DROITS DEVANT ASBL

IP Rights for an Age Equality Nonprofit

Pro Publico matched droits devant ASBL with Clifford Chance to help a young nonprofit protect its training materials and build a sustainable model for sharing its expertise on human rights in older age.

Ageism Is a Human Rights Issue

Discrimination based on age remains one of the least challenged forms of inequality in our societies. Yet the rights of older people – to dignity, participation, and autonomy – are fully grounded in international human rights law.

droits devant ASBL was founded to change that. The Brussels-based nonprofit uses a rights-based approach to reframe how we think about ageing. It fosters cooperation between older people and dedicated organisations, and develops accessible educational content to empower individuals across all stages of life.

Their work is niche, rigorous, and genuinely needed. But like many young nonprofits, they faced a practical challenge before they could scale it.

The Challenge: Sharing Knowledge Without Losing Control

droits devant had developed specialised training materials for field workers and organisations working with older people. They wanted to disseminate this content widely – to help the age equality movement grow. But they needed to do so carefully.

Two concerns shaped their request for pro bono support. First, they wanted to prevent misappropriation: ensuring their materials could not be used for purposes contrary to their values. Second, they needed to think about commercial accessibility – using licensing to fund their advocacy and other non-commercial activities.

There was also an internal dimension. The training content had been developed by individual authors: clarifying intellectual property rights between the nonprofit and those individual authors was essential before any external sharing could happen.

This is exactly the kind of legal challenge that can stall a young organisation for months – or years – without expert guidance.

Enter the Lawyers at Clifford Chance

Thanks to the coordination of George Tyler and the conviction of Partner Richard Blewett, Pro Publico was able to match droits devant with Clifford Chance, one of the world’s leading international law firms, with deep expertise across IP, commercial, and regulatory law. Maria Tsoukala and Valia Aravantinou Zafeiri led the engagement on behalf of the Brussels office.

From the outset, the Clifford Chance team worked to understand the specifics of droits devant’s situation – not just the legal framework in the abstract, but the organisation’s mission, its content ecosystem, and its ambitions for growth.

How the Pro Bono Work Unfolded

The Clifford Chance lawyers provided a structured overview of the intellectual property framework applicable in Belgium, covering copyright ownership, the relationship between individual authors and the nonprofit entity, and the options available for licensing content to third parties.

The advice was practical and actionable. Rather than delivering a dense legal memo, the team produced clear, accessible recommendations – designed to be understood and acted upon by a board of directors who are not legal specialists.

Estelle Huchet, Co-founder of droits devant, describes the outcome: “We received a very clear and understandable input by the agreed deadline which allowed our team – who are not necessarily familiar with legal language – to move forward based on their recommendations.”

The guidance covered the conditions under which third parties could reuse droits devant’s content, the question of potential fees, and the internal steps needed to formalise agreements with content authors. It gave the organisation a roadmap to take to its board.

What Changed for droits devant

The pro bono advice did more than answer a legal question. It gave a one-year-old nonprofit the kind of professional guidance that is normally out of reach at that stage of development.

“We could have never dreamed of receiving such professional guidance while our nonprofit had just one year of existence,” says Estelle Huchet. “The pro bono lawyers we worked with provided us with instrumental advice for defining our internal policies.”

As droits devant notes, the value is also preventive. Fellow organisations working in the training space have flagged how the absence of internal IP policies creates stressful, sometimes conflictual situations when third parties attempt to copy or repurpose materials without consent. Having a clear framework in place protects the organisation before problems arise.

The Role of Pro Publico

Connections like this one rarely happen by chance. droits devant would not have had access to a firm like Clifford Chance without an intermediary able to establish trust on both sides.

“The support provided by Pro Publico was highly qualitative,” says Estelle Huchet. “The matching facilitated by Pro Publico helped establish a trustworthy relationship. We would have never accessed such profiles without your intermediary.”

For Pro Publico, this case illustrates something broader: intellectual property rights for nonprofits are not a niche concern. They are foundational to the ability of civil society organisations to grow, share, and sustain their work – without losing control of it.

A Model Worth Replicating

droits devant‘s next steps are clear: discuss the options with their board, formalise agreements with content authors, and define terms of use for training recipients. They are also drawing inspiration from organisations like Senior Montessori, Le Bien Vieillir, and the Ella Baker School of Organising, which have developed their own practices for sharing training content responsibly.

With a solid legal foundation now in place, droits devant can focus on what it does best – building a movement for age equality, one training at a time.

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Thanks to @MariaTsoukala, @ValiaAravantinouZafeiri, @GeorgeTyler, RichardBlewett, @SoniaBelhassen, @TomDunn, @EllenO’Connell, @CliffordChance, @Estelle Huchet, @Nena Georgantzi @droitsdevant @FrancescoZatelli, @ProPublico

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