RDF Manila Human Rights Documentation

To whom are we responsible?

• Individuals that are the focus of documentation
• People who give you info
• People the info is about
• People who it is for
• People you communicate the info to/people who are listening/ppl who use/reuse your data
• Beneficiaries
• To all humans affected by human rights
• Your documentation team (and yourself)
• Any community indirectly affected by the data
• Those who are represented (directly or indirectly) by the data/info
• Donors and funding bodies
• Peers

What are we responsible for?

• Be honest about if you are the right org to be collecting data
• Using appropriate resources for documentation
• Mitigating adversarial use of data
• Thorough/imaginative risk assessments/mitigation stratgies/plans
• Analysis is correct/defensible; no misrepresentation
• Cultural/political sensitivities are carefully managed in collection/use
• Controlled/planned end to project and/or follow through in a sustainable way
• Clear objectives/goals
• Positively influence guidelines to good practice
• Credibility of over data/info
• Risk/impact of the work
• Verifiability of data (integrity)
• How/if/when to publish/share
• Credibility/integrity/transparency of methods/process
• Actually using it (not just collecting it) to create positive change
• Attempt to foresee future risks as times change
• Representations of data
• Protecting personal identifiable data in the broadest sense
• Simple/straightforward
• Data connects to advocacy mechanisms that are available
• Monitoring/informing data reuse
• Follow through particularly if the case is about an individual
• Rights-based approach to data use/collection
• Bring it back to the community you collected it/for

How are we held responsible?

• Legally/contractually
• Trust/relationship w/ communities and process of bringing data back to the community
• Legislative/policy frameworks
• Peers/agreements about good practice
• Donors/funders
• Internal guidelines/standards
• Adversaries (human rights violators)
• Conscience
• Media
• Boards/steering committees
• Institutional memory/culture
• Institutional review boards (IRBs at universities)
• Ethical framework
• Data audits/peer review/ external & transpareny reviews