A Roadmap to Justice

Abstract

This white paper explores the gap between principle and practice concerning access to justice in America and what should be done to address it. The analysis grows out of a Roadmap to Justice forum involving over one hundred leading experts, co-sponsored by the Stanford University Center on the Legal Profession and the James Sokolove Charitable Fund.

One group of Forum participants met in Boston in October 2008, and another in Stanford in March 2009. Their discussions centered on three main questions, which we examine more fully here: goals and priorities for the delivery of civil legal assistance; inadequacies in the current structure; and cost-effective strategies for addressing those inadequacies.

Keywords: Civil Gideon, access to justice, right to counsel, pro bono, legal ethics, professional responsibility