@ the Center: 🗺️ NCSC International Programs announces projects in three continents

National Center for State Courts sent this bulletin at 04/10/2019 09:06 AM EDT

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APRIL 10, 2019

New international projects in three continents announced

NCSC International Programs has announced new projects to work with courts and court advocacy groups in Asia, Africa and South America.

“This represents a small amount of our work globally, but we’re thrilled to be growing and helping courts in emerging democracies and in countries where we have an established presence,” said Jeff Apperson, vice president for NCSC International Programs. “This is exciting and meaningful work. We’re looking forward to growing our relationships in those places.”

Here’s a brief summary of the work:

NCSC will help the Lebanese High Judicial Council create and use electronic archiving systems that will improve records maintenance and management. Funding comes from the U.S. State Department’s Bureau of International Narcotics and Law Enforcement Affairs (INL).
INL is also funding an effort to provide training for prosecutors throughout Honduras.
NCSC teams are working in Colombia and Peru this year to support criminal justice and security sector capacity building in those countries.
NCSC is working in Myanmar to protect legal rights and promote access to justice, along with Chemonics International, Inc., a Washington, D.C.-based company that works in developing countries, to support U.S. Agency for International Development's Promoting Rule of Law Program.
NCSC serves as the secretariat to the International Organization for Judicial Training, which is hosting a conference from Sept. 22-26 in Cape Town, South Africa. The organization’s mission is to support the work of judicial education institutions and advance judicial training worldwide. Go here to register for the conference and here to respond to the call for papers.

Read more here about NCSC’s work outside the United States.

Making family courts work better for families

In a step to make family courts more user-friendly, the Conference of Chief Justices adopted new principles to help courts meet the public’s changing needs and expectations. The principles, released this week, seek to make family courts less adversarial, more efficient – particularly for those individuals who use the courts without the help of an attorney – and more responsive to the needs of the families involved in litigation. The principles were developed as part of the Family Justice Initiative, a partnership between NCSC, IAALS (the Institute for the Advancement of the Legal System), and the National Council of Juvenile and Family Court Judges (NCJFCJ). The State Justice Institute is funding the initiative.