Dear Participants,
Welcome to the second day of the JUST SOCIETY conference: Addressing the Rule of Law and Welfare in the Sustainable Development Goals and welcome to our second keynote session on human rights-based approaches to development. I look very much forward to introducing our speakers in a few moments. But before focusing on today’s speakers, let me focus on the institutions they represent.
The 16th Sustainable Development Goal (SDG16) strives to:
“Promote peaceful and inclusive societies for sustainable development,
provide access to justice for all and build effective, accountable and inclusive institutions at all levels”
Today, we will hear from three institutions who work to promote SDG16 on a more or less global scale, even if they have their headquarters in Copenhagen, Denmark.
Let me present today’s institution number one: The 1953 Danish Constitution introduced a new phenomenon in Danish Constitutional law: The Scandinavian Ombudsman. How can I sum up this institution in just a few words? If I should choose only one word for the Danish Ombudsman, I am sure that it would be impact. As an institution, The Danish Ombudsman has shaped, if not created modern Danish Administrative Law. The former president of the European Commission described the European Union as an Unidentified Political Object, and I am sometimes tempted to say the same thing about the Danish Ombudsman institution. Maybe it is because the parliamentary ombudsman has no formal powers. He only has the power of his words. Of course, it helps if the government officials also listen. And in general, they do. The Ombudsman yearly follows up on complaints from thousands of citizens who experience serious hardships and who would not be able to wait for a trial or could not afford a lawyer. In my perspective, we could, and we should not be uncritical about the Ombudsman institution which, in Denmark, could be seen as a surrogate for the administrative courts that were never established in Denmark. Using the Ombudsman is not always an option, and nine out of ten cases are dismissed by the Ombudsman without review. Yet, there is little doubt that this institution is very well-respected. On a good day the ombudsman lives up to the words of the international writer Joseph Conrad: "My task, which I am trying to achieve is, by the power of the written word, to make you hear, to make you feel – it is, before all, to make you see." -
Moving on to the second institution, the International Work Group for Indigenous Affairs (IWGIA). This institution, founded in Copenhagen in Denmark in 1968, was – just like the Ombudsman institution – created by a group of dedicated scholars. It all started with a fear of atrocities being committed against native peoples in South America. This led to the establishment of a documentation centre, which soon became world famous. The project expanded and began to involve international human rights work as well as empowerment projects and producing publications. There are approximately 476 million indigenous people globally, according to the ILO. And even though indigenous peoples constitute only six percent of the global population, they make up 15 percent of the world’s extreme poor. Hard facts like these were the starting point for the work of the IWGIA. Since 2019, the institution has had a strong focus on climate, land rights, indigenous rights-defenders at risk and global governance. IWGIA is a global human rights organisation dedicated to promoting, protecting and defending indigenous peoples’ rights. IWGIA represents just how indispensable powerful NGOs are in the quest for peace and justice.
Finally, we will pay a visit to The Danish Institute for Human Rights (DIHR). DIHR plays a crucial role in Danish society as both a national human rights-watchdog with a legal mandate to monitor Danish legislation’s accordance with binding human rights obligations. Moreover, a large part of DIHRs efforts are directed to international work, where the institute works to promote human rights across the world and secure effective and sustainable national justice systems where duty-bearers provide justice services for all, and rightsholders have knowledge and ability to seek remedy for their grievances. In collaboration with NGOs and a network of national inter-national human rights institutes, the institute works conducts and disseminates research on fundamental human rights within a range of areas including business and Human rights, rule of law, education and sustainable development goals.
As such, I just overflew three of the major international human rights institutions in Denmark. Now, I will give the word to the representatives who incarnate these organisations. Let me now introduce todays speakers…
9 November 2021
To watch the opening remarks as well as the entire keynote session, click here.