People-centred justice approaches to stop forced evictions

Forced evictions are acute and violent manifestations of housing injustices, and too often affect the most marginalised groups in society. Although forced evictions are recognised by international law as a gross violation of human rights, they continue to take place in many countries.

When people’s rights are violated, they often turn to legal pathways for help. However, access to justice in land and housing disputes is often hugely unequal, leaving vulnerable communities facing forced evictions with few remedies against powerful actors.

A people-centred justice approach that focuses on people’s lived experiences and needs as a basis from which to transform justice systems offers an important pathway to deliver concrete, long-term solutions to prevent forced evictions and ensure people’s right to adequate housing.

What is IIED doing?

IIED is collaborating with Pathfinders for Peaceful, Just and Inclusive Societies to study collective action on forced evictions and launch a policy paper on people-centred housing justice.

IIED is applying a justice and rights lens to housing, land rights and urban informality by empowering grassroots groups and supporting efforts to shift power away from top-down legal systems.

This project builds on IIED’s housing justice portfolio of work and its research on forced evictions, including their impacts in the context of climate change and experiences of anti-eviction struggles in Brazil. Through a literature review and in-depth case studies, we analysed the following questions: what does a people-centred justice approach bring to housing justice efforts? What can be learned from the experiences of anti-eviction struggles for the transformation of justice systems?

The resulting policy paper explores how the different components of a people-centred approach can support justice systems to embrace prevention and remedy of forced evictions. The paper presents practical examples of anti-eviction struggles in Brazil, South Africa and North America, illustrating different levers that can drive people-centred justice in the context of forced evictions.

The examples showcase potential mechanisms to advance people-centred justice, including:

• Creating multi-sectoral conflict resolution spaces to address land disputes 
• Strengthening linkages between urban policy, planning and the justice system, and 
• Recognising collective grassroots structures as valid ways to negotiate justice outcomes.

The paper provides initial recommendations for advancing a people-centred justice approach to forced evictions. It also reflects on how housing justice struggles can drive broader shifts toward more people-centred justice systems.

IIED will co-host an online event with Pathfinders to disseminate the findings of the report and discuss its implications.