Lawyer self-regulation and the public interest: a reflection

Legal Ethics ◽  
2017 ◽  
Vol 20 (1) ◽  
pp. 115-124
Author(s):  
Richard L. Abel
Keyword(s):  
Public Interest ◽  
Self Regulation ◽  
The Public

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.

Conclusion: SDO Decision-making and the Public Interest

2020 ◽  
pp. 210-237
Author(s):  
Alison Harcourt ◽  
George Christou ◽  
Seamus Simpson
Keyword(s):  
Decision Making ◽  
Civil Society ◽  
Public Interest ◽  
Self Regulation ◽  
International Level ◽  
Multiple Streams ◽  
Policy Entrepreneurship ◽  
Historical Representation ◽  
The Public ◽  
Decision Making Processes

The conclusion situates the book’s findings in academic debates on democracy and the Internet, global self-regulation, and civil society, and international decision-making processes in unstructured environments. It assesses whether current standards-developing organization (SDO) decision-making is able to bridge historical representation gaps and deficiencies. A nuanced pattern is emerging with increasing inclusion of a wider number of actors within SDO fora. The first part of the chapter returns to the Multiple Streams (MS) framework applied to the case studies on a comparative basis. It identifies key processes under which SDO rules of interaction are established at the international level and explains which interests have come to the fore within decision-making highlighting the occurrence of policy entrepreneurship, forum shopping, and coupling. The final part explores additional frameworks for SDO regulation where spaces for public interest consideration might occur in the future. These are opportunities for inserting public interest considerations into international and national Acts, certification programmes, and the move towards open source solutions for Internet management. The book concludes that, although the literature is expansive on the interaction of corporate sector actors within SDOs, the study of other actors, such as digital rights groups, civil society, academics, policy entrepreneurs and the technical community as a whole, has been underdressed in the literature on international self-regulatory fora to date. In this respect, the book raises important questions of representation of the public interest at the international level by having addressed the actions of actors within SDO fora who promote public interest goals.

scholarly journals Professional Self-Regulation and the Public Interest in Canada

2016 ◽  
Vol 6 (3) ◽  
Author(s):  
Tracey L. Adams
Keyword(s):  
Public Interest ◽  
Consumer Choice ◽  
Self Regulation ◽  
Regulatory Change ◽  
The Public ◽  
Business Interests ◽  
Professional Groups ◽  
Professional Self ◽  
Anglo American ◽  
Definition Of

The regulation of professional groups has often been justified as being in the public interest. In recent decades, policymakers in Anglo-American countries have questioned whether self-regulating professions have truly served the public interest, or whether they have merely acted in their own interests. This paper draws on legislative records and policy reports to explore meanings attached to professional self-regulation and the public interest in Canada by state actors over the past 150 years. The findings point to a shift in the definition of the public interest away from service quality and professional interests, towards efficiency, human rights, consumer choice, and in some contexts business interests. Changing views of the public interest contribute to regulatory change.

scholarly journals Industrial Self-Regulation and the Public Interest

1966 ◽  
Vol 64 (7) ◽  
pp. 1239 ◽  
Author(s):  
Harper W. Boyd ◽  
Henry Claycamp
Keyword(s):  
Public Interest ◽  
Self Regulation ◽  
The Public

scholarly journals Self-regulation and compliance enforcement practices by the Investment Dealers Association in Canada

2017 ◽  
Vol 25 (1) ◽  
pp. 2-21 ◽  
Author(s):  
Mark Lokanan
Keyword(s):  
Public Interest ◽  
Design Methodology ◽  
Self Regulation ◽  
Best Interests ◽  
Future Research ◽  
Content Type ◽  
The Public ◽  
The Core ◽  
The One ◽  
Time Future

Purpose This paper aims to examine the enforcement practices of the Investment Dealers Association of Canada (IDA) and argue that self-regulation simply does not work in the financial sector, as the sanctions available are neither applied with sufficient severity nor are the responsibilities for enforcement adequately divided between self-regulation, provincial securities commissions and the police. Design/methodology/approach The core compliance data for the study came from the IDA’s tribunal cases that were heard between 1984 and June 2008. The theoretical approach involves the invocation of classic articles by the likes of Stigler, Posner and Becker, the essence of whose conclusions is that institutions will act in their own best interests and cannot be expected to act in the public interest. Findings The findings show that over the period from 1984 to 2008, the severity of the sanctions increased consistently over the period. When penalty ceilings were increased, penalties increased. When in the latter phase of the period, public members (i.e. non-members of the industry) chaired the tribunals, penalties also increased. Research limitations/implications Researchers can use the data to write a paper which asks “Why did the IDA tribunal penalties increase so consistently with time?” Future research could canvass various possible explanations, including the one presented in this paper, to focus sustained attention on the issue of self-regulation. Originality/value This study is the first to systematically examine the enforcement performance of the IDA.

The Best Way(s) Forward

2018 ◽  
Author(s):  
Evan Osborne
Keyword(s):  
Public Interest ◽  
Good Reason ◽  
Self Regulation ◽  
Scientific Productivity ◽  
Dramatic Improvement ◽  
The Public ◽  
Past Half Century ◽  
Economic Forces ◽  
Past Half

There is good reason to be skeptical of the assumption that political regulation operates with the public interest in mind. Scientific productivity has continued to advance in the past half-century, as has the value and quantity of human expression. The argument in favor of socioeconomic self-regulation is identical to that for the other two systems. Yet recent scholarship suggests declining rates of economic growth in the wealthiest countries most subject to increasing political regulation during this period, while greater reliance on self-regulating economic forces has resulted in dramatic improvement of socioeconomies in the developing world. As political regulation of human expression has declined, literary, artistic, and philosophical achievement have expanded. Guidance is offered for how people should understand social change in their role as citizens and how they should conduct themselves in a world full of short-term instability but tremendous long-term progress.

scholarly journals The End(s) of Self-Regulation?

2008 ◽  
pp. 169 ◽  
Author(s):  
Richard F. Devlin ◽  
Porter Heffernan
Keyword(s):  
Public Interest ◽  
Task Force ◽  
Self Regulation ◽  
Legal Profession ◽  
Regulatory Structure ◽  
Future Possibility ◽  
The Public ◽  
Advantages And Disadvantages ◽  
Liberal Democratic ◽  
Liberal Democratic Society

Self-regulation is a sacred cow of the Canadian legal profession. The authors question this assumption on several levels and ask whether, in a liberal democratic society such as Canada, self-regulation really is in the public interest. The advantages and disadvantages of self-regulation are discussed in the context of other Commonwealth nations who have moved away from this type of regulatory structure. Though the self-regulation debate has been traditionally viewed as a "one way or the other" argument, calibrated regulation seems to be a possibility in Canada and, in fact, steps have already been taken in this direction. Devlin and Heffernan conclude by proposing the creation of a Task Force — The Sponsors’ Table on the Regulation of the Legal Profession — to reconsider the present state and future possibility of recalibrated regulation in Canada.

‘Professionally we’re definitely in this together’

2018 ◽  
Vol 7 (3) ◽  
pp. 481-500
Author(s):  
Julian Petley
Keyword(s):  
Public Interest ◽  
News Media ◽  
Political System ◽  
Self Regulation ◽  
The Political ◽  
Fourth Estate ◽  
The Public ◽  
Sex Scandals ◽  
The Creation

In early April 2016, the websites Byline and open Democracy published a number of articles alleging that the Culture Secretary, John Whitting dale, had been involved in a liaison with a prostitute. Remarkably, given most British national newspapers’ obsession with sex scandals, the national press not only refused to pick up the story but also attacked Byline and open Democracy for running it, arguing that it was not in the public interest. Byline and open Democracy responded that the nationals had refused to run the story because they did not want to harm Whittingdale, who was known not to be in favour of putting the recommendations of the Leveson Inquiry into practice. The nationals hit back by accusing Byline and openDemocracy, which supported Leveson, of trying to undermine Whittingdale and so improve the chances of the Leveson recommendations being adopted. But in the course of this extremely bitter battle between different sections of the news media, it soon became apparent that the nationals had in fact been sitting on not only the prostitute story but a number of other scandals as well concerning Whittingdale. This article will utilize the Whittingdale controversy to argue that most of the British national press puts serving its own interests far above serving the public interest, that it will use every means at its disposa to thwart the creation of the kind of system of press self-regulation proposed by the Leveson Inquiry and that it is far too deeply enmeshed in the political system, and in particular, with Conservative interests, to be considered as a Fourth Estate of the realm.

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