Partner With Us
Build with us, not around us.
Refugees in Libya works with organisations, movements, legal practitioners, researchers, journalists, artists, institutions and funders who share our commitment to dignity, freedom, justice and accountability.
For us, partnership is not simply the exchange of logos, visibility or institutional access. It means building relationships based on trust, shared responsibility and respect for the leadership of people directly affected by displacement, detention, border violence and racialised migration policies.
We welcome partners who are prepared not only to support our work, but to listen, contribute, share power and build with us.
Why Partnership Matters
The systems confronting refugees and migrants do not operate in isolation. They extend across borders, governments, courts, humanitarian institutions, private companies, detention centres, surveillance systems and political agreements.
Confronting them requires collective knowledge and coordinated action.
Refugees in Libya brings lived knowledge, community trust, documentation, political analysis and direct access to realities that are often hidden from public view. Our partners may bring legal expertise, research capacity, institutional access, resources, public platforms or specialised skills.
When these forms of knowledge are brought together responsibly, partnership can become a powerful instrument for protection, accountability and structural change.
What Partnership Means to Us
A partnership with Refugees in Libya must recognise that people with lived experience are not merely witnesses, beneficiaries or sources of information. We are investigators, organisers, analysts, advocates and decision-makers.
We are not a pool of testimonies to be accessed when institutions need evidence, legitimacy or emotional impact.
Partnership means involving us from the beginning: in defining the problem, shaping the strategy, making decisions, carrying out the work and sharing its outcomes.
It also means ensuring that the communities whose knowledge makes the work possible benefit from it and are not exposed to unnecessary danger, exploitation or abandonment.
Ways We Can Work Together
Law and accountability
We collaborate with lawyers, legal organisations and accountability mechanisms on strategic litigation, criminal investigations, evidence preservation, case development and efforts to hold states, institutions, militias and other perpetrators responsible.
Investigations and documentation
We work with investigative organisations, journalists and researchers examining detention, interception, trafficking, forced return, enslavement, border violence and state-sponsored or organised systems of exploitation.
Community protection
Partners can support emergency response, medical care, shelter, legal referrals, protection pathways, evacuations and other forms of assistance shaped by the priorities of affected communities.
Advocacy and campaigning
We build joint campaigns, public actions and political strategies aimed at changing harmful laws, agreements and practices, including policies that enable interception, detention, refoulement and the containment of refugees in unsafe countries.
Research and policy
We collaborate on reports, policy briefs, submissions and research that combine professional expertise with the knowledge of people directly affected by the systems under examination.
Media, culture and public education
Journalists, filmmakers, artists, educators and cultural institutions can work with us to challenge dominant narratives and create platforms through which refugees speak in their own voices and on their own terms.
Resources and long-term capacity
Funders and supporting organisations can help strengthen our independence, infrastructure, staff, community networks and ability to respond consistently rather than only during moments of crisis.
Our Principles for Partnership
Refugee leadership
People directly affected must have a meaningful role in setting priorities, shaping decisions and representing the work.
Mutual respect
Partnership should recognise different forms of knowledge. Professional credentials must not be treated as more valuable than lived, community or experiential knowledge.
Shared responsibility
Partners should remain engaged throughout the work and accept responsibility for its consequences, including risks created for affected individuals and communities.
Community benefit
Projects should produce meaningful value for the communities whose experiences, knowledge and labour make them possible.
Independence
Partnership must not compromise our ability to criticise governments, institutions, humanitarian actors or policies that cause harm.
No extraction
Testimonies, images, contacts, documents and community access must never be treated as resources to be taken without informed consent, protection and reciprocal responsibility.
Transparency
Roles, expectations, finances, authorship, data use and decision-making should be agreed clearly from the beginning.
What We Bring
Refugees in Libya brings more than access to people or information.
We bring:
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trust built within affected communities;
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direct knowledge of migration routes, detention systems and protection failures;
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experience documenting abuses and identifying perpetrators;
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relationships with survivors, families, legal teams and institutions;
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political analysis grounded in lived reality;
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experience in advocacy, campaigning and strategic litigation;
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the capacity to connect local realities with regional and international accountability efforts.
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We expect this knowledge to be respected as expertise.
Who We Work With
We welcome collaboration with:
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refugee-led and migrant-led organisations;
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grassroots movements and community groups;
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legal organisations and individual practitioners;
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investigative journalists and media organisations;
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universities and independent researchers;
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human rights organisations;
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artists, filmmakers and cultural institutions;
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trade unions and professional associations;
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foundations and ethical funders;
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public institutions prepared to respect our independence and principles.
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We do not enter partnerships that reproduce the same inequalities, silencing or exploitation that our movement exists to confront.
Begin a Conversation
Strong partnerships do not begin with a predetermined project imposed on a community. They begin with a conversation about shared values, responsibilities, needs and possibilities.
Whether you are proposing a legal collaboration, investigation, campaign, research project, public event, funding relationship or long-term alliance, we invite you to approach us with clarity about what you hope to build and how affected communities will participate and benefit.