refugee Rights in records framework

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OPEN FOR PUBLIC COMMENT

The R3 Project is now soliciting feedback on the draft Refugee Rights in Records Framework. Please email Kathy Carbone kcarbone@ucla.edu with any comments.

Arguing that documentation, data and recordkeeping practices create critical impediments to the actualization of human rights, R3 Project researchers (Anne J. Gilliland and Kathy Carbone) analyzed 19 human rights and data privacy conventions and instruments, and professional guidelines for records relevant to human rights, as well as media, NGO, legal and personal accounts of documentation and recordkeeping challenges faced by refugees. Based on these analyses they have proposed the following Framework comprising the following 25 possible rights that could support refugees in enabling and actualizing their human rights while also improving the effectiveness of recordkeeping by agencies and authorities who are assisting or otherwise interacting with them. 

The rights are grouped under nine rubrics or kinds of rights. They were last update July 27, 2020 based upon feedback received.

Rights to have a record created:

· The right to be provided with a universally recognized identity document upon request.

· The right to have a birth certificate, and to have both parents' names listed on that birth certificate if the father is deceased or otherwise unable to be present at his child's birth, if the mother requests it. 

· The right for family members and other dependents to a process for issuing a death certificate when there is no body after a certain amount of time. 

Rights to know:

· Prior to a record about oneself being created, the right to be fully informed about why it is being created, what it will contain, what it may be used for now and in the future, and how it will be secured. 

· The right to know that a record about oneself exists, where, why, and who can see it and under what circumstances.

· The right to know if there is a classified record or data impeding an action one is trying to complete.

Rights regarding records expertise:

· The right to be provided, and at no cost, with the index terms or other metadata necessary for locating and retrieving records about oneself.

· The right to request and be provided with a records advocate or other expert in locating, introducing and challenging records.

· The right to have a records expert testify regarding the historical and bureaucratic circumstances surrounding the creation, management, reproduction, translation and reliability of records about oneself that are introduced in asylum and immigration adjudications, return, restitution and other actions.

Cultural, self-identity and family rights in records:

· The right to have one's cultural or community recordkeeping practices recognized in legal, bureaucratic and other processes that depend upon the introduction of records.

· The right to have one's self-identity acknowledged in records about oneself, including, but not limited to name, gender, and ethnicity.

Right to respond and to annotate (right to rectification):

· The right to respond to and include a permanent annotation on records about oneself.

Refusal and deletion rights:

· The right to refuse to participate in the creation of a record about oneself or to resist being recorded if there is a credible fear that doing so will compromise one's human rights or those of others.

· The right to request deletion of a record or deletion of data or metadata about oneself from a record if that record, data or metadata would compromise one's human rights. 

Accessibility, reproduction and dissemination rights:

· The right to access records about oneself, including those that are still otherwise subject to legal or other closure periods.

· The right to access one’s record according to one's own literacy, modality, writing or signing system.

· The right to guaranteed safe, secure, timely and low or no-cost access to relevant records about oneself upon request.

· The right to receive copies of records about oneself, and to specify the form and format of those records, or else to be given a clear explanation as to why one may not.

· The right to transmit or share records about oneself.

Consultation rights:

· The right to be consulted regarding how, where and when records about oneself are preserved or archived, made available for archival research, or disposed of.

· The right to be consulted when and why another party, including family members, requests access to a record about oneself.

Personal recordkeeping rights:

· The right to a secure personal recordkeeping/archival space.

· The right to a safe, secure, and trusted infrastructure for managing, preserving, certifying, and transmitting one’s documents. 

Supplemental Materials

The R3 Framework juxtaposed with other frameworks proposing human rights in documentation or information processing