Publication: Cross Country Comparison of Regional Mechanisms for Delivery of Free Legal Assistance
Loading...
Published
2014-01
ISSN
Date
2014-04-16
Author(s)
Editor(s)
Abstract
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.
Link to Data Set
Citation
“World Bank. 2014. Cross Country Comparison of Regional Mechanisms for Delivery of Free Legal Assistance. © http://hdl.handle.net/10986/17837 License: CC BY 3.0 IGO.”
Digital Object Identifier
Associated URLs
Associated content
Other publications in this report series
Journal
Journal Volume
Journal Issue
Collections
Related items
Showing items related by metadata.
Publication Serbia(World Bank, Washington, DC, 2015-02-09)This report aims at identifying the particular needs and constraints faced by the poorest women and men when accessing the judicial system. Similarly to the Judicial Functional Review,6 the scope of this report focuses primarily on the courts because they are the main vehicle for justice service delivery and the primary institutions of justice in Serbia. The scope includes all types of services and covers litigious and non-litigious aspects of civil, commercial, administrative, and criminal justice. The focus is on the actual implementation and day-to-day functioning of the sector institutions that deliver justice to people, rather than the law on the books . The scope includes other institutions in the sector to the extent that they enable or impede service delivery by the courts, including: the Ministry of Justice (MOJ), the High Judicial Council (HJC), the State Prosecutorial Council (SPC), the courts, the Public Prosecutor Offices (PPOs), the Judicial Academy, the Ombudsperson s Office, the police, prisons, and justice sector professional organizations (such as the Bar, notaries, bailiffs, and mediators). The focus of this report is on access to justice services, including relevant financial, informational, and geographic barriers to such access.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.Publication In Search of Success : Case Studies in Justice Sector Development in Sub-Saharan Africa(World Bank, 2010-06-01)The World Bank, Department for International Development (DFID) and other donors have long been engaged in legal and judicial reform in sub-Saharan Africa in such areas as legal drafting, strengthening court administration, judicial training, and the empowerment of citizens through a better understanding of the legal system. This has often been done on an ad hoc basis with only limited review of other reform efforts in the region. In order to foster a more responsive approach to justice sector development programs, a collection of case studies was commissioned. One of the more daunting tasks was identifying notable justice sector developments or reforms, which offered specific impacts and which could be examined through both a desk review and field research. Independent of the funding source, the evidence base was not only limited but revealed a need for donors themselves to invest in better data collection, which could then be analyzed and measured against benchmarks or objectives such as improved access to justice. There is a significant need to review and learn from experiences, including controversial ones, in Africa's justice sectors. These case studies are not homogenous largely because their subjects vary and span a wide array of developments that reflect the realities of the region. Each story stands alone and is in no particular order. In the final chapter, the conclusions offered in each story are digested into ideas for future actions. The collection also represents a modest range of stories and it is to be hoped that other cases will be identified and shared. A comparison of experiences of sector-wide programs (SWAPs), for example, could help both donors and governments enhance socio-economic impact. It should be noted that the emphasis in this report is on providing information about positive directions in justice sector development and the ways in which lessons learned might be applied to achieve greater impact in the future. The anticipated value of this collection is that some of the conclusions or actions may be taken up and used to contribute to improvements by those committed to improving the rule of law in sub-Saharan Africa and is in search of 'success'.Publication Pre-trial Procedures in Administrative Justice Proceedings in England and Wales, France, Germany and the Netherlands : A Comparative Study with a View to the Possible Development of Pre Trial Procedures in Administrative Law in Turkey(World Bank, 2010-07-19)Disputes between citizens or businesses and the State about respective rights and duties are at the core of administrative law. The ability for citizens and businesses to hold Government accountable for acting within the rule of law is a key element of good governance. It provides legal certainty and guarantees predictable and rule-based implementation of legal and regulatory frameworks across different sectors. It also provides Government with effective mechanisms to enforce these frameworks. An effective administrative justice system is therefore a crucial element to make sure all players follow the rules of the game. As such, it is an important aspect of a sound investment climate. The Turkish Ministry of Justice has identified the absence of pre-trial procedures in the administrative justice system as a major obstacle to the efficient and effective delivery of judicial services to citizens, businesses, and the state. There are widespread complaints that administrative judges crumble after a heavy workload and that certain types of cases may be more effectively dealt with outside of the courts. This will make dispute resolution for citizens, businesses, and the state more effective and will alleviate the workload of the administrative courts. Current dysfunctions also affect Turkey's ability to live up to its commitments under the European convention for human rights. Its article six grants those seeking justice the right to a fair trial within reasonable time. Citizens and businesses bring complaints to the European court of human rights which has the power to condemn signatory states for non-compliance. This has financial implications as a country found in violation of this convention has to pay compensation. Beyond the financial implications, though, it negatively affects the image of the Turkish justice system abroad and particularly in Europe, which casts a cloud over European Union accession negotiations.Publication Vested Interests in Legal and Judicial Reform(Washington, DC, 2008-05)This report analyzes the main reasons or interests that have prevented some recent judicial and legal reforms in Honduras and Bolivia from becoming effective. It focuses on the reasons why criminal justice reforms were unable to put an end to the misuse of pre-trial detention. The report also includes a study of some of the reasons that have prevented criminal procedure code reforms from reducing the perception of impunity prevailing in both countries. With respect to the reforms of judicial selection mechanisms, it focuses on the interests that have prevented the public perception of judicial independence from improving in spite of the implementation of those reforms. The report includes an annex to Section 1, consultations with civil society in Honduras. Section 2 discusses civil and commercial justice in Paraguay. Section 3 discusses vested interests in legal and judicial reform projects in Guyana.
Users also downloaded
Showing related downloaded files
Publication Revealing Tax Evasion(Washington, DC: World Bank, 2024-07-24)This paper examines the pervasiveness of tax evasion among firms in Indonesia and the characteristics associated with higher levels of noncompliance. Tax evasion is estimated through a randomized, double-list experiment embedded in a nationally representative survey of 2,955 registered firms. This revealed whether firms pay all the taxes they owe without them having to disclose this directly. Across both list experiments, around a quarter of the firms indirectly reveal that they have evaded taxes. Firms that do not export, face intense competition from informal firms, and believe tax administration is a major obstacle to their business are the most likely to evade taxes. These findings help to inform the enforcement activities of tax authorities in middle-income countries, which face substantial challenges in estimating levels of tax evasion and identifying noncompliant taxpayers.Publication Digital Africa(Washington, DC: World Bank, 2023-03-13)All African countries need better and more jobs for their growing populations. "Digital Africa: Technological Transformation for Jobs" shows that broader use of productivity-enhancing, digital technologies by enterprises and households is imperative to generate such jobs, including for lower-skilled people. At the same time, it can support not only countries’ short-term objective of postpandemic economic recovery but also their vision of economic transformation with more inclusive growth. These outcomes are not automatic, however. Mobile internet availability has increased throughout the continent in recent years, but Africa’s uptake gap is the highest in the world. Areas with at least 3G mobile internet service now cover 84 percent of Africa’s population, but only 22 percent uses such services. And the average African business lags in the use of smartphones and computers as well as more sophisticated digital technologies that catalyze further productivity gains. Two issues explain the usage gap: affordability of these new technologies and willingness to use them. For the 40 percent of Africans below the extreme poverty line, mobile data plans alone would cost one-third of their incomes—in addition to the price of access devices, apps, and electricity. Data plans for small- and medium-size businesses are also more expensive than in other regions. Moreover, shortcomings in the quality of internet services—and in the supply of attractive, skills-appropriate apps that promote entrepreneurship and raise earnings—dampen people’s willingness to use them. For those countries already using these technologies, the development payoffs are significant. New empirical studies for this report add to the rapidly growing evidence that mobile internet availability directly raises enterprise productivity, increases jobs, and reduces poverty throughout Africa. To realize these and other benefits more widely, Africa’s countries must implement complementary and mutually reinforcing policies to strengthen both consumers’ ability to pay and willingness to use digital technologies. These interventions must prioritize productive use to generate large numbers of inclusive jobs in a region poised to benefit from a massive, youthful workforce—one projected to become the world’s largest by the end of this century.Publication The Convergence of Sovereign Environmental, Social and Governance Ratings(World Bank, Washington, DC, 2021-03)This paper studies sovereign environmental, social, and governance (ESG) ratings from the qualitative and quantitative angles. First, it introduces the landscape for sovereign ESG ratings. Second, it provides a comparison with the history of credit ratings, factoring in that ESG ratings are in an early development stage. Third, the paper reviews different actors, key issues, including taxonomy, models and data from different providers. The paper provides a qualitative assessment of the convergence of ratings among providers by introducing a factor attribution method, that maps all providers' ratings into a common taxonomy defined by the United Nations-supported Principles for Responsible Investment (UNPRI). Then, a quantitative analysis of the convergence is performed by regressing the scores on variables from the World Bank sovereign ESG database. A noticeable contribution to the literature is a high level of explanatory power of these variables across all rating methodologies, with a R2 ranging between 0.78 and 0.98. An analysis of the importance of variables using a lasso regression exhibits the preponderance of the governance factor and the limited role of demographic shifts for all providers.Publication Digital Trade for Development(International Monetary Fund, 2025-01-22)This report explores the opportunities and challenges for developing economies arising from digital trade and discusses the role of international cooperation in tackling these opportunities and challenges. The report considers policy actions in the areas of digital infrastructure, skills, international support for capacity development, and the regulatory and policy environment. Specific policy issues include the WTO e-commerce moratorium, regulation of cross-border data flows, competition policies, and consumer protection.Publication Rural Water in Tanzania(World Bank, Washington, DC, 2017-12)The purpose of the document is to lay out the reasons for a lack of progress in Tanzania's rural water sector. Its key messages include: stressing the additional progress that is needed to make Sustainable Development Goal (SDG) targets for water, in particular taking into account accessibility of functioning rural water points; the need to address the causes of high water point failure; and the need to address institutional constraints that have limited the capacity of investment to reach its desired return. The econometric analysis of water point failure reveals the importance of the choice of pump type in comparison to the promoter and management in explaining water point failure. Meanwhile, the institutional analysis points to a limited user participation and weak accountability mechanisms; blurred institutional roles and intergovernmental arrangements; and limited capacity of local government and community-owned water supply organizations.