Sistren Legal Collective
Sistren Legal Collective is dedicated to advancing social and racial justice by supporting grassroots civil society organisations and social movement groups led by and for marginalised communities in the UK. These include Black, Asian, Indigenous, migrant and refugee communities.
They use their legal expertise to work with community organisations, helping them organise, set up, and govern themselves in creative and pathbreaking ways. Their work facilitates the participation of marginalised and under-resourced communities in shrinking civic spaces by tackling legal barriers to entry and operation. They also support organisations in navigating restrictive environments for campaigning, political, and advocacy work.
In 2023, they conducted research into the legal support needs of organisations led by or for people from minoritised communities, particularly those working at grassroots level in England and Wales on issues of racial and social justice. This research identified a range of barriers to accessing legal advice that went beyond financial resources, and laid the foundation for building an organisation that could adequately address those barriers.
Based on direct feedback from grassroots community organisations, they developed 8 Principles of Community Lawyering:
They share lived experiences with or develop a shared understanding of their clients' community contexts.
They stand in solidarity with their clients' work.
They understand the systemic barriers that communities face in accessing legal advice.
They proactively dismantle barriers to legal advice by adopting an 'access to justice' approach in their legal practices.
They embrace collaborative and reciprocal approaches to exchanging knowledge.
They actively democratise and distribute access to legal knowledge.
They can advise on intersecting individual and community needs.
They situate their work within wider movements for social justice.
“We use our knowledge of the law as a tool to support the work of leaders, activists, changemakers and organisations centring social and racial justice.”
