Goal #16

The United Nations Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs)

SDG 16 Peace, Justice and Strong Institutions

Promote peaceful and inclusive societies for sustainable development, provide access to justice for all and build effective, accountable and inclusive institutions at all levels

UNSW is committed to this goal and demonstrates its commitment through:

  • Research informing and engaging leading debate in areas such as constitutional law and refugee justice
  • Our leading Law & Justice faculty, built on a steadfast commitment to the pursuit of social justice and the provision of free legal and tax advice for our students
  • Ensuring that UNSW is an accountable and inclusive institution at all levels, including reporting wrongdoing
  • The Kingsford Legal Centre, a community legal centre providing free legal advice, casework and legal education to our local community.
two females looking through a casefile

Delivering access to justice for the most disadvantaged members of our community 

The Kingsford Legal Centre (KLC) is a community legal centre providing free legal advice, casework and legal education to the local community. KLC is part of the UNSW Sydney Faculty of Law & Justice and provides a number of clinical legal education programs to its students. KLC's lawyers, volunteers and students help over 1,500 local community members each year with problems such as domestic violence, discrimination, housing, employment, criminal law, credit and debt, fines and victim’s compensation and is committed to social justice and to promoting access to and reform of the legal system.

 

Find out more

Centre for Crime, Law and Justice

Building on the strong tradition of criminal justice research and scholarship at UNSW, the Centre for Crime, Law and Justice was established in 2018. The Centre's primary goal is to support staff and higher degree researchers in the production of multi-disciplinary scholarship on important topics in criminal law, criminal justice, criminology and crime prevention that are of pressing local, national and international significance. Projects include:

 

Comparative Youth Penality Project

A major multi-year and multi-jurisdictional research project has made an important contribution to Australian and international youth justice research. Funded by an Australian Research Council Discovery Project grant, the project has undertaken an examination of more than 40 years of youth justice law, policy and practice in Australia and the United Kingdom. The team has analysed the changing approaches to youth incarceration, particularly in the context of perceived effects on crime and the substantial public and social costs of imprisonment.

Find out more 

Open letter to Australian governments

Initiated by members of the CCLJ at UNSW, more than 300 criminologists, lawyers and other academics from across Australia have signed an open letter calling on all Australian governments to take urgent action to address the over-criminalisation and over-incarceration of Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander people. The open letter catalogues the disturbing and overwhelming evidence of massive over-representation of Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander people in prisons, and as targets of police surveillance, enforcement and violence. 

Find out more

Drug Policy Modelling Program

The Drug Policy Modelling Program (DPMP) aims to improve alcohol and drug policy and the Australian Government Department of Health engaged the Drug Policy Modelling Program at UNSW to develop a National Treatment Framework (NTF).

 

Find out more 

Blurred lights on a dark street at night

UNSW Strategy in Action 2025

UNSW documents Icon

UNSW 2025 Strategy Update

This document celebrates the key achievements of the first phase of the 2025 Strategy, highlighting where we have come from and where we are now. It also updates the framework against which we will assess, track and measure existing and new strategic initiatives over the next five years.

Download

UNSW documents Icon

UNSW Annual Reports

Informing, engaging and leading through critical thinking, evidence and debate.

Read now

UNSW Law & Justice

UNSW campus Law building

UNSW Law & Justice is a top-ranking faculty and a global leader in law and criminology education and research, setting the pace in Australia for 50 years.   

Find out more 

The Institute for Global Development

4 symbols that make up the IGD logo

Invested in more than 35 projects since 2016, building institutional and community capacity, and supporting student placements and peer learning exchanges with partners in developing countries.

Find out more

The Indigenous Law Centre

Established in 1981, the Indigenous Law Centre (ILC) is the only Indigenous law research centre in Australia. The ILC contributes to the recognition, protection and development of the legal rights and freedoms of Indigenous peoples both in Australia and internationally. The Centre achieves this by conducting and disseminating innovative and high quality research on Indigenous legal issues and through community legal education on issues of particular significance.

Find out more 

Report icon png

UNSW Sustainable Development Goals 2020-2021 Report

This report outlines UNSW's performance against the SDGs over the years 2020-2021.

Download

Related stories

More SDGs