Digital Justice for All: Developing A People-Centered Framework in the UK

Overview:

How can courts harness digital technologies while ensuring fairness, accessibility, and public trust? This proposed project explores the future of digital justice by examining how online dispute resolution, virtual hearings and AI-enabled legal processes are reshaping access to justice in the UK and beyond. Bringing together researchers and professionals, the project will draw on experiences from China’s Internet Courts and India’s digital justice initiatives to inform the design of empirical research on reforming UK online dispute resolution platforms and digital justice policy. Rather than focusing solely on institutions and technologies, the research places people at the centre, exploring how users of judicial institutions like courts experience digital justice and the challenges they face, including digital exclusion, accessibility barriers and varying levels of technological confidence.

Activities and events:

The IAS Research Development Project will support a multidisciplinary workshop involving academics, legal practitioners and technology innovators. By creating opportunities for dialogue across sectors and disciplines, the workshop will foster new collaborations and generate innovative ideas for future research on digital courts and access to justice. It will also provide a platform for developing a larger interdisciplinary funding application examining how to ensure courts and dispute resolution platforms of UK remain accessible, inclusive and responsive to all in the digital era.