American Red Cross & Equal Justice Initiative: Strategies to Obtain Peace and Justice

Executive Summary

We analyzed both the American Red Cross (the case company) and the Equal Justice Initiative (the exemplar company). We looked to see whether the organizations were aiming their strategies to obtain peace, justice, and strong institutions from the United Nations' sustainable development goals.

From the exemplar company, we found that EJI's main goal is to achieve what the United Nations has listed as sustainable. The Equal Justice Initiative, founded by Bryan Stevenson, is a legal service that desires to eliminate the abuse that the justice system in America faces. EJI not only serves those incarcerated but it educates the public so that people are aware of the injustices that occur. The organization continues to do research so that it can stay up to date about problems that are going on in society and to create strategies that will reduce or end all injustices to initiate peace.

The case company we analyzed was the American Red Cross and its International Committee. The American Red Cross's goal is to develop peace and justice in developing countries around the world by bringing aid to those countries when disaster strikes. However, being that the Red Cross is the case company, we found some things that the Red Cross can improve on in their organization in order to achieve the UN sustainable development goal. The strategies that the Red Cross can improve on are its inclusivity for its committee board as well as strengthening the participation of developing countries in the institutions of global governance such as itself. To tackle the strategies, it is best for the Red Cross to create a membership board for their International Committee that is voluntary so that countries around the world can become part of it and to help it diversify its board. The second implementation that we found that the Red Cross should consider for increasing participation among developed nations is to limit its aid for countries that have a government that restricts its leaders from participating in global organizations that withstands inhumane practices and injustice.

Introduction

We will be developing a strategic plan for The American Red Cross to help them address the UN sustainability goal of “Peace, justice, and strong institutions”. We will compare them to an exemplar company, the Equal Justice Initiative. In auditing these companies, we will be using five audit standards:

1. Promote and enforce non-discriminatory laws and policies for sustainable development
2. Substantially reduce corruption and bribery in all their forms
3. Ensure responsive, inclusive, participatory and representative decision-making at all levels
4. Broaden and strengthen the participation of developing countries in the institutions of global governance
5. Develop effective, accountable and transparent institutions at all levels

Exemplar Company Review

The case company we will audit is going to be the American Red Cross. The American Red Cross is a non-profit organization that aims to help those in need after disaster strikes. An exemplar company that is doing something towards the goal is EJI (Equal Justice Initiative). EJI is a nonprofit organization that fights injustice in the criminal system in America.

EJI was founded in 1989 by a lawyer named Bryan Stevenson. They provide legal service to people who have been illegally convicted, unfairly sentenced, or abused in jails or prisons. They also help by challenging the death penalty and excessive punishment and helping formerly incarcerated people re-enter society after they leave prison. They specialize in helping communities affected by poverty and unequal treatment. They produce reports and short films about race issues in America to help improve race issues in America. They also provide research and recommendations to policymakers for criminal justice reform. They also publish reports, discussion guides, and various other educational materials to help accomplish the goal. EJI is meeting the UN goal by striving to reduce child imprisonment, racial injustice, mass incarceration, and eliminating the death penalty. The organization is aiming to establish a much more just and peaceful society as this is what the UN is trying to obtain.

In America the justice system is corrupt. There is a lot of unfair sentencing that takes place and cases that are not being brought to trial. Along with those troubles are those who are being abused in jail, and children who need to be given much less harsh sentencing due to the environment in which they grew up in and the mental capacity that they have. The ideas and principles that need to be balanced in order to tackle these problems and create a much better society are a mercy for the condemned and justice for the victims.

Case Company Audit

Promote and enforce non-discriminatory laws and policies for sustainable development

• -When it comes to promoting and enforcing non-discriminatory laws and policies for sustainable development, the Red Cross has a human rights council that seeks to reduce the impact of armed conflict and other situations of violence on people's lives around the world. The name of the human council is the International Committee of the Red Cross (ICRC) and they interact at the local, regional and global levels with stakeholders who can help create a change over the sources of the problems or situations dealing with humanitarian concerns.”

Substantially reduce corruption and bribery in all their forms

• -The Red Cross international committee aims at taking down global issues even in monetary and economic means to help the environment and governments of different countries.

Ensure responsive, inclusive, participatory, and representative decision-making at all levels

• The Red Cross’ international committee is not inclusive, it is being run by 25 members of Swiss nationality who represent and make all the decision-making. I believe that it would be best for the committee to elect those who are not Swiss-born but also come from different parts of the world to help in the decision-making on how to build strong institutions around the world.

Broaden and strengthen the participation of developing countries in the institutions of global governance

• The Red Cross committee tries to broaden and strengthen developing countries through the means of providing essential assets such as food, shelter, and clothing but does not have the ability to change laws in those countries. One thing that the international committee aims in doing is to remind the developing countries about human rights when it comes to their inhumane treatment of their citizens. That’s all they are able to do at this point because they are not allowed to truly interfere with the government and politics in other countries.

Develop effective, accountable, and transparent institutions at all levels

• The Red Cross has developed an effective, accountable, and transparent institution at all levels that aim to create peace and justice around the world. That institution is the International Committee of the Red Cross, and their mission is to promote human welfare.

In Summary, in judging The Red Cross with our chosen audit standards, The Red Cross is doing good at accomplishing the UN goal of “Peace, Justice, And Strong Institutions”, but they are not fully fulfilling all of the standards. They have more room to improve for sure. They are accomplishing standards 1,2, and 5 well. Our third standard “Ensure responsive, inclusive, participatory and representative decision-making at all levels” needs work to be more inclusive. The current international committee is not inclusive at all. They should work on becoming more inclusive. They should start electing people from all over the world to be on the committee to be more inclusive, instead of all swiss-born people.

With the “Broaden and strengthen the participation of developing countries in the institutions of global governance” standard, they are definitely doing some things by providing essential assets for developing countries. It also tries to remind them of their humanitarian rights, which is all they are able to do. They are not able to really interfere with their government directly.

The American Red Cross does a great job in trying to create peace, justice, and strong institutions around the world, however, there are some things that it can improve on when dealing with crisis situations globally.

The first problem that the Red Cross needs to fix is having an inclusive committee that helps in the decision-making process. In order to combat this, the Red Cross can have a membership board for countries that want to become part of their International Committee (similar to the United Nations Security Council). In that way, they will not be forcing anyone to join but it will be voluntary and give those leaders in developing countries an opportunity to get their voices heard. Another way they can implement inclusivity is by electing a new president to their board periodically. The current president of the Red Cross International Committee is Swiss-born Peter Maurer who has been in office since 2012. He took the place of Jakob Kellenberger who is also of Swiss origin. It would be best for the committee to consider electing leaders outside of Switzerland and try to look for those imposing their same qualities in countries that are being affected by the problems they are aiming to combat.

The second problem that the Red Cross needs to defeat is broadening and strengthening the participation of developing countries in the institutions of global governance. In one of the implementation goals that I mentioned before, having a membership treaty that gives developing countries an opportunity to join the Red Cross International Committee is a good way to ensure that there are no compulsions involved. In addition, the International Committee can have developing countries participate in their organization by imposing rules and laws that may prohibit some countries of receiving certain aid or a limited amount if they refuse to become part of their committee. This may sound a bit inhumane or harsh, however, the countries will continue to receive aid but it will only be limited because of their government laws that may try to keep them from becoming part of a global government. In this way, if the government desperately needs aid, it will decide to lessen its restrictions and allow its qualified leaders to become part of the Red Cross International Committee.

Conclusion

To conclude, the UN sustainable development goal seeks out to promote peace on a global scale and tries to unite nations by having the same mindset about eliminating inhumane practices and injustice. Goal number 16 on the UN development list demonstrates plans to deliver peace, justice, and strong institutions. With this objective, we analyzed both the Equal Justice Initiative (our exemplar company) and the American Red Cross (as our case company). EJI is an organization that mainly focuses its attention towards the American justice system and its incarceration. We found that EJI successfully displays the UN development goals by aiming to put an end to injustice and by creating platforms that build onto the concept of strong institutions that inform the public about what is going on and how the world can end it. The Red Cross contributes to the sustainable goals list but needed a few adjustments in its operation under the audit standards provided by the UN. Through those audits standards, we determined that the Red Cross could focus its attention in diversifying its committee by creating a voluntary membership board for developing countries and we also decided that the organization could increase participation by limiting its aid in hopes of having the developed nation's government remove its harsh laws that prohibit their leaders from being part of global governments and organizations such as the Red Cross. If the Red Cross considers our recommendations it will be able to join the Equal Justice Initiative in successfully meeting the goal of the UN sustainable development objective.