Institute for Policy Research and Advocacy (ELSAM), established in August 1993 in Jakarta, is a policy advocacy organisation with limited association as its legal entity. To actively participate in the efforts to develop, promote and protect civil and political rights and other human rights, as mandated by the 1945 Constitution and Universal Declaration of Human Rights (UDHR), has become ELSAM’s ‘driving’ objective. From the outset, ELSAM has committed itself to developing a democratic political order in Indonesia by empowering civil society through advocacy and promoting human rights.         

 

MISSION

In general, ELSAM’s overall programs goal is aimed to encourage and stimulate the realization and establishment of a social order within society respecting human rights values, democracy, social and economic justice, and gender perspective throughout Indonesia.

 

PRIORITIES

1. Settlement of Gross Violations of Human Rights, including Past Human Rights Violations. In handling this issue, ELSAM will run a program that covers activities and efforts for the empowerment of an established institution, which will work for the settlement of gross violations of human rights; and pulverize authoritarianism nature within institution, policy or culture that hinder the settlement process of gross violations of human rights;

2. Reinforcement of Human Rights Protection from the Hazard of Market Fundamentalism, Religious Fundamentalism and Communalism. In handling this issue, ELSAM will run a program that covers activities and efforts that concentrate on human rights protection strategy in the local level and promotion of human rights fulfillment in all state’s policies;

3. ELSAM Institutional Building through Institutional Development, Capacity Empowerment and Reinforcement of Institutional Capacity and Accountability. In handling this issue, ELSAM will run a program that covers activities and efforts focusing on strategy to increase organization capacity, management and staff to make it adequate to support the accomplishment of ELSAM vision and mission.

 

ACTIVITIES

 

Research and Study of Alternative Policy Development

The program is designed to provide strong analysis in developing policy advocacy. The program covers three main activities, namely (1) study of policy or legal impacts on human rights, particularly policy regarding the settlement of human rights violation in the past, policy that has legal impact on the enjoyment of economic, social, and cultural rights, (2) study on international human rights instruments and other peaceful human rights settlement mechanism, (3) study on accountability mechanism of gross human rights violation in economic, social, and cultural rights, and (4) legal drafting.

 

Advocacy and Campaign

The program is designed to foster public opinion through seminars, conferences, public debates, and mass media program.

 

Publication

The program is designed to collect and process data information related to human rights violations and to disseminate information to networks and society at large including producing ELSAM publication.

 

Workshop and Training

This program is designed to offer human rights education and training program in the priority regions and sectional network of ELSAM. Besides human rights training are also provided initiative workshop on economic, social, and cultural rights monitoring, human rights mechanism in general for student, human rights defenders and lawyers.

 

Monitoring and Investigation

This program is designed to facilitate the ongoing rapid changes and its implication to the human rights violations. Besides, it provides necessary data to conduct study and research to develop alternative policy in preventing gross human rights violations.

 

Lobby

This program is designed separately from advocacy and campaign program in order to intensify its function in policy advocacy. This program is specifically addressing the important of establishing policies that adopted human rights perspective standards through lobbying the parliament and related government institution

 

Planning, Monitoring, and Evaluation

This program is designed to develop good planning, monitoring and evaluation system to support the implementation of overall programs of ELSAM.