Access to Justice, Digitalization and Vulnerability by Naomi Creutzfeldt, Arabella Kyprianides, Ben Bradford and Jonathan Jackson examines individuals’ experience of seeking justice in housing and special educational needs and disabilities (SEND) in the context of post-pandemic digitalisation. Manisha Shukla deems the book a valuable resource for practitioners, scholars, and anyone interested in the evolving landscape of justice and digital accessibility.
“Before the Law stands a doorkeeper. To this doorkeeper comes a man from the country who asks to gain entry into the Law. But the doorkeeper says that he cannot grant him entry at the moment. This is something that the man from the country had not expected. The Law, he thinks, should be accessible for everyone at all times.” These lines from Franz Kafka’s classic The Trial could be an apt beginning for Access to Justice, Digitalization and Vulnerability by Naomi Creutzfeldt, Arabella Kyprianides, Ben Bradford and Jonathan Jackson, a book exploring justice and its various doorkeepers in the form of digital technology, administrative access and consciousness or capability around the law.
The book is the first in a new series from Bristol University Press, “Perspectives on Law and Administration to Justice”, co-edited by Jess Mant and Daniel Newman. The book is based on the project, Delivering Administrative Justice After the Pandemic’ funded by Nuffield Foundation seeks to understand the extent to which the people of England and Wales were able to access the Administrative Justice System (AJS) during the COVID-19 pandemic and what this reveals about the future of this digital modernisation project and its inclusiveness going forward. Thus, the authors seek to work at the intersection of access to justice, administrative dispute redressal and vulnerability, and how people’s experience informs the trust they place in the alternative justice mechanisms in this digital era.
The Access to Justice from the 1970s to COVID-19
The book is a significant addition to the existing scholarship on “Access to Justice”, a movement which began in the 1960s with the aim to vindicate the rights of the poor to access low-cost litigations. In the 1970s, during the movement’s second wave, the area was broadened to include the interests of the poor more broadly and more diffuse concerns like environmental issues and consumer grievances. It was in the mid-1990s, with the introduction of Alternative Dispute Resolution mechanism (ADR) and mediation as alternatives to court, that the third wave of the Access to Justice Movement was born.
It is this area of convergence with ADR that forms the basis of the book. It deals with AJS during the COVID-19 pandemic when offline modes of justice delivery were not feasible. Yet, the areas concerning administrative institutions has shifted online, to fulfil the needs of a digitalising society and address the grievances arising in the field. The AJS is formed of the institutions that support an individual’s right to access to the courts, so that they have the means to resolve legal disputes where government institutions are involved. It comprises the institutions of complaint schemes, ombuds, tribunals and the administrative court. It affects diverse areas of one’s life, but the authors focus on Housing and Special Educational Needs and Disabilities (SEND), areas that were significantly affected during the pandemic.
The importance of legitimacy and trust
The book is based on both quantitative and qualitative data collected from in-depth interviews, public panel surveys and vignettes experiments. Apart from professionals, the authors interviewed service users or help seekers whom they categorised into four different types based on legal consciousness and capabilities: Digitally and Legally Literate; Digitally Agnostic, Legally Able; Digitally Assisted, Legally Unable and Digitally and Legally Abandoned (34).
The first part of the book sets out its theoretical framework, the “vulnerability approach” to access to justice (23). It argues that access to justice scholarship cannot be limited to its legal dimension. Rather, it invokes the trust and legitimacy people place in the justice system, grounded in the due process underpinning it. Legitimacy is understood in terms of procedural (formal) aspects, referring to the way institutions engage with service users. Trust is informed by the societal constructs (informal aspects,) referring to the way people perceive the institution based on their circumstances and experiences. The authors maintain that access to justice should be understood in a more communal sense that takes account of both formal and informal elements.
Mapping a help seeker’s journey to identify barriers
The authors distil eight steps that a help seeker’s journey consists of: awareness, taking action, advice sector referral, support and guidance, intermediate process, consideration, engage, service and outcome (78). The book argues that it is not the offline or online scenario where one mode guarantees justice more than the other; rather, it is how smoothly and effectively the process is carried out in both, and the capability of the user to navigate through it.
To illustrate this process, the book then follows the help seekers’ journey in two specific areas, Housing and SEND, that occurred during the pandemic. The authors aim to understand how the online Alternative Dispute Resolution mechanism was deployed, and what lessons can be taken forward as digitalisation advances. The book evidences its arguments through various case studies, few of them being the real-life cases from the surveys and interviews and others fictional scenarios that illustrate how offline and online modes can suit different people and situations. A fictional example of a woman with two disabled children who loses her job during the pandemic and faces eviction from her social housing demonstrates how online services can be beneficial for those who have complex caring responsibilities.
Taking forward lessons from the pandemic
The last section of the book discusses outcomes and takeaways from the interview and secondary research analysis. The authors explore the role of procedural justice in ADS and its accessibility. A strong section of the book is its second last chapter, which deals with “Marginalised groups and their Unmet Legal needs” (174). It examines the concerns of people who form type 3 and type 4 of its data, i.e., “digitally assisted and legally unable” and “digitally and legally abandoned/excluded” people who were unable to access the procedures of justice and thus lost their trust in justice.
A timely examination of the accessibility of digital justice in a post-pandemic world
Here, as highlighted by the authors, the book considers the reasons and barriers to access, such as the struggles of the homeless and disadvantaged parents of SEND children who do not have the capacity to learn how to access these systems. Both groups need to be understood, accommodated and supported in a more nuanced manner. The ideal journey through the justice might figure as linear, but as the case studies show, a help seeker’s real-life experience is much more complex, and they might easily get stuck along the way or abandon the journey altogether.
The book is a timely examination of the accessibility of digital justice in a post-pandemic world and what lessons can be taken forward from that experience. It argues that to make justice accessible, there is a need to make justice procedures navigable, with help is available at all the eight steps, to ensure public trust in the justice system. This book will be a helpful resource for practitioners and scholars in the field of law or justice and a worthwhile read for the anyone interested in access to justice or digital justice.
Note: This review gives the views of the author and not the position of the LSE Review of Books blog, nor of the London School of Economics and Political Science.
Image: Paul Wishart on Shutterstock.
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