South Africa: Volunteer Law & Human Rights Placements and Work Experience

South Africa: Volunteer Law & Human Rights Placements and Work Experience

With its brutal history of apartheid and colonialism, there can be few better places than South Africa to get involved in campaigning for human rights and make a real impact on people’s lives.

Our Law & Human Rights placements in South Africa are based in the bustling city of Cape Town. Although voted one of the most beautiful cities in the world, Cape Town harbours a noticeable disparity between rich and poor. A huge indicator of this can be seen when flying into Cape Town International Airport and viewing the housing situation below.

Volunteering on the Law and Human Rights placement in South Africa will give you the opportunity to work on really worthwhile projects, alongside likeminded volunteers and passionate staff. You will gain first-hand experience of human rights law in practice, gain knowledge about the legal system as well as learn about community involvement. Interns are given the opportunity to get involved at grass roots level, raising awareness about human rights to a variety of people throughout the Western Cape.

We have welcomed many volunteers including pre-university students as well as undergraduates, graduates and those taking career breaks. The work is suitable to all who have a general interest in human rights and are willing to work hard and dedicate their time to improving the lives of others.

The Law & Human Rights Internship in South Africa

In response to the huge need for human rights volunteers in South Africa, Projects Abroad funds our own Human Rights Office in Cape Town.

Volunteers are based at the Projects Abroad Human Rights Office, fondly known as PAHRO, which is located in the Rondebosch area of Cape Town. Your precise role within the project will be determined by your background, legal knowledge and level of interest in specific areas.

Our Mission

The collective mission of the Projects Abroad Human Rights Office is to promote respect for human rights and human dignity by providing good quality, independent legal advice to the poor and vulnerable and also to participate in social justice projects to bring communities together and educate them about human rights. We work with many vulnerable communities, especially those who were so appallingly mistreated during apartheid as well as those composed of refugees and African immigrants who are subjected to xenophobic attacks and mistreatment.

Our work simply aims to help ordinary people understand their rights, empower them to speak out when their rights are infringed, and to give them the skills and knowledge necessary to do so. In this regard we cover a broad spectrum of topics within our office. If you want to read more about the office and get an idea of the areas of work we cover, as well as details on the projects that are currently running please visit the Projects Abroad Human Rights Office website.

Your placement will typically involve several elements. You might be producing information resources, such as research reports or questionnaires or consulting with clients, handling case work and writing up legal opinions on these cases. At other times you might visit community groups, schools or shelters to carry out workshops on specific human rights aspects. There is plenty for you to become involved with and you will definitely be kept busy!

Your legal experience will determine the level of legal work you will be involved in and some of the more important, complex legal work may be reserved for those who have legal experience. It is also important that you have a good level of English to participate in this project. Strong English skills are especially relevant if you wish to work with the legal services.

Interns help us to support our key areas of work, these include:

Free and Independent Legal Advice

The Projects Abroad Human Rights Office offers free and independent legal advice to those who need it most and our clients and casework comes from a number of sources. Our first comes from clients who come into our offices after hearing about our organization through word of mouth. Secondly, we receive casework from the South African Human Rights Commission (SAHRC) for which we will carry out research and offer them a legal opinion on the outcome. And finally we conduct a free legal clinic in the community of Lavender Hill at the organization Philisa Abafazi for those who are unable to visit us here in the office.

There are a variety of case topics we deal with including, domestic violence and matrimonial matters, labour law, human rights violation referrals from the SAHRC and possibly our biggest area - refugee rights.

Immigrants and refugees rights have become a huge part of the work we do due to the instability of a number of countries within the region and South Africa increasingly becoming a central assembly point for refugees.

The Human Rights Office assists asylum seekers and refugees if they are facing serious protection and safety challenges within the communities where they are staying. We welcome them through our doors and offer them the necessary advice or assistance that they require. We assist them with such things as getting their correct documentation to ensure that they are staying in South Africa legally and assisting them when they have suffered violations of their human rights.

Community Development

By running workshops and discussions within disadvantaged communities we aim to educate and promote human rights to those who need the information most. We visit women’s shelters, schools, places of safety and groups within the communities. We deliver information about anything that may be relevant to them including drugs, violence, gangs, HIV/AIDS, housing, domestic abuse and so on. We know that we cannot reach everybody but if we can educate a group within a community there is the hope that they can become mentors for others and so the promotion of human rights can continue.

Parliamentary Monitoring

Even in an established democracy such as South Africa, independent monitoring of the discussions and decisions of parliament is vital to maintain transparency and public trust in government. Projects Abroad supports the work of the Parliamentary Monitoring Group, an independent regulatory body. Volunteers are able to sit in on committee meetings held in Parliament, with those attended dependant on the volunteers own personal interest and maybe any research they are carrying out.

Examples of a few of the committees which meet on a regular basis in Parliament include, The Select Committee on Social Services, The Portfolio Committee on Basic Education, The Portfolio Committee on Justice and Constitutional Development and the Portfolio Committee on Home Affairs.

There will also be times when volunteers will be requested by staff to attend Parliament if the legislation being debated is relevant to an area in which we as an office have a big focus, for example, the Children’s Act. In such cases when returning to the office volunteers will be asked to prepare a report for use by the office on the matter that was discussed.

Sometimes there are calls from Parliament asking for submissions/comments from any interested parties on draft Bills, draft regulations and others before they are submitted to the relevant authorities. This is something that interns are able to get involved in provided they are here for a long enough period.

Volunteering on the Law & Human Rights Project

Law & Human Rights volunteers should expect to work from 8.30am to 4.30pm from Monday to Thursday and then 8.30 to 1.00pm on Fridays. All volunteers need to show a good level of initiative; how much you get out of this experience is related to what you are prepared to put in. Volunteers who get involved, ask questions and make an impact on their supervisors will have a fantastic learning experience.

All volunteers need to be flexible, communicate well, and work hard as internships are demanding and must be taken seriously. You will be representing a professional organisation and you may sometimes have deadlines to meet.

The Projects Abroad Human Rights office closes over the Christmas and New Year period, from the 23 December – 2 January. This is due to the courts, Parliament and our project partners being closed for the holidays.

Volunteers can join this project from 2 weeks upwards; however, we recommend that volunteers join us for as long as possible. Those interning for 2 weeks or one month sometimes find that it is not long enough to get as involved as they would have wanted to. However, if you show initiative and throw yourself into your work then you are able to get a huge amount out of whatever length of time you spend here.

All volunteers taking part in any of the Cape Town based projects in South Africa have the opportunity to add a 7-Day Conservation Project to the end of their main placement. For more information visit our Conservation in South Africa project page.