When the Global Strategic Litigation Council for Refugee Rights was first imagined, its founders
were responding to a striking imbalance. Governments across the world were actively sharing
practices on how to remove and restrict refugee and migrant rights, while civil society actors such
as lawyers, activists, academics, and nonprofits were fighting those battles in isolation.
The Global Strategic Litigation Council for Refugee Rights, currently housed at Cornell Law’s
Migration and Human Rights Program, was created to close that gap.
The Council emerged from years of conversations among strategic litigators convened by Ian Kysel,
co-director of Cornell’s Migration and Human Rights Program, and Alex Elov, then head of the
Zolberg Institute. Those conversations crystallized during the pandemic, when a decision was made
to start coordinating strategies and mobilizing resources to advance refugee rights in an
innovative way. In 2021, the Council was launched with 28 founding members as a global legal
knowledge-sharing community.
Connection alone was not enough. Civil society organizations were stretched thin, with little
capacity to collaborate across regions without active support. Under the leadership of director
Bella Mosselmans and Kysel’s guidance, the Council evolved from a peer network into a structured
global coalition with dedicated regional staff and a clear strategy. The goal was to build the
infrastructure needed to translate shared legal knowledge into real-world impact.
Today, the Council brings together more than 630 litigators in 79 countries, alongside refugee
leaders, advocates, organizations, and academics. Its regional networks, supported by lead
litigators based in Mexico, Costa Rica, Nairobi, India, and the United States, were designed to
leverage the fact that many refugee and migration challenges, as well as court systems, are similar
within regions.
By convening in-person consultations and maintaining cross-regional communication, the Council
enables legal strategies and precedents developed in one country to inform cases in another. They
can challenge widespread policies across multiple jurisdictions, also benefiting from their
connections to civil society and communities on the ground.
That model has delivered tangible results. Recent cases have involved obtaining citizenship for
refugees in Africa and the Asia Pacific region, or securing the release of migrants deported by the
U.S. and detained in Latin America and Africa.
A prominent example is the Council’s work in Panama following the election of President Donald
Trump in late 2024. Anticipating a rise in cross-border deportations, the Council convened its
regional network in the Americas to prepare legal strategies in advance. They decided to challenge
the cases in the countries where the migrants were sent. When asylum seekers were transferred to
Panama and detained, the Council, working closely with Cornell’s Transnational Disputes Clinic,
moved quickly. A request for precautionary measures before the Inter-American Commission on Human
Rights was filed, drawing on legal theories refined collaboratively months earlier. Panama released
nearly all detainees just days later, demonstrating the power of coordinated litigation.
Another area where the Council is shaping the field is climate displacement. Through its Climate
Mobility Case Database, the Council is documenting how courts around the world are addressing
climate-related displacement, filling a critical research gap and serving as a foundation for
future litigation and advocacy. The Council is currently working with displaced communities in
Brazil and it played a key role in a landmark climate opinion by the Inter-American Court of Human Rights, helping lift up underrepresented Caribbean perspectives.
Across its work, whether on detention and due process, legal status and lawful stay, or climate
displacement, the Council leads and supports litigation, offers free training, develops
forward-looking legal strategies, and creates spaces where knowledge travels faster than
restrictive policies.
With a lean team and a rapidly growing global membership, the Council has already contributed to
litigation affecting more than 400,000 people worldwide. Its continued growth underscores both its
success and the scale of the unmet need it was created to
address.