By: the GEM Report
“I still feel afraid of talking to the lawyers. The afraid child inside me is still alive.”
Ranusha Rai* in Nepal grew up without any legal papers. Her mother ran away from home when just a child without her birth certificate, citizenship card or other official documentation. She was not to know the importance that documentation would play in her daughter accessing future opportunities.
An organization eventually intervened and supported Ranusha’s continued education by asserting her right to education. But the barriers did not disappear. She was unable to access scholarships and internships and could not enrol in the government law programme she wanted to attend because she lacked the required documents. She still does not have a bank account.
Her experience illustrates a challenge affecting millions of people worldwide. While the right to education is widely recognized in law, access to education often depends on access to justice, legal identity and administrative systems that many people struggle to navigate.
The recent GEM report and Namati report Education and justice: Learning to build just societies demonstrates the clear links. Justice systems help determine whether people can access education and protect their rights. Education, in turn, helps people understand those rights and exercise them.
Legal identity is one of the clearest examples of this relationship. Globally, around 150 million children under the age of five do not have their births registered. An estimated 4.5 billion people lack legal tools such as identity documents, housing tenure or formal work arrangements that help them claim and exercise their rights.
Without documentation, access to education can become more difficult. In some countries, birth certificates are required to sit examinations or transition between levels of education. Stateless children often face barriers progressing through secondary education. For Ranusha, the experience also exposed a gap between legal rights and practical reality.
“Now I understand more. The officers who are there to make the documents don’t really apply the law exactly as it is written. In the constitution it is written that you can get a birth certificate and citizenship from the mother’s name. But in reality, it is not really easy to get it. The law is different from the reality.”
This gap is reflected globally. Research for the GEM Report had noted 10 years ago that while 82% of national constitutions include provisions on the right to education, the right is fully justiciable in only 55% of countries. Today, more than 273 million children, adolescents and youth remain out of school worldwide.
The challenge is to ensure people can use their rights, not just see them reflected on paper
Legal action has helped improve educational opportunities in many countries. Court decisions have expanded free education, increased school funding, improved school infrastructure and challenged discriminatory practices. Yet pursuing such remedies requires awareness, confidence and support that many people do not possess.
This is where education itself becomes part of the solution. The report argues that education should help people understand rights, institutions and processes, building the capability to address legal problems and participate in public life. Around 1.4 billion people face barriers to resolving everyday justice problems, often because they lack legal capability or access to assistance.
Ranusha’s experience reflects this challenge. Today she works as a change agent helping others understand and exercise their rights.
“Most of the people know about their rights, but when it comes to how to use them, they don’t know who to seek help from. Some people don’t even know you can complain.”
Her observation points to an important policy lesson: expanding access to education might take more than just meets the eye. Education and justice are often treated as separate sectors. In practice, they are deeply connected.
The legal context surrounding education systems, which enables people to obtain legal identity, access services and seek redress when their rights are denied, is also critical. Children without legal identity can struggle to access education. Adults without education can struggle to navigate justice systems. And societies that fail to address either challenge risk reinforcing exclusion across generations.
For policymakers, the implication is clear: protecting the right to education means paying greater attention to the justice systems, legal identity systems and legal empowerment efforts that make that right meaningful in practice.
*name changed for anonymity
