2023 Global Citizenship Review

What's inside

Highlights of our pro bono and volunteering efforts

A message from our Chair

Heather K. McDevitt

Partner|New York

Services

Commercial Litigation, Antitrust/Competition, Life Sciences and Healthcare, Financial Institutions

Chair

White & Case’s Global Citizenship initiative is a cornerstone of our Firm, and our 2023 pro bono and charitable work was driven by both passion and purpose. This review tells these stories and demonstrates what we can accomplish by focusing our knowledge and resources on the challenges of our time.

In the United States, our Racial Justice Task Force worked to seal decades-old criminal records for pro bono clients, enabling them to pursue better employment, housing and educational opportunities. Relying on a law that addresses sentencing disparities that disproportionately affect Black people, we secured freedom for individuals who had served lengthy sentences imposed when they were under the age of 25 years. Our externship program with Historically Black Colleges and Universities enabled students to work with us on racial justice pro bono matters.

Across conflict-torn regions, our lawyers advocated for asylum-seekers and other forced migrants. As the war in Ukraine continued, we helped eligible refugees obtain UK visas and began researching critical issues that included how Ukraine will finance its eventual reconstruction.

We also secured critical rights for girls. In the US, we helped end child marriage in three states and collaborated on draft legislation to change the federal laws that enable it. In Kenya, we structured a Development Impact Bond that funds sexual and reproductive health care for teenaged girls.

On the environmental front, our lawyers analyzed the constitutions of every country in the world to help ensure access to clean drinking water and sanitation as a human right. Our work also included designing a debt-for-nature swap in Southeast Asia, which will preserve hundreds of square miles of coral reefs.

We retained our focus on educating and empowering the next generation of legal leaders. Key initiatives included training Kenyan lawyers on developments in arbitration law and expanding our support of the Willem C. Vis International Commercial Arbitration Moot for law students in Africa, Central Asia and Eastern Europe.

Our efforts had tangible benefits for people around the world, and I am immensely proud of what we have accomplished together. Our work continues and evolves, grounded in the belief that the law can be a force for positive transformation on a global scale.

Heather K. McDevitt, Chair

Our inaugural Global Citizenship campaign

The Firm's first Global Citizenship campaign focuses Firmwide efforts to amplify impact

Elevate: investing in the next generation

Our new Global Citizenship campaign concentrates the Firm's volunteering and charitable giving efforts on investing in youth through education, empowerment and employability

Read 2 min. article

A silhouetted view of five children playing outside a hot air balloon decorated in squares of red, yellow, orange, blue and black.

Access to justice

Highlights include the expansion of our Racial Justice Task Force and our efforts on behalf of asylum-seekers and refugees

A force for good

Multipronged effort helps individuals disproportionately affected by our criminal justice system and addresses racial injustice

Read 7 min. article

A group of five multi-generational family members, three male, two female, embrace in a backyard with their backs to the camera.

Advancing human rights

Our work focused on protecting women's rights and providing humanitarian assistance and legal aid for Ukraine

Pro bono in wartime

Firm provides humanitarian and legal aid to Ukraine

Read 2 min. article

A female volunteer, right, and Ukrainian refugee woman, left, sit on steps in a train station, both looking at a document the volunteer is holding and explaining.

An impactful bond

Structuring a Development Impact Bond that enhances reproductive health services for girls in Kenya

Read 3 min. article

A community nurse, left, shares information on a clipboard with three teenage girls, right. The group stands by a wooden fence in front of a shack in an informal settlement in Africa.

Ending child marriage in the United States

Momentum continues to build as we helped change laws in three more states, bringing the total to ten states

Read 3 min. article

Two teenage girls facing each other raise their fists against a late-afternoon blue sky. One girl, left, looks up, while the other, right, looks into the distance. The wind blows their hair.

Environmental action

We used our legal skills to safeguard the human right to water and draft an innovative debt-for-nature swap

Swapping debt for nature

The Firm's latest debt-for-nature swap was among the first to tap into a newly reauthorized US law

Read 3 min. article

Image from a camera half-submerged in the tropical waters of Lissenung Island, Papua New Guinea. Under water, dense and varied green coral is visible. Above water, an island and a person paddling a traditional outrigger canoe are silhouetted against a vibrant orange sunset.

Clean water, effective sanitation

Our legal research for Human Right 2 Water helps push essential needs toward becoming legally protected human rights

Read 2 min. article

Two pairs of hands, one left, one right, wash leafy greens in a red bucket, under a stream of water from a water gravity system in a village in northern Sierra Leone. The water is drawn from a local mountain.

Educating future leaders

Building legal capacity by training practitioners and future lawyers in developing countries

Training the next generation of international lawyers

The Firm expanded its Vis Moot training to students in Central Asia and Eastern Europe

Read 4 min. article

A nighttime view of the Wiener Staatsoper (Vienna State Opera) in Vienna, Austria. The Neo-Renaissance building is warmly lit, inside and out. Light from traffic appears as red and white streaks in the left foreground.

Trailblazing jurist Florence Mumba receives White & Case Distinguished Jessup Alumni Award

The competition opens doors and shapes careers for many law students around the world

Read 4 min. article

A distant view of the Supreme Court of Zambia, in the country's capital of Lusaka. The red-brick, two-story building features white columns along the main facade and a pair of white lion sculptures enclosing the wide entrance steps. A large palm tree stands to the left, and three flagpoles to the right.

Dispute alternatives

Training programs help Nairobi's push to become a preferred venue for dispute resolution

Read 3 min. article

Lawyers in traditional black gowns and light-colored wigs walk up a winding concrete ramp as they arrive at the Supreme Court of Kenya, in Nairobi, to be admitted to the Bar in November 2023. Some are also wearing sunglasses.

About pro bono

A truly global Pro Bono practice

Our work focuses on providing access to justice, serving organizations with a social or environmental mission and promoting the rule of law and good sovereign governance

Pro bono hours and participation

105,550pro bono hours in 2023

100k+ pro bono hours for the seventh consecutive year

100% of our offices and practices do pro bono work

125+ partners and counsel serve as pro bono leaders

800+ pro bono matters in 2023

A model partnership

Amazon and White & Case raise the bar on pro bono collaborations with four projects in 2023

Read 3 min. article

A view of the portico of the New York County Supreme Court, in lower Manhattan in New York City. Above its columns, the portico is engraved with the motto, "The true administration of justice is the firmest pillar of good government." Sun shines on the top left corner.

Reconciling differences

White & Case teams up with Jawun to support Australia's Indigenous communities

Read 3 min. article

A close-up view of 28 colorfully decorated flags that form the art installation "United Neytions," which hangs in Sydney Airport. Each flag represents one of the original Aboriginal nations and is decorated in varying combinations of stripes, dots, spirals, diamonds and stars, in a color palette of orange, green, black, red, yellow and white. The work is by artist Archie Moore, a member of Australia's Kamilaroi Indigenous nation.

Learn more

For more information about our commitment and activities, please visit our Global Citizenship web pages.

Read our Annual Review

Previous Global Citizenship Reviews

Dispute alternatives

Training programs help Nairobi's push to become a preferred venue for dispute resolution

Story

3 min read

White & Case joined forces with the Nairobi Centre for International Arbitration (NCIA) and the International Senior Lawyers Project (ISLP) to build dispute resolution capabilities in one of the world's fastest-growing economies. The ISLP is a nonprofit that provides pro bono legal assistance to governments, social enterprises, impact investors, civil society organizations in the Global South and countries transitioning to democracy and market-based economies. White & Case partner Ank Santens is a longtime ISLP board member (and recipient of its Global Impact Volunteer Award), and ISLP's Executive Director Sara Lulo is an alumna of White & Case's New York International Arbitration team.

Kenya is a rising economic power, with annual GDP growth of approximately 5 percent, often outperforming the regional average. Its capital, Nairobi, is also among Africa's top-20 fastest-growing cities in terms of GDP.

Such growth and the importance of international trade to Kenya results in greater exposure to legal risk and necessitates sophisticated legal arrangements. International commercial contracts frequently provide for international arbitration for dispute resolution, and international investors may well benefit from bilateral investment treaties, which give them a potential ability to bring investor-state disputes. This requires lawyers to be up to speed with the latest developments in international arbitration.

The ISLP approached Santens about helping to enhance its capacity to handle these demands. An inquiry from Santens to the global White & Case International Arbitration team received an enthusiastic response, and the Firm teamed up with ISLP and NCIA to provide training to Kenyan lawyers on the latest arbitration law developments, in addition to other pro bono support.

One initiative consisted of partners Preeti Bhagnani and Robert Wheal leading a large team of Firm lawyers to conduct a training program in Nairobi for approximately 30 lawyers from Kenya's Office of the Attorney General and the Department of Justice. The week-long program, held in March 2023, covered a variety of best practices and recent developments in international commercial arbitration and investment law.

Bhagnani and Wheal noted the attendees work in various government ministries and often represent the state in contract negotiations with global companies and financial institutions, which bring significant experience drafting sophisticated arbitration clauses and related contract provisions to the negotiating table. The Firm's team found the attendees highly engaged with the program content, participating throughout the full-day interactive sessions and continuing discussions during breaks and evenings.

The ISLP says the Nairobi training program will improve efficiency in dispute resolution in Kenya, which, in turn, benefits the country's investment climate.

"The instructors were expert, encouraging, willing to answer our questions and willing to share examples from case studies. We were immensely fond of all of them!" said one attendee in feedback to the ISLP.

In addition to the program in Nairobi, Santens and partner Matthew Drossos worked with NCIA and White & Case associates Meredith Craven and Aleksandra Drabek-Hoogerwaard to host two webinars, one on drafting dispute resolution clauses in international contracts in March 2023 and a second on investment-treaty arbitration in September 2023. More than 200 people attended each of these virtual programs. Santens also hosted another seminar on international arbitration with partners Jennifer Glasser and Zelda Hunter for the Women Lawyers Committee of the East Africa Law Society, another ISLP client.

White & Case lawyers are also providing pro bono assistance to NCIA as it updates its rules to match the national arbitration law and incorporate international best practices and other alternative dispute resolution developments in other jurisdictions.

The training of lawyers at Kenya's Office of the Attorney General and the review of NCIA Rules received financial and technical support through Advocates for International Development's Rule of Law Expertise UK (ROLE UK) Programme, funded by the UK Foreign, Commonwealth and Development Office.

Photo by © Simon Maina / GettyImages
Lawyers arrive at the Supreme Court of Kenya, in Nairobi, to be admitted to the Bar in November 2023.

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