Publication: Justice Sector Services and the Poor in Jordan : Determining Needs and Priorities
Loading...
Date
2013-05
ISSN
Published
2013-05
Author(s)
Editor(s)
Abstract
Understanding the demands and priorities of poor persons is important to effectively target services in the justice sector. To help enhance data, in 2012 the Department of Statistics implemented a survey of 10,000 households focusing on the justice sector the first of its kind in Jordan. The survey was administered throughout the country, covering both rural and urban areas. Its primary objective was to identify the most common types of legal disputes and the characteristics of the households and individuals involved. The survey demonstrates that the most frequent types of cases reported vary by the expenditure levels of respondents. The key areas for reform to impact poverty include: improving the quality of services in personal status cases, especially access to alimony, child support and inheritance; simplifying the process of deferring court fees for poor persons; and strengthening special services developed to address personal status issues, including the newly-established alimony fund.
Link to Data Set
Citation
“Prettitore, Paul. 2013. Justice Sector Services and the Poor in Jordan : Determining Needs and Priorities. MENA Knowledge and Learning Quick Notes Series;No. 96. © World Bank. http://hdl.handle.net/10986/16120 License: CC BY 3.0 IGO.”
Associated URLs
Associated content
Other publications in this report series
Journal
Journal Volume
Journal Issue
Collections
Related items
Showing items related by metadata.
Publication Building Legal Aid Services from the Ground Up : Learning from Pilot Initiatives in Jordan(World Bank, Washington, DC, 2014-01)Like most governments, the Government of Jordan (GoJ) struggles with the provision of legal aid services, information, counseling and representation by a lawyer - to the poor. Jordanians have the legal right to state-sponsored services only for serious criminal cases, while the Jordan Bar Association tries to provide services for lesser crimes and civil cases. Civil Society Organizations (CSOs) have joined the pool of service providers. Yet legal aid remains much underutilized despite high demand, especially for family law (personal status) cases. These include divorce, alimony, child support and inheritance. The Jordanian CSO the Justice Center for Legal Aid (JCLA) provides legal aid via centers throughout Jordan, providing information and awareness to over 6,500 beneficiaries, counseling to 2,000 and legal representation to over 1,200 over the last several years.Publication Cross Country Comparison of Regional Mechanisms for Delivery of Free Legal Assistance(Washington, DC, 2014-01)This report provides comparative analysis of different delivery models of Free Legal Aid (FLA) in Montenegro, Bosnia and Herzegovina (Brcko), Lithuania, Croatia and Slovenia. The field work and data collection was conducted from November to December 2013. The survey was funded by the Multi Donor Trust Fund for justice sector support, established with generous contributions from the European Union (EU) delegation in Serbia, United Kingdom Department for International Development, the Swedish International Development Cooperation Agency, Norway, Denmark, the Netherlands, Slovenia, Spain, and Switzerland.Publication Poverty and Legal Problems in Jordan(World Bank, Washington, DC, 2015-09)Jordanian citizens are no exception - a household survey conducted in Jordan in 2011 found that roughly 20 percent of families had a member experience a legal problem in the previous five years. Legal problems, left unaddressed, can cause an economic or social shock that pushes vulnerable persons into poverty. From an equity standpoint, the poor and near-poor need equal access to services that subsequently enhance opportunities to exercise their rights. Taking the equity argument a step beyond equal access to existing services, governments should develop special services that target the specific needs of the poor in resolving legal problems. Defining the relationship between legal problems and poverty is not a simple task. The first step is identifying the types of legal problems that are most likely to affect the poor and the near poor, and comparing this with wealthier citizens. The second step is to identify within this group the types of cases that are most likely to have some kind of poverty impact on the poor and near-poor. Greater knowledge of this relationship will help policymakers develop the appropriate tools to address these problems.Publication Who Needs Legal Aid Services? Addressing Demand in Jordan(World Bank, Washington, DC, 2012-03)With the launch of two World Bank-funded programs, Jordan is stepping where few countries in the Middle East and North Africa (MENA) region have gone before the development of comprehensive legal aid services based more closely on demand. For many poor persons, regular avenues of dispute resolution may prove inaccessible due to the costs involved, the complicated nature of procedures, the inability to procure legal information and representation, and a general lack of knowledge about rights and the means to enforce them. Legal aid services information, counseling and representation in court can help poor persons overcome these obstacles. They are not only important as services themselves, but are gateway services they may ultimately lead to access to other services, such as social welfare benefits or basic services.Publication Sri Lanka : Justice Sector Review(Washington, DC, 2013-06)Improvement of the performance of the judiciary is an important part of a growth agenda for Sri Lanka as it moves to middle income country status. The present government has set ambitious targets to double gross domestic product (GDP) per capita by 2016 and has cited the need for a more efficient judicial sector as a means of reducing poverty. This is consistent with the broad historical evidence that a well-functioning judicial sector is the most effective long-term instrument for securing property rights and enforcing contracts, which in turn are critical factors for investment and commerce, and hence poverty reduction and economic growth. Sri Lanka ranks 133rd in the 2013 doing business's sub-index on enforcement of contracts, a level that is comparable to other South Asian countries but lower than other middle income comparators such as Thailand (ranked 23rd) and Malaysia (ranked 33rd). Identifying the contributing factors to inefficiency in Sri Lanka's courts in hearing commercial cases is the main purpose of this review. The findings in the report are based on available statistics on court performance and interviews with key stakeholders in the justice sector. The report is structured as follows: chapter one gives introduction, chapter two gives organization and management of the courts, chapter three gives data on case handling in courts, chapter four deals with private sector approaches to dispute resolution, chapter five focuses on legal and procedural issues in commercial cases, chapter six gives past reform efforts, and chapter seven gives conclusions and recommendations.
Users also downloaded
Showing related downloaded files
Publication Remarks at the United Nations Biodiversity Conference(World Bank, Washington, DC, 2021-10-12)World Bank Group President David Malpass discussed biodiversity and climate change being closely interlinked, with terrestrial and marine ecosystems serving as critically important carbon sinks. At the same time climate change acts as a direct driver of biodiversity and ecosystem services loss. The World Bank has financed biodiversity conservation around the world, including over 116 million hectares of Marine and Coastal Protected Areas, 10 million hectares of Terrestrial Protected Areas, and over 300 protected habitats, biological buffer zones and reserves. The COVID pandemic, biodiversity loss, climate change are all reminders of how connected we are. The recovery from this pandemic is an opportunity to put in place more effective policies, institutions, and resources to address biodiversity loss.Publication The Journey Ahead(Washington, DC: World Bank, 2024-10-31)The Journey Ahead: Supporting Successful Migration in Europe and Central Asia provides an in-depth analysis of international migration in Europe and Central Asia (ECA) and the implications for policy making. By identifying challenges and opportunities associated with migration in the region, it aims to inform a more nuanced, evidencebased debate on the costs and benefits of cross-border mobility. Using data-driven insights and new analysis, the report shows that migration has been an engine of prosperity and has helped address some of ECA’s demographic and socioeconomic disparities. Yet, migration’s full economic potential remains untapped. The report identifies multiple barriers keeping migration from achieving its full potential. Crucially, it argues that policies in both origin and destination countries can help maximize the development impacts of migration and effectively manage the economic, social, and political costs. Drawing from a wide range of literature, country experiences, and novel analysis, The Journey Ahead presents actionable policy options to enhance the benefits of migration for destination and origin countries and migrants themselves. Some measures can be taken unilaterally by countries, whereas others require close bilateral or regional coordination. The recommendations are tailored to different types of migration— forced displacement as well as high-skilled and low-skilled economic migration—and from the perspectives of both sending and receiving countries. This report serves as a comprehensive resource for governments, development partners, and other stakeholders throughout Europe and Central Asia, where the richness and diversity of migration experiences provide valuable insights for policy makers in other regions of the world.Publication South Asia Development Update, April 2024: Jobs for Resilience(Washington, DC: World Bank, 2024-04-02)South Asia is expected to continue to be the fastest-growing emerging market and developing economy (EMDE) region over the next two years. This is largely thanks to robust growth in India, but growth is also expected to pick up in most other South Asian economies. However, growth in the near-term is more reliant on the public sector than elsewhere, whereas private investment, in particular, continues to be weak. Efforts to rein in elevated debt, borrowing costs, and fiscal deficits may eventually weigh on growth and limit governments' ability to respond to increasingly frequent climate shocks. Yet, the provision of public goods is among the most effective strategies for climate adaptation. This is especially the case for households and farms, which tend to rely on shifting their efforts to non-agricultural jobs. These strategies are less effective forms of climate adaptation, in part because opportunities to move out of agriculture are limited by the region’s below-average employment ratios in the non-agricultural sector and for women. Because employment growth is falling short of working-age population growth, the region fails to fully capitalize on its demographic dividend. Vibrant, competitive firms are key to unlocking the demographic dividend, robust private investment, and workers’ ability to move out of agriculture. A range of policies could spur firm growth, including improved business climates and institutions, the removal of financial sector restrictions, and greater openness to trade and capital flows.Publication Media and Messages for Nutrition and Health(World Bank, Washington, DC, 2020-06)The Lao People’s Democratic Republic (Lao PDR) has experienced rapid and significant economic growth over the past decade. However, poor nutritional outcomes remain a concern. Rates of childhood undernutrition are particularly high in remote, rural, and upland areas. Media have the potential to play an important role in shaping health and nutrition–related behaviors and practices as well as in promoting sociocultural and economic development that might contribute to improved nutritional outcomes. This report presents the results of a media audit (MA) that was conducted to inform the development and production of mass media advocacy and communication strategies and materials with a focus on maternal and child health and nutrition that would reach the most people from the poorest communities in northern Lao PDR. Making more people aware of useful information, essential services and products and influencing them to use these effectively is the ultimate goal of mass media campaigns, and the MA measures the potential effectiveness of media efforts to reach this goal. The effectiveness of communication channels to deliver health and nutrition messages to target beneficiaries to ensure maximum reach and uptake can be viewed in terms of preferences, satisfaction, and trust. Overall, the four most accessed media channels for receiving information among communities in the study areas were village announcements, mobile phones, television, and out-of-home (OOH) media. Of the accessed media channels, the top three most preferred channels were village announcements (40 percent), television (26 percent), and mobile phones (19 percent). In terms of trust, village announcements were the most trusted source of information (64 percent), followed by mobile phones (14 percent) and television (11 percent). Hence of all the media channels, village announcements are the most preferred, have the most satisfied users, and are the most trusted source of information in study communities from four provinces in Lao PDR with some of the highest burden of childhood undernutrition.Publication Economic Recovery(World Bank, Washington, DC, 2021-04-06)World Bank Group President David Malpass spoke about the world facing major challenges, including COVID, climate change, rising poverty and inequality and growing fragility and violence in many countries. He highlighted vaccines, working closely with Gavi, WHO, and UNICEF, the World Bank has conducted over one hundred capacity assessments, many even more before vaccines were available. The World Bank Group worked to achieve a debt service suspension initiative and increased transparency in debt contracts at developing countries. The World Bank Group is finalizing a new climate change action plan, which includes a big step up in financing, building on their record climate financing over the past two years. He noted big challenges to bring all together to achieve GRID: green, resilient, and inclusive development. Janet Yellen, U.S. Secretary of the Treasury, mentioned focusing on vulnerable people during the pandemic. Kristalina Georgieva, Managing Director of the International Monetary Fund, focused on giving everyone a fair shot during a sustainable recovery. All three commented on the importance of tackling climate change.