Human rights cannot flourish through government action alone. The citizens who benefit from these values must support and at times take ownership of them.

The age of information is also an age of innovation; many opportunities exist for activists and change-makers to pursue their own ideas and strategies in advancing access to justice.

Kolba wishes to work with individuals and groups with innovative ideas for advancing human rights, access to justice and the rule of law in order to increase their impact! If this is you, join us.

10th February, 2015 is the deadline for submitting your ideas…

Human rights are often understood as being like legal packages that are simply disseminated by governmental and international institutions.  Individuals and groups are seen as customers in this transaction, whose role is only to receive passively what someone else has created.

Human rights are rarely transactions.  The process of achieving rights and justice for all, regardless of age, disability, gender, race or ethnic origin, religion or belief, and sexual orientation, cannot be achieved without citizen activism.

The Government of Armenia has taken steps to support human rights, most recently under its human rights strategy.  Despite this there remains a lack of access to and awareness about human rights bodies as well as systems and processes of justice.

For example, rural areas lack special bodies that are able to offer legal advice and consultation, some citizens continue to be subject to discrimination on a day-to-day basis and many experience abuse of their labour rights.  But in all these areas significant improvements can be achieved with increased civic engagement and the development of new ideas and approaches.

Kolba views human rights as fundamentally citizen-centered.  Citizens must work together with government to ensure that all of society benefits from human rights reforms and to ensure that these reforms are being implemented.  Kolba provides the space for citizens to engage and lead this process.

If you have an idea that could address one of these big human rights issues, or if you are already working on these issues and you would like to increase your impact, Kolba would love to work with you.

Looking for inspiration?

Try the fast idea generator.  It is full of interesting ways to twist current approaches and generate creative ideas.

Some other cool examples of innovation in human rights include:

• Justice availability schemes, such as the Justice-on-wheels service developed in the Philippines.  Under this project, customised buses with courtroom and mediation rooms go to places where justice is inaccessible due to insufficient number of judges, high dockets, or distance.  Other access to justice ideas include Youtube channels devoted to providing free legal advice to anybody, anywhere.
• Co-operative networks that share knowledge and expertise.  For example, the European network of equality bodies ‘Equinet’, which has brought together 41 organisations from 31 different European countries in order to fully advance equality in the region.

These ideas are just to inspire – please do not let them constrain your creativity.