Background
Throughout 2015-2016, a members-led thematic Cluster within Equinet brought together legal experts from equality bodies with an interest in strategic litigation in discrimination cases. This was followed up by an Equinet training on strategic litigation organised in December 2017, hosted in Warsaw by the Polish Commissioner for Human Rights.
Strategic litigation is already used by some equality bodies, while others currently consider experimenting the use of this tool to take up cases that can result in important clarifications and adjustments of the applicable law and positive changes going beyond the particular case. The Cluster and the training provided a space for interested equality bodies as part of an expert group to discuss the advantages, disadvantages and challenges of strategic litigation, share and discuss criteria for strategic litigation and analyse successful examples of court cases.
Discussions in the Cluster and at the training and their conclusions served as the basis of this Equinet Handbook on Strategic Litigation which we hope will serve as a useful resource for equality bodies and their partners considering to engage in strategic litigation.
The Handbook includes chapters on the following:
- What is Strategic Litigation?
- Principles of Case Selection
- Methods
- Risks of Strategic Litigation
- Sourcing Cases
- Media Work and Follow-up Activities
Download
Strategic Litigation Handbook (2017)
Accessible version (Word document) available here.