Part III: A systematic change perspective Dimensions of change regarding duty-bearers and rights-holders, including issues of institutional culture Another way of looking at dimensions of change is to focus on the three dimensions of learning that have been developed in the context of human rights training and education, but can be seen to be relevant in the broader field of human rights practice. These dimensions envisage enhancing the capacity of dutybearers to be better able to respect, protect and fulfil human rights as well as rights-holders to claim their rights.271 In the context of preventive monitoring, the most relevant duty-bearers are staff and management at places of detention as well as officials at the system administration/ministry level. A wide range of activities, including but not limited to awareness raising and capacity development measures, might be undertaken to promote change in the following three dimensions: • Change at the level of knowledge and understanding about required professional and human rights standards, including about the role and function of NPMs • Change at the level of skills so as to perform one’s duties according to the required professional and human rights standards, in particular communication skills • Change at the level of attitude and values which determine how people perceive others, in particular detainees, how they act in the world, their worldview and their concept of the human being. While NPM’s presence in closed institutions and their interviewing of detainees probably contributes to a stronger awareness and knowledge about their rights, a more systematic way of thinking how NPMs could strengthen rights-holders’ capacities for claiming their rights seem not yet to exist.272 Knowledge/ Understanding Change Dimensions at the level of actors Skills Attitudes/ Values It is clear that, in particular, changes at the level of attitude and values can only be understood through a close look at the institutional culture and group dynamics, operating in places of detention as ‘total institutions’,273 with very specific characteristics. The prevailing culture within places of deprivation of liberty has a direct bearing on the behaviour of people, both staff and detainees. If NPMs want to achieve positive human rights change in closed institutions, they need to be aware of cultural risks factors in places of detention as well as the characteristics and strategies for human rights based culture change.274 UN General Assembly (UNGA) Res 66/137 (19 December 2011) UN Doc A/RES/66/137, art 2. This question was strongly raised during the final conference in April 2015. 273 ‘Total institutions’ are defined as ‘places of residence and work where a large number of like-situated individuals, cut off from the wider society for an appreciable period of time, together lead an enclosed, formally administered round of life.’ See E Goffman, Asylums: Essays on the Social Situation of Mental Patients and Other Inmates (Anchor Books 1961) xiii. 274 For a detailed discussion of how preventive monitoring can change institutional culture in detention see APT and Penal Reform International (PRI), Institutional Culture in Detention: a Framework for Preventive Monitoring (PRI 2013). 271 272 - 94 -