Poverty, Efficiency of Dispute Resolution Systems and Access to Justice in Developing Countries

This book analyses access to public and private dispute resolution mechanisms within a sample of low/middle human development index (HDI) nations by using a law and economics approach that takes into account supply and demand-related factors. An empirical model is proposed and tested covering 18 countries in Africa and Latin America within which the access to dispute resolution mechanisms is determined by supply-related factors, such as: (a) the economic cost of providing court services vis a vis the cost of providing formal/informal private alternative dispute resolution mechanisms (ADRMs); (b) expectations of high or low levels of political governance among judicial system personnel; (c) the relative size of public vs. private alternative dispute resolution mechanisms; and (d) technologies used in the provision of public and private dispute resolution mechanisms. On the other hand, the demand for public and private dispute resolution mechanisms is jointly determined by (a) the price of access to public vis a vis private dispute resolution mechanisms faced by users; (b) relative income levels of the parties in dispute; (c) number of users/complexity of their cases; and (d) users´ expectations of the governance (e.g. quality of rulings or judicial corruption) in the provision of public vs. private dispute resolution mechanisms. An empirical model is tested by developing and using jurimetrics-based objective indicators of (judicial) efficiency in public courts and in private ADRMs (and not just perceptional indicators) that, for the first time in the literature, account for qualitative and quantitative dimensions of rulings (decisions). Qualitative indicators of judicial rulings are computed through the analysis of a sample of real case-files focused on land titling disputes experienced by users within the lowest 20 percent segment of income levels in each of 18 countries. The quality of judicial rulings indicator detects substantive and procedural judicial errors in 18 court systems between 2004 and 2008. Quantitative indicators account for the clearance rates in each country between 2003 and 2007. The real changes in judicial budget lines between 2004 and 2007 (such as changes in judicial technology, salaries, infrastructure, and judicial training) are used as explanatory factors