UNDP Conference on Justice and Security Sector Reform "Coherence, Cooperation and Comparative Strengths"

Oslo, April 10-11, 2003

Lawyers Committee for Human Rights:
a comparative partnership with UNDP
Robert O. Varenik


Although we like to think that the current collaboration between LCHR and the UNDP's Bureau of Crisis Prevention and Recovery (BCPR) is novel for several reasons, the most interesting may be that we can bring the same approach, methods and products to bear on the security sector in Mexico as well as far more dramatic post conflict situations half a world away from North America. I hope that my remarks will demonstrate that what is at play here is a basic methodology, sensitive to country conditions but not circumscribed by them, and which without taking the analysis to too great a level of abstraction, can be said to form a (but not "the") template for promoting civil society advocacy for accountability in most situations of transition and opportunity.

Because this appears to be an atypical partnership for BCPR, it is probably worth explaining its genesis and current scope. LCHR spent much of 2001 developing new program areas, including policing and society, which evolved into a focus on means of accountability. Although the events of September 11 forced the launch of a full scale police accountability program to give way to a new domestic law and security initiative focused on the civil liberties aftershocks of the attacks, we decided to take a pilot policing project to Mexico. This effort reflects our attempt to plant the seeds of a culture of institutional accountability where none had existed, drawing on comparative experience to provide fodder for policy debate and development.

We have tried in Mexico combine the introduction of outside experiences with critical assessments of local police accountability mechanisms. Our approach to comparative experience forms the basis of the partnership with UNDP. We are jointly surveying several different types of accountability based on a simple matrix we developed, by examining, in each case, three different versions of the same mechanisms as they are manifest in different countries. These studies are undertaken by a diverse collection of experts from academia and law enforcement who operate under LCHR's direction and BCPR's auspices. In most cases, the authors come from the countries under review. Currently, there are three studies in the works, covering internal investigative mechanisms (generically known as internal affairs units), policies and procedures for review of use of force (principally firearms discharge); and external oversight mechanisms.

The countries studied are not primarily post-conflict or crisis situations. They are a mix of developed and developing jurisdictions, but in almost all cases differ from likely BCPR-interest nations. While some might question this approach (i.e., how to rebuild in traumatized nations by using relatively stable and highly evolved examples) we feel that these more stable situations better illustrate the end state which government and civil society alike should visualize before embarking on a rebuilding process. In the same vein, the well developed scenarios often highlight the choices and dilemmas, and with longer historical track records, can better demonstrate both the path of reform and the fringe benefits of instituting such changes than a recently emergent society still in the throes of rebuilding. The failures too, may often be well documented and can be equally important fodder for analysis.

It may well be the case that in the actual implementation of such mechanisms many of the arising practical issues will mirror other post -conflict situations, so there is clearly a need for awareness of other analogous processes. However, having been a part of various efforts to draw lessons from international community's previous post conflict or crisis interventions, I feel the tendency has been to offer narratives — descriptions of what has been done to begin to develop a passable set of structures — rather than an analysis of what makes good structures good. This partnership is premised on the notion that the latter assessments are relevant to rebuilding efforts, and that they are more readily drawn from review of factual patterns that are admittedly very different from those in which UNDP will be working. They are not intended to be the only tool needed for reconstruction, but we think they will be highly useful.

Although as I have indicated, the production of these studies is the essence of this partnership — each partner is free to make use of the results in their respective areas of activity — we believe that the balance of what LCHR is doing in Mexico is an extension of the same approach, and is also relevant to this discussion. Indeed, while promoting change in Mexico is an important goal for our organization, LCHR undertook this effort because it shares BCPR's belief that the lessons of comparative advantage are important for the relevant actors in diverse situations around the world. Within that broader context, our joint and several initiatives further the goals of promoting civil society advocacy for accountability in two main ways:

• By focusing experts the mining of international experience in building the architecture of accountability, we provide the basic tools for advocacy.

• LCHR's in-country efforts examine which civil society strategies might be most useful in the local context, and seek to support and develop them.

The comparative studies emphasize a functional analysis rather than a narrative of country efforts. In order to provide some texture that will aid both advocates and decision makers, the studies offer a multifaceted tool comprising:

• a generic template for the mechanism at hand, combining a description of its main purposes and functions, and highlighting the principal institutional, political or legal choices that confront the architect of that system element;

• an assessment of how each critical issue is resolved in three distinct country situations (which are chosen not simply to reflect different nations or regions, but also significantly different models, and often different legal and institutional traditions;

• analysis of the interaction between the studied mechanism and the other existing elements (if any) in the accountability systems;

• To the extent appropriate (and here we must be quite careful) identification of the most promising models (or elements thereof) for a hypothetical jurisdiction with little or no accountability tradition, significant problems of misconduct (either past or anticipated or both) and relatively weak external mechanisms for control of police behavior.

LCHR believes that this question is sufficiently critical that it merits revisiting as a stand-alone issue. Indeed, since from an analytical point of view our primary aspiration is to elucidate and articulate the element of systems, information management should be perhaps the focal point of our effort. (This need not mean, by the way, high technology, or in the conference parlance, elaborate programming. The concept of tracking certain types of information, which can (and in some instances is preferably) done manually is important, not the use of high-powered software.)

It may be illustrating the obvious, but let me draw from the notorious experience of the LAPD. Imagine, from television car chases, the linked efforts of the police to apprehend the criminal -- helicopters talking to station dispatchers, dispatchers relaying to patrol cars in different sectors to help them converge and join the chase, headquarters evaluating the facts relayed to it and making decisions as to deploying different elements, whether and when to put up roadblocks, how to handle the imminent confrontation, etc. That is a system, communicating among its various parts.

Contrast that with the facts revealed by an investigatory commission after the now-infamous beating by LAPD officers of an African- American motorist, Rodney King. LAPD had internal affairs units, pre-employment screening, complaints procedures, prosecuting attorneys for criminal cops, sensitivity training and the like. But what the commission found was that evaluation processes never utilized civilian complaint data, which in turn was not digested and reported up the chain of command in a fashion that would have told any minimally competent manager that the Department had a particular rotten sector of officers with a disproportionately rich history of excessive force and civilian abuse — and, parenthetically, that this group was disproportionately represented among the perpetrators of that beating. The Department had a recorded data base of officer transmissions with dispatchers and among patrol cars, which was a sad but rich source of intelligence about the need to upgrade departmental sensitivity training as well as disciplinary procedures. There was apparently no policy or practice of reviewing such tapes for clues about officer understanding of an adherence to basic elements of the training.

In short, LAPD had the pieces but not the sum of the parts -- it lacked an effective system. And it cost some Angelinos their lives, others their freedom, and as is particularly the case in the United States, the city of Los Angeles millions of dollars in litigation damages paid out. One trusts that information management is now a lot higher on the LAPD wish list after lurching through a series of scandals over the last decade.

The papers themselves are intended for multiple audiences, not solely government officials. With NGOs and others in mind, they are written to demystify the working notions that underlie the mechanics of organizational or institutional accountability — a technical area relatively unknown outside of law enforcement and academic circles, and certainly not the daily bread of most NGOs', journalists, or even lawyers and judges. This is, in the broadest terms, an educational effort on a number of fronts, or more accurately, aimed at a number of audiences.

In this context it is worth revisiting the fact that LCHR is first attempting to utilize this approach in Mexico. Unlike the typical BCPR context, Mexico presents a much more stable environment whose transition is a frustratingly subtle evolutionary opening of governance styles, combined with a growing acknowledgement (fueled in part by newfound political competition) that the justice and security sectors are disastrous, and are in need of significant renovation.

However, as the study formats should indicate, we have designed this particular collaboration according to the working assumption that civil society groups are virtual newcomers to this material, that their recent orientation has been more towards "struggle advocacy" -- decrying official abuses, questioning the legitimacy of the government (or at least governing style) — than technical policy analysis or close assessments of institutional performance. This oversimplifies reality, of course, but it helps ensure work products that can be readily assimilated by various intended audiences. It is also worth noting that, with important caveats, it is a workable assumption even for Mexico, where civil society, including academia, have (probably for reasons different from those operating in the post conflict societies that most concern BCPR) have by and large not been able to enter this particular policy arena in any perceptible fashion.

LCHR: seeking other formulas to assist NGO advocacy.

It seems evident (and indeed our partnership is founded upon this assumption) that there is learning to be done by both government and civil society regarding the mechanics of institutional accountability. Among the obvious challenges are

• Finding ways for officials and civil society actors develop the same or similar knowledge foundations (obviously, these studies are a start);

• Developing a more inclusive means of positioning accountability, i.e., one that reconciles controls and respect for rights with effective crime-fighting;

• Looking for the best mechanics to promote a change process (which often draws on comparative experience);

• Conducting investigations in a way that defines a methodology so that others can use the same approach;

• Trying to forge alliances, particularly among NGOs, academics and selected journalists -- since often individual sectors have weaknesses that make combining forces essential to ensure impact.

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