Microjusticia: Case studies

image image image image image image
Access to citizenship (Serbia - Croatia ) Biljana Buljevic is originally from Gracac, Croatia, but she now lives as a refugee in a collective center in Kladovo, Serbia. She has no regular income. Because she did not have any formal documentation, she was unable to get a job. Since she did not have any Croatian documents, she could not start the procedure to obtain the Serbian citizenship – necessary to obtain any type of legal work.
Read the Full Story
Access to finance (Bolivia) Juana Huayller has lost her husband recently. Now, as a widow, she needs to earn her living. She wanted to open a little coffee place near the market. She has approached a microcredit institution where an officer explained the requirements to get a loan. Among those, she needed a death certificate of her husband. This certificate will allow her to have a preferential interest rate.
Read the Full Story
Access to insurance, social benefits and voting (Bolivia) Hilaria is a mother of 5 children. Since ten years she has been trying to obtain her birth certificate. She did not manage however, since there are inconsistencies between the data in the registry books and on her documentation. On top of this, there is an error in her mother’s registration as well: the mother is registered as Juan instead of Juana.
Read the Full Story
Access to Producers Associations (Perú) The peasant community Molina Kapia is located in the Chucuito province of Puno. In Peru all communities and their elected leaders need to be registered. Without registration, they cannot participate in Producers Associations. The problem for this community was that the previous director had died. Because of this, the community could not comply with the required procedure. For more than 2 months the community did not manage to solve this problem.
Read the Full Story
Access to social benefits (Perú) Dionisia is a young mother of three children. She is a farmer. For nine years she has not been able to get the birth certificates of her children because her name and surname are wrongly written in the birth registry book.

Without the birth certificates of her children, she cannot participate in the public social program called “Juntos” (together), which provides financial support and social services to poor families with small children.
Read the Full Story
Access to special pension(Serbia - Croatia ) Mirjana Posinak is from Croatia, but now lives in Backa Palanka, Serbia. As she suffers from a serious disease, she is not able to earn her own living and depends on her pension. She is a Serbian citizen, but cannot apply for a state pension as she is not old enough. Before, in Croatia, she has worked many years. This would give her the right to obtain a special pension, but she can not proove this.
Read the Full Story

Welcome to Microjustice for all

Microjustice is an innovative, sustainable way of delivering legal assistance to poor people, to enjoy their basic rights, empowering them to participate in society in full dignity.

Often, simple access to fundamental rights opens up a floodgate of opportunities that allows poor people to end their cycle of poverty. For example, having identity papers is pre-requisite to many basic rights - going to school, getting a job, owning a business, home or land, accessing health care, getting social benefits and participating in society. Yet, many poor people do not have the right papers due to lack of knowledge or the bureaucratic and expensive processes of obtaining them. They cannot afford the help of a lawyer, nor does traditional legal aid reach them. Thus disadvantaged people end up even more marginalized, and the poverty spirals into the next generation.

Microjustice’s innovative model addresses these needs by providing the legal services demanded at a price level that even poor people can afford, allowing the disadvantaged to access a whole range of opportunities, and facilitating a long-lasting, sustainable way out of poverty.

Our Vision is a world where everyone lives in dignity, enjoying their basic rights and protected by a system of social justice.

Our Mission is to empower poor and vulnerable people globally in enjoying their fundamental basic rights and the opportunities these rights offer.

We hold the following Beliefs:

  • Access to legal rights is a prerequisite for numerous opportunities that will allow people to live better lives;
  • Without access to justice, small issues can escalate into larger problems, churning the poor into a vicious cycle of poverty and disempowerment;
  • Four billion people in this world need legal aid in accessing their basic rights;
  • A new, innovative model of legal empowerment is needed because traditional programs are usually expensive, unsustainable and do not reach the people who need the services the most.  
 
Copyright © 2012 MICROJUSTICE FOR ALL. All Rights Reserved.
Joomla! is Free Software released under the GNU/GPL License.