This article comments on the process of law reform in Australia from the perspective of a legislative drafter. After a description of the Australian political and parliamentary system and a discussion of the role of the legislative drafter, a brief summary of the formal law reform processes in Australia is provided, including a discussion of how legislative drafting offices participate in the law reform process. Participation includes the drafting of Bills giving effect to law reform proposals based on drafting instructions approved by Cabinet, providing for the undertaking of statutory reviews, as well as the remaking of legislation. It is the role of the legislative drafter to assist the government by turning policy into legislation, so the focus here is on the practical implementation of law reform rather than the independence of law reform bodies.

The delegation of legislation from the parliament to the administration plays an important role in a modern administrative state. In Britain, parliamentary control – whereby the parliament has the right to approve or veto a delegated legislation – has been institutionalized and implemented. On the other hand, the Japanese parliament is powerless to approve a delegated order beforehand or ex post. Therefore, improper procedures such as the deviation of the delegated order from the enabling act by a governmental agency, or the introduction of arbitrary administrative measures, have been carried out under insufficient supervision by the parliament in Japan. The National Diet of Japan should, ideally, also hold the power to control the administrative order on the basis of the legal principles formulated by the Diet. Therefore, we propose the introduction of a parliamentary control system that invalidates the ex post enactment of a cabinet order if both Houses of parliament refuse the order within 40 days of its submission. These procedures would have increased efficacy when augmented with a political check function on the proposed cabinet orders by the parliament’s Committee on Oversight of Administration, or their standing committees.

The meetings of US President Donald Trump and North Korean leader Kim Jong-un, on 12 June 2018 in Singapore, as well as of South Korean President Moon Jae-in and Kim Jong-un, on 18 and 19 September 2018 in Pyongyang, intensified hopes of a step-by-step process aimed at the reunification of Korea. This development may follow the patterns of (West) German Chancellor Willy Brandt’s ‘East Policy’ with the Soviet Union and the (East) German Democratic Republic in 1970-71, which led to the reunification of Germany under Chancellor Helmut Kohl, in 1990. This article deals with similarities and differences in regard to Germany’s and Korea’s recent histories. It analyses the political, economic and legal aspects of a possible way to achieve Korean unity.

There is a general unease among the public across all jurisdictions about the progressive economic inequality that seems to define the new normal, and this phenomenon has been succinctly documented in numerous prominent studies. This trend of capitalism has been supported by the existing structures of the common law, albeit contrary to the aim and purpose of its original principles. The studies show that the modern capitalist societies display a persistent trend of increasing inequality, and this is summed up by the observation that modern capitalism generates progressive and intense economic inequality.
Capitalism as a socio-economic system is structured and sustained by the law and by socio-economic systems of institutions. Capitalism is not only a social ordering; essentially, it is a legal ordering. At the heart of this legal ordering are private laws, and tort law, but the most important is contract law: freedom of contract. It is common law, similar to the private law in other jurisdictions, that is responsible for the extreme inequality because it allows the institutions of capitalism to function freely and without much control. The open-ended capitalism that allows accumulation of wealth without ceiling causes progressive inequality in society and consequently works against the very freedom and individualism that are supposed to be the ideals of common law and capitalism. Because of the existing institutions of capitalism and the legal construct, freedom, fairness and the intended progress of the individual were not properly realized; the understanding of the ideas and principles of freedom, individualism, juridical equality, the right to property and freedom of contract have been imperfectly realized. With rising inequality, it is this imperfect realization, particularly of juridical equality that is in question.

This article examines the factors that have influenced the independence of the Law Commission of England and Wales and the implementation of its recommendations. It discusses innovations in Parliamentary procedure for Law Commission Bills, the Protocol between Government and the Law Commission; and the requirement for the Lord Chancellor to report annually to Parliament on the implementation of the Law Commission’s proposals. It makes the case that the relationship between independence and implementation is complex: at times the two pull in opposite directions, and at times they support each other.

This article is aimed at clarifying the legal implications of blockchain when applied to contracts and the impact of smart contracts in conflict prevention and dispute resolution.

The Internet and communications technology are changing every aspect of our lives. Now ODR is set to revolutionize commercial dispute resolution across APEC with the adoption of a new ODR Collaborative Framework. In this article, we will look at the challenges APEC small businesses face today and how the APEC ODR Collaborative Framework provides a much-needed solution to improve justice and boost trade.

We are currently witnessing a revolution in access to justice and a parallel revolution in justice delivery, design and experience. As dispute resolution design scholars tell us, the implementation of any new dispute intervention plan in a system should involve all of its stakeholders from the beginning. In our justice system there are three primary stakeholders, who have been traditionally involved in processes of innovation and change: the courts, the parties and the lawyers. Courts and parties have been involved in the development of online dispute resolution (ODR). However, one significant justice stakeholder, the legal profession, has been relatively absent from the table thus far – whether by lack of awareness, by lack of will or innovative spirit or by lack of invitation: lawyers.

This is a written representation of the presentation given on 29 October 2019, at 3:20 pm Eastern at the NCSC ODR2019 Summit held at the Colonial Williamsburg Lodge in Williamsburg, VA.

The authors presented on this topic during the International ODR Forum 2019 in Williamsburg, Virginia. The goal of this presentation was to share practices and ideas that have worked well in the design phase of an Online Dispute Resolution (ODR) pilot project for the State Courts of Colorado.

Technology has revolutionized the world in the last century, although computation devices have existed for millennia and punched-card data processing for two centuries. After 70 years of progress in technology and telecommunications with all the knowledgeable computer specialists and the sophistication of online services, it is high time public and private justice offered fair access to a fundamental human right: justice online. The role of technology in dispute resolution is high on the agenda, and the topic is increasingly at the centre of discussions. In a world that is rapidly developing, it is surprising to observe that online dispute resolution (ODR) is lagging behind.

As a judicial officer and court administrators tasked with creating and implementing online dispute resolution (ODR), we have found it both challenging and rewarding to operate at the nascent stage of this brave new world for courts. There is no standard set of best practices clearly tailored for this unique task. Instead, we draw on the wisdom of similarly situated programmes and standards to guide us. Specifically, we have consulted the National Standards for Court-Connected Mediation Programs, Resolution Systems Institute’s Guide to Program Success and the National Center for State Courts’ many articles on ODR. From these resources, and our own experiences, we recommend that court administrators charged with designing ODR systems consider several questions.

On 6 August 2019, the Singapore Convention on Mediation was announced. The Convention parallels the New York Convention for arbitration by moving to legitimize mediation as a dispute resolution method for international commercial transactions. The Convention tries, in particular, to address the enforceability of mediation settlements by referring to the application of mediation ‘standards’ in Article 5 (e). Mediation standards have been a controversial topic in professional circles since the rise of mediation as an alternative dispute resolution process, because of the extreme diversity of mediation approaches across the world. We argue that all stakeholders in the mediation ecosystem should focus on creating a ‘Code of Disclosure’ as a complement to the Singapore Convention, that such a ‘Code of Disclosure’ may be the first step towards a future ‘Uniform Code of Conduct’, and that a code of disclosure will bring certainty to parties about the international commercial mediation process, which is a key prerequisite for its true adoption.

Infractions are the most voluminous case type in most court locations. Through two initiatives funded by the National Highway Safety Administration, namely eCitation and On-line Disposition, the Connecticut Judicial Branch has been able to establish a comprehensive electronic citation and adjudication platform during a time of significant budgetary challenges.

The EU internal market has undergone several developments in the past decades. One of the main developments is the inclusion of a digital dimension. One of the fields in which these developments are very evident is the consumer market. A further development of e-commerce is however hindered because there are no suitable redress mechanisms for consumers involved in low-value, high volume claims typically arising from e-commerce transactions. In response to the ills of existing redress mechanisms, an emerging trend of consumer alternative dispute resolution (ADR) and consumer online dispute resolution (ODR) schemes has been identified throughout the Member States (MS) aimed to offer consumers a swift, cheap and simple procedure through which they can enforce their rightsThis paper outlines the EU approach to Consumer ADR/ODR, gives some observations of the functioning of the legislation in practice and concludes with some thoughts for the future.

Getting cases decided in court within a reasonable time is a problem in many countries and in some cases can present a veritable crisis of justice. An alternative that is commonly used in judicial proceedings (at least in many civil law countries) is to hold a preliminary hearing in order to encourage a settlement. This article aims to analyse online dispute resolution as an efficient alternative to resolve the crisis of justice in Brazil.

Using a participatory design approach supports initiatives seeking to advance access to justice, whether they be policy, service or solution-oriented. A participatory design approach can be used effectively irrespective of whether your perspective towards access to justice is as a court employee, a private practitioner (attorney, mediator), a legal aid or human service agency professional, an academic or a technologist.

Canadian courts and tribunals are successfully incorporating online dispute resolution (ODR) mechanisms into their processes in order to offer user-centric dispute resolution systems aimed at increasing access to justice. Although they use different approaches, three such examples, British Columbia’s Civil Resolution Tribunal, Ontario’s Condominium Authority Tribunal, and Quebec’s PARLe-OPC platform, have all demonstrated how public ODR can increase litigants’ sense of justice while respecting basic legal tenets. This article serves as a short introduction to this user-centric Canadian approach.

As ODR rolls out in courts across the United States, we need to learn more about how litigants experience it. This is particularly true about their experience of access to justice, which is a primary motivator for courts to adopt ODR. This article discusses plans for an evaluation Resolution Systems Institute and the University of California, Davis, will be conducting of ODR programmes in Hawaii and Texas for small claims cases.