Involvement of People With Lived Experience

Our vision 

We strive to ensure that people with lived experience of imprisonment are active partners in the creation of policies, programmes and services that directly affect them. We believe that the system can only be fair and effective if it includes the voices of those who have experienced it first-hand. 

What is the problem? 

People with a criminal past are often seen only as recipients of assistance, not as co-creators of solutions. This means we lose out on their unique experiences and insights from within the system. By involving people with lived experience, we gain valuable knowledge about what works and what doesn’t in practice – and we improve the quality of services, professional work and systemic changes. 

What we have achieved 

  • One-third of our employees have lived experience and are involved in all of the organization’s activities.  
  • We have developed and piloted a training course for people with lived experience involved in advocacy and awareness-raising. 
  • Part of the organization’s structure is the “Voice” team of people who actively use their lived experience. 
  • We share their expertise with other organizations; for example, they have created information materials for the Czech Prison Service. 
  • We co-created two instructional videos for people entering prison – one for men and one for women – with scripts co-written by people with lived experience. 

Videos