Regulation of Legal Services and Access to Justice in the Digital Age

2021 ◽  
pp. 179-194
Author(s):  
Jin Ho Verdonschot ◽  
Max Houben
Keyword(s):  
Digital Age ◽  
Access To Justice ◽  
Legal Services

scholarly journals Lawyering in a Digital Age: A Practice Report on the Design of a Virtual Law Clinic at Cumbria

2015 ◽  
Vol 22 (3) ◽  
pp. 334 ◽  
Author(s):  
Ann Thanaraj ◽  
Michael Sales
Keyword(s):  
Core Competencies ◽  
Legal Education ◽  
Digital Age ◽  
Law Students ◽  
Access To Justice ◽  
Legal Services ◽  
Law Schools ◽  
Efficient Manner ◽  
New Type

<p>This practice paper offers a modest proposition that could make law graduates more capable of serving their clients in a modernised and efficient manner. We propose that in addition to law clinics and other forms of experiential activities, law schools could add a new type of clinical component to their curriculum that teaches students to use technology to assist in the delivery of legal services. Digital lawyering skills will help law students learn core competencies needed in an increasingly technological profession, and it may help close the gap between offering access to justice by making legal services available online in the most accessible and convenient way possible and in equipping law graduates with a modernised and digital legal education. </p>

Digitalization and administrative justice: An access to justice perspective

2021 ◽  
Author(s):  
Lorne Sossin ◽  
Darin Thompson
Keyword(s):  
Holistic Approach ◽  
Digital Age ◽  
Access To Justice ◽  
Legal Services ◽  
Digital Architecture ◽  
Online Dispute Resolution ◽  
The Subject ◽  
The Impact ◽  
Careful Design ◽  
Administrative Justice

This chapter examines the impact of digitalization on access to justice and administrative justice. It discusses the significant potential of digitalization to enhance access to justice as well as the accompanying risks, and argues for a more contextualized approach to the subject. It advocates for a focus on user needs as well as design and administrative justice architecture. The chapter concludes that the relationships between digitalization and access to justice must not be over-simplified. Increased reliance on technology is often thought to increase access to justice based on assumptions that digital legal services will be less expensive and easier to use. Poorly designed digital interfaces and processes, however, can add unnecessary complexity to simple justice transactions. Perspectives on digitalization and access should recognize the nuance of this evolving landscape. The chapter sketches out a more holistic approach to access to justice in a digital age that places considerable emphasis on the importance of design with an intention to benefit administrative justice users. The analysis is divided into five sections. The first section examines key frameworks and perspectives on access to administrative justice in the digital age. The second section considers the ‘digital divide’ and the importance of careful design. The third section considers the impact of digital access to various forms of legal supports. The fourth section reviews the digital architecture of administrative justice specifically. Finally, the fifth section explores online dispute resolution in administrative justice and its potential for enhancing access to justice.

Imperfect Duty: Lawyers’ Obligation to Foster Access to Justice

2008 ◽  
pp. 107 ◽  
Author(s):  
Alice Woolley
Keyword(s):  
Legal System ◽  
Policy Response ◽  
Access To Justice ◽  
Legal Services ◽  
Imperfect Duty ◽  
Special Obligation ◽  
Legal Market ◽  
Integral Component

Access to justice is an integral component of the legal system. However, the question of upon whose shoulders the obligation of ensuring this access should fall has been widely debated. In particular, do lawyers, as part ofthe legalprofession, have a special obligation to foster access to justice? In this article, the author explores the legitimacy of various arguments with respect to whether lawyers should carry this obligation to a greater extent than other members of society. The author begins by critiquing the traditional arguments related to imposing such an obligation on lawyers — for instance, the refined monopoly arguments. She then goes on to critically consider an alternative argument: that imperfections in the marketfor legal services justify the existence of a special obligation for lawyers. An examination of the limitations of this justification follows. Overall, the author concludes that while the arguments arising from imperfections in the legal market offer the best justification for seeing lawyers have a special obligation to ensure access tojustice, the claims from the argument are modest ones, and any policy response in furtherance of such an obligation should be similarly modest.

ADVANCING ACCESS TO JUSTICE THROUGH GENERIC SOLUTIONS: THE RISK OF PERPETUATING EXCLUSION

2013 ◽  
Vol 31 (1) ◽  
pp. 1
Author(s):  
Patricia Hughes
Keyword(s):  
Access To Justice ◽  
Legal Services ◽  
Low Literacy ◽  
Remote Areas

Recent reports about access to justice have focused on issues of affordability, with little reference to the differences of equity-seeking groups. They have tended to recommend “generic” solutions intended to help people represent themselves better and to access limited legal services that fail to consider characteristics that exclude people from using them effectively. The author argues that if factors such as low literacy or living in remote areas are not taken into account, generic solutions run the risk of perpetuating exclusion rather than increasing access to justice.       Des rapports sur l’accès à la justice qui ont été publiés récemment s’intéressent principalement à la question de la capacité de payer et s’attardent peu aux différences au sein des groupes en quête d’équité. Ils tendent à recommander des solutions « génériques » pour aider les justiciables à mieux se représenter eux‑mêmes et à jouir d’un accès à des services juridiques limités qui ne tiennent pas compte des facteurs qui empêchent les gens d’utiliser ces services efficacement. L’auteure plaide que si des facteurs tels qu’une faible littératie ou le fait de résider dans une collectivité éloignée ne sont pas pris en compte, les solutions génériques risquent de perpétuer l’exclusion plutôt que d’améliorer l’accès à la justice.      

Health justice partnerships: a promising model for increasing access to justice in health services

2019 ◽  
Vol 43 (6) ◽  
pp. 636 ◽  
Author(s):  
Virginia Lewis ◽  
Lauren Adamson ◽  
Faith Hawthorne
Keyword(s):  
Health Services ◽  
Specific Area ◽  
Access To Justice ◽  
Successful Implementation ◽  
Legal Services ◽  
Fully Integrated ◽  
Seek Health Care ◽  
Know How ◽  
Health Partnership ◽  
Health Justice

Many people experience legal issues that affect their health, but do not seek legal help, particularly if they are disadvantaged in some way. This may be because they do not recognise they have a legal problem, they are unwilling or unable to address it, or they do not know how to go about dealing with it. Most people seek health care at some point, so linking health and legal services may help promote access to justice. There have been ongoing efforts in Australia to link health and law services, such as through co-locating health and legal services or through running legal ‘clinics’ in health services, but these have not always reached the intended clients. Fully integrated health justice partnerships are a model where the law/health partnership is collaborative at all levels of the organisation. This perspective piece argues that the model is particularly suitable for health services that have clients with needs in a specific area of law, and should be carefully targeted to where it is most needed. Factors that contribute to successful implementation of the model are described.

scholarly journals What Are We Waiting For? It’s Time to Regulate Paralegals in Canada

2018 ◽  
Vol 35 ◽  
pp. 149-176 ◽  
Author(s):  
Lisa Trabucco
Keyword(s):  
Public Interest ◽  
Self Regulation ◽  
The State ◽  
Access To Justice ◽  
Legal Services ◽  
The Public ◽  
Statutory Duty

Law societies in Canada have long been granted the privilege of self-regulation by the state – a privilege that comes with a statutory duty to govern in the public interest. There exists an access to justice crisis in this country. More must be done to address unmet legal needs. There is nothing new in this, but law societies across Canada are reluctant to implement at least one ready solution. Ontario introduced paralegal regulation over ten years ago with the promise that it would increase access to justice. Evidence suggests that it has done so. Yet no other Canadian jurisdiction is prepared to regulate paralegals as independent providers of legal services. Law societies’ continued resistance to the regulation of paralegals is contrary to the public interest. This paper argues that to alleviate the access to justice crisis, it is time to regulate paralegals.

Referral fees – the business of access to justice

Legal Studies ◽  
2012 ◽  
Vol 32 (1) ◽  
pp. 109-131 ◽  
Author(s):  
Andrew Higgins
Keyword(s):  
Justice System ◽  
Public Funding ◽  
Legal Rights ◽  
Access To Justice ◽  
Legal Services ◽  
Civil Justice ◽  
Better Regulation ◽  
The Government ◽  
The Right ◽  
Civil Justice System

The paper examines the controversial issue of referral fees for personal injury claims. It looks at the function of referral fees in the civil justice system, their relationship to the guarantees of access to court and the right to seek legal assistance in ECHR Art 6, and the debate about promoting access to justice or a litigious society. It examines the experience of the referral fees market in England and Wales, where the costs of referrals have risen dramatically and there is concern that referrers are auctioning their customers to the highest bidder rather than helping them find competent lawyers. Sir Rupert Jackson recommended banning referral fees in his report on the costs of civil litigation, and the Government has announced it will implement this recommendation. The paper considers the potential effects of a ban on competition in the legal services market and its compatibility with UK and EU competition law. The paper argues that a combination of better regulation of the industry and proper regulation of costs rules is a better and more proportionate way of controlling legal costs and the quality of legal services than an outright ban. While referral fees have not delivered all the benefits one would expect from a for-profit independent referrals service, they can help people obtain information about their legal rights, and competent lawyers to enforce them. This service is particularly valuable given that the state has substantially cut public funding of the civil justice system in recent years.

scholarly journals The Legal Academy’s Engagements with Lawtech: Technology Narratives and Archetypes as Drivers of Change

2019 ◽  
pp. 27-45
Author(s):  
Kate Galloway ◽  
Julian Webb ◽  
Francesca Bartlett ◽  
John Flood ◽  
Lisa Webley
Keyword(s):  
Curriculum Design ◽  
Legal Education ◽  
Legal Profession ◽  
Access To Justice ◽  
Legal Services ◽  
Law Schools ◽  
The Rule Of Law ◽  
Services Delivery ◽  
Technological Developments ◽  
The Law

This article argues that legal education is currently grappling with three narratives of technology’s role in either augmenting, disrupting or ending the current legal services environment. It identifies each of these narratives within features of curriculum design that respond to legal professional archetypes of how lawyers react to lawtech. In tracing how these influential narratives and associated archetypes feature in the law curriculum, the article maps the evolving intersection of lawtech, the legal profession and legal services delivery in legal education. It concludes by proffering the additional narrative of ‘adaptive professionalism’, which emphasises the complex and contextual nature of the legal profession, and therefore provides a more coherent direction for adaptation of the law curriculum. Through this more nuanced and grounded approach, it is suggested that law schools might equip law graduates to embrace technological developments while holding on to essential notions of ethical conduct, access to justice and the rule of law.

scholarly journals THE LAW SOCIETY OF UPPER CANADA AND ACCESS TO JUSTICE: LESSONS FROM LAWYER-LICENSING REFORM

2013 ◽  
Vol 31 (2) ◽  
pp. 121 ◽  
Author(s):  
David Wiseman
Keyword(s):  
Present Article ◽  
Task Force ◽  
Legal Profession ◽  
Pilot Project ◽  
Access To Justice ◽  
Legal Services ◽  
Upper Canada ◽  
Institutional Approach ◽  
The Law ◽  
Legal Training

The process for licensing new lawyers in Ontario is in the midst of significant change following the Law Society of Upper Canada’s approval of a recommendation by it’s Articling Task Force to introduce of a 3-year pilot project that will provide a program of practical legal training as an alternative to articling.  This article describes and critically analyzes these changes and the process that led to them in relation to three aspects of access to justice: access to the legal profession, access to legal services, and access to legal governance.  The analysis reveals numerous shortcomings that provide lessons that could be applied to the proposal for evaluating the pilot project as well as to the Law Society’s recently announced initiative to overhaul its institutional approach to access to justice. Le processus d’accès à la profession qui s’applique aux nouveaux avocats en Ontario fait actuellement l’objet de changements importants. Le Barreau du Haut-Canada a approuvé un projet pilote de trois ans recommandé par son Groupe de travail sur le stage, dans le cadre duquel il sera possible de suivre un programme de pratique du droit plutôt que de faire un stage. Le présent article décrit et analyse de façon critique ces changements – ainsi que le processus ayant mené aux changements – par rapport à trois aspects de l’accès à la justice : l’accès à la profession juridique, l’accès aux services juridiques et l’accès à la gouvernance juridique. L’analyse fait ressortir de nombreuses lacunes qui pourraient servir de leçons à appliquer à la proposition d’évaluation du projet pilote ainsi qu’à l’initiative récemment annoncée du Barreau visant à réviser son approche institutionnelle à l’accès à la justice.

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