GLOBAL JUSTICE CENTER

The Global Justice Center (GJC) seeks success on two levels - positive change at the international level that diminishes the corrosive power of centuries of oppression and patriarchy, and positive change at the individual level that transforms the everyday lives, health, and safety of women and girls.

We seek to promote gender equality by focusing on two priority areas: (1) Fighting for Sexual and Reproductive Rights, and (2) Demanding Justice for Sexual and Gender-Based Violence. Within these two priorities, GJC has four active programs:

1) "Abortion Access in Conflict" - advances sexual and reproductive rights in humanitarian crises.
2) "Illegal US Abortion Policy" - combats the United States' illegal and dangerous restrictions on abortion funding.
3) "Mass Atrocity Crimes" - ensures justice for gendered crimes of genocide, crimes against humanity, and war crimes.
4) "Discriminatory Legal Systems" - challenges legal systems that fail to serve justice for gender-based violence.

The Global Justice Center (GJC) brings a progressive, feminist lens and a human-rights based perspective to conversations and venues that have the greatest potential for global impact. GJC advocates for change using a three-pronged strategy:

1) Innovative Legal Analysis
2) Strategic Advocacy
3) Collaborative Partnerships

GJC's contribution to the field of international human rights is demonstrated by our solid legal analysis that advances advocacy efforts and supports governments as they work to fulfill their international legal obligations. Our innovative approach focuses on achieving gender equality by strengthening the implementation and enforcement of international humanitarian and human rights laws, and building the capacity of our grassroots partners to engage with human rights mechanisms.

GJC is a trusted partner and expert to NGOs, UN agencies, and domestic and international officials and policymakers. We provide training, model legal tools, advocacy talking points, strategic advice and direct assistance, and work to amplify the voices of grassroots actors.

This work is bolstered by GJC’s membership in the NGO Working Groups on the Security Council and on Women, Peace and Security, as well as the Inter-Agency Working Group (IAWG) on Reproductive Health in Crises’ sub-groups on Safe Abortion Care and Advocacy and Accountability. With Economic and Social Council (ECOSOC) consultative status, GJC engages with ECOSOC and its subsidiary bodies, as well as with the UN Secretariat, program, funds, and agencies.

It is GJC’s unique focus on using the law to embed gender equality—often in bold and innovative ways—as the cornerstone of our advocacy that sets us apart from our peer groups in these spaces.

Since 2005, GJC has made significant progress towards our mission. A few key accomplishments include:

- Pioneering the argument that international humanitarian law protects the right to abortion for girls and women raped in war and gaining recognition of this argument by the governments of the UK, the Netherlands and France, the European Union, the UN Security Council and the Global Study on Security Resolution 1325.

- Having rape and sexual violence included and prosecuted as crimes against humanity and genocide, using the international definitions of these crimes as established by the Rome Statue, in the trials of the Iraqi High Tribunal.

- Producing groundbreaking legal analyses of the role of gender in mass atrocity crimes, including the first comprehensive legal analyses of the gender-based crimes committed against the Rohingya in Burma and the gender-based crimes committed by Daesh under the Rome Statue.