Rachel Law
SoCO (Society for Community Organization 香港社區組織協會)
Hong Kong, China
Community engagement and organizing are major aspects of human rights advocacy and important parts of my work here at SoCO. As part of my research project on improving the prison internal complaints system, I made several outdoor visits to clients collecting relevant research materials, including interviews with an ex-inmate and a current detainee at the Lai Chi Kok reception center (a center housing detainees awaiting transition to their assigned prisons).
Through these interactions, Tracy (my project teammate!) and I got to hear from an insider’s perspective and analyze case documents provided by the clients, which include complaint correspondences with the Correctional Services Department (CSD), testimonies from and transcripts of prison internal disciplinary hearings, complaints investigation reports, and more. These materials are critical to deepening our understanding of the practicalities of the prison complaints system and providing our research with hard evidence.
More importantly, the engagement of stakeholders and community members means including their input and recommendations—which are often developed through their personal experiences with the prison system—as an integral part of our research. For instance, a client shared a distressing experience of failing to request the use of CCTV recordings as evidence in a complaint investigation. His statement seems to conflict with the CSD’s claim that their investigations are fully compliant with standard practices, which led us to focus on the gap between policies and execution in our study.
Interestingly, conversations with our clients revealed not only loopholes in the current system but also a shared vision of what the ideal system should look like. We coincidentally identified the main solution: creating an independent committee to oversee complaints handling and investigation as well as to act as the point committee for everything equity-related in prisons.
This idea, for me, is one reflected in the recent appointment of the chief diversity officer at NYU. It is fascinating to see how my experience abroad has shaped not only the way I perceive the prison system but also how the yearning for justice and fairness transcends geographical boundaries.
Community input is essential, and the fight for justice cannot be fought alone. Through assisting some of our clients with filing complaints related to procedural unfairness with different departments, such as with the Privacy Commissioner for Personal Data, and through organizing press conferences to make a petition to the chief executive, I had the chance to help organize members of the community by encouraging them to speak up and be more open about their issues.
Next time, I will share more about our collaboration with not only members of communities that we are serving, but also with other human rights advocates and the society at large. Stay posted!