Category
Protection
Subcategory
Migration
Client
Global Detention Project
Final Beneficiary
Migrant detainees

Summary

The Global Detention Project (GDP) is a non-profit organization based in Geneva that promotes the human rights of people who have been detained for reasons related to their non-citizen status. They have developed a database of migration detention practices and detention centers around the world that can be used to assess the evolution of detention practices, provide an evidentiary base for advocating reforms, and serve as a framework for comparative analysis.

Tutator worked with them to develop a new Content Management System (CMS) to manage their database and a new website to allow them to publish all the data and make it accessible to the general public.

Description

The Global Detention Project was initiated in 2005 by students at the Graduate Institute of International and Development Studies in Geneva as a tool for improving transparency of detention by systematically documenting where and in what conditions migrants and asylum seekers are detained. Over the years they have collected information about detention centers for migrants across the world and assembled this information into a database managed through an application based on an open source Content Management System (CMS). Their database also includes a list of all the international and regional treaties related to migration with all the signatories for each treaty. They also have compiled for a number of countries across the world a profile for individual countries related to migration: applicable laws, current practices, statistics, etc.

When Tutator started working with GDP they had realized that the Open Source CMS platform they were using was not really adapted to their needs and they were looking for an alternative.

In late 2015, Tutator started the development of the next generation CMS system for the GDP project based on Tutator CMS platform. This was a complex project which included a CMS application, historical data tracking and report and BMP rules built-in. The new system allows remote researchers to submit new data or update existing data for review by the GDP staff before the data is committed to the database, greatly expanding the reach and capabilities of the overall project.

The CMS application interfaced with a WordPress web site through a secure REST API. The WordPress site also included SEO optimization to increase the visibility of the GDP teamwork.

Challenges

  • Taking over a legacy software with no documentation
  • Very limited resources

Screenshots

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