Justice and Development Working Paper Series

39 items available

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The Justice and Development Working Paper Series serves as a platform for new and innovative thinking on justice and development that features work from World Bank and external authors. It is a product of the World Bank’s Justice Reform Practice Group, which generates knowledge and provides advice and assistance to Bank staff and Bank client countries on improving state and nonstate justice system institutions and mechanisms. Justice and Development disseminates the findings of works in progress to facilitate a more rapid exchange of ideas about development issues and justice reform.

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Now showing 1 - 3 of 3
  • Publication
    Crimes and Disputes : Missed Opportunities and Insights from a National Data Collection Effort in Papua New Guinea
    (World Bank, Washington, DC, 2014-02) Akmeemana, Sakuntala; Diwa, Reno; Menzies, Nicholas; Bailey, Laura
    As in many developing countries, data collection has proved to be a considerable challenge in Papua New Guinea (PNG). A welcome effort at data collection on dispute incidence and personal security was made in PNG's household income and expenditure survey (HIES or the Survey), (2009-2010) an experience that also highlights some of the challenges of such an exercise. For the first time, the HIES asked questions about dispute incidence and personal security. The survey was administered in all provinces of PNG to a nationally and regionally representative sample of over 4,000 households, and provides comprehensive data about the socio-economic status of households. The results are representative at the level of the country's four regions (Southern, Highlands, Momase, and Islands) plus the metropolitan area (which comprises the major urban areas of National Capital District and Lae), as well as for a rural or urban breakdown within each region. This briefing note highlights some of the main findings on dispute and personal security, noting which results need to be treated with caution. It also distils a number of lessons from this data collection effort.
  • Publication
    Surveying Justice : A Practical Guide to Household Surveys
    (World Bank, Washington, DC, 2010-01) Himelein, Kristen; Menzies, Nicholas; Woolcock, Michael
    Though household surveys have long been an established part of development practice and regularly used to gather data on poverty incidence and the range of associated indicators, they have not yet become a common tool of justice reform practitioners. This guide aims to be a practical starting point for integrating justice work and household data collection, targeted both towards justice practitioners interested in survey design, as well as survey researchers interested in incorporating justice questions into their work. It provides guidance on designing a survey, suggested topics and questions, and ideas to facilitate a constructive engagement in discussions around justice in development practice. Household survey data can be beneficial to understanding justice questions as household surveys ordinarily cover a large, randomly selected cross-section of people - including the rich and poor, urban and rural dwellers - capturing a population's most common justice issues. Household survey questions commonly ask respondents about their most frequently experienced justice issues, issues when seeking redress, and knowledge and opinions of the law. Household surveys thus complement data collection techniques more familiar to justice practitioners (such as user surveys or sector assessments) that tend to focus on institutions of the justice sector and hence capture only the views of those who manage to access such institutions and privilege the perspectives of system incumbents. Household surveys have their limitations - not least significant cost, time and complexity implications. In addition, the standardized nature of surveys limits the type of information that can be gleaned and hence household surveys are generally most useful for gaining a picture of the "what" when it comes to justice issues, with complementary research methods often needed to properly understand the "why." Nevertheless, surveys can represent a useful starting point for engagement in a particular context, providing a snap shot of the justice landscape from which more detailed qualitative and quantitative studies can be undertaken.
  • Publication
    Taking the Rules of the Game Seriously : Mainstreaming Justice in Development - The World Bank's Justice for the Poor Program
    (World Bank, Washington, DC, 2009-11) Sage, Caroline; Menzies, Nicholas; Woolcock, Michael
    This paper explains the ideas and approaches that underpin the World Bank's Justice for the Poor (J4P) program. J4P is an approach to legal empowerment that focuses on mainstreaming sociolegal concerns into development processes, in sectors ranging from community-driven development and mining technical assistance to labor-rights advocacy and classic judicial reform. It has developed out of a perspective that legal and regulatory frameworks and related justice concerns cannot be conceived of in terms of a 'sector' or a specific set of institutions, but are integral to all development processes. Further, while there is broad agreement that justice reform and building an equitable justice sector is central to good governance and sustainable development, there is limited understanding of how equitable justice systems emerge and how such processes can be facilitated by external actors. J4P addresses these knowledge gaps with intensive research aimed at understanding the ways in which development processes shape and are shaped by local context, and in particular, how the poor engage with and/or are excluded from the multiple rule systems ('legal pluralism') governing their everyday lives. Through three case studies of the program's work, this paper illustrates how understanding the various roles of law in society provides an innovative means of analyzing and responding to particular development problems. The cases also demonstrate the principles that underpin J4P: development is inherently conflict-ridden; institutional reform should be seen as an iterative and thus 'interim' process; building local research capacity is critical to establishing an empirically based and context-driven reform process; integrating diverse sources of empirical evidence is needed to deeply engage in local contexts; and rule systems are ubiquitous in all areas of development, not just the 'legal sector.'