Building Community-Led Justice Through Collaboration and Shared Learning
Date: September 7 – 9, 2025
Venue: Dhaka, Bangladesh 🇧🇩
Organised by: Nationality for All (NFA) and the Council of Minorities
Supported by: Namati and the Legal Empowerment Fund
From September 7 – 9, 2025, Nationality for All (NFA), in partnership with the Council of Minorities, and with support from Namati and the Legal Empowerment Fund, hosted the Paralegal Design and Implementation Exchange in Dhaka, Bangladesh.
The three-day exchange brought together representatives from Citizenship Affected People’s Network (CAPN), Nepal, and Family Frontiers, Malaysia, for an immersive learning experience focused on strengthening community paralegal programs that advance the right to nationality and address statelessness across the Asia-Pacific region.
Learning, Sharing, and Innovating Together
Over the course of the exchange, participants engaged in interactive workshops, collaborative planning sessions, and field visits to observe paralegal initiatives in practice. They shared their experiences, challenges, and innovations in building and sustaining paralegal programmes — from developing case management systems and documenting legal identity barriers, to ensuring meaningful participation of impacted persons.
The exchange demonstrated that the most effective solutions emerge when communities learn from each other’s realities — blending local knowledge, lived experience, and practical strategies for justice.
Paralegals as Catalysts for Change
Community paralegals play a vital role in bridging the gap between communities and justice systems, helping people navigate complex administrative processes and claim their rights to nationality, documentation, and recognition.
Through this exchange, participants explored strategies to:
- Design sustainable and people-centered paralegal programmes.
- Strengthen data collection and evidence-based advocacy.
- Foster cross-border collaboration between statelessness networks.
- Promote wellbeing and collective care among paralegals and community advocates.
These conversations reaffirmed that paralegals are not only facilitators of justice, but also drivers of systemic change within their communities.
A Movement Rooted in Peer Learning
The Paralegal Design and Implementation Exchange reaffirmed NFA’s belief that peer learning is not just a method — it’s a movement. When advocates and communities come together to share and reflect, they build stronger foundations for long-term change.
