing, research papers, and internships and exchanges to promote skills- and knowledge-sharing. Examples of technical assistance projects
Resource Library
The resource library contains reports and technical assistance materials on access to justice issues, ethics, professional responsibility and institutionalizing pro bono inside a law firm. Pro Bono and Access to Justice Library
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