ICwS: The Institute of Commonwealth Studies (ICwS) and its partners, the International Commission of Jurists (ICJ) and the Commonwealth Secretariat launched a new Practitioner’s Guide on the decriminalisation of poverty and status at a packed side event at the Commonwealth Heads of Government Meeting (CHOGM) Samoa 2024.
This Practitioners’ Guide addresses the global, growing trend towards the wrongful criminalisation of conduct associated with poverty, homelessness and status by presenting a human rights-based approach to criminal law, based on general principles of criminal law and international human rights law and standards. This approach can be used to address the detrimental impact of the criminalisation of this conduct on health, equality and other human rights and to further its decriminalisation.
The Guide, the first of its kind, aims to serve as a practical tool and comparative law casebook to justice sector actors and others – such as legislatures, government officials, policy-makers, national human rights institutions, oversight bodies, victims’ groups, human rights advocates, civil society organizations and academics – offering a clear, accessible and operational legal framework and practical legal guidance on a human rights-based approach to criminal law. It aims to assist justice sector actors and others in pursuing legal advocacy and reform efforts for the review and repeal of discriminatory laws that are antithetical to human rights and the rule of law.
Background
At the last CHOGM at Rwanda in 2022, Heads of Government pledged to “fully implement laws that promote and protect inclusion, to eliminate discriminatory laws, policies and practices, and to promote appropriate legislation, policies and action.”
In response, the detailed Practitioners’ Guide on a human rights-based approach to criminal law, including to the decriminalisation of poverty and status, will serve as a reference and guide to governments, justice sector actors and others including members of civil society.
The Guide was produced following consultations with civil society and justice sectors across Asia, the Caribbean and Africa following a presentation at the Commonwealth Law Ministers Meeting in Zanzibar.
The Guide forms part of the work of the Global Campaign to Decriminalise Poverty and Status, which is a coalition of organizations from across the world that advocate for the repeal of laws, reform of policies and change in practices, that target people based on poverty, status or for their activism.
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