Law reform is the process of changing laws to improve legal outcomes. It includes a wide range of activities, from identifying problems and making proposals to implementing the changes.
The broader goal is to ensure that the justice system is accessible and affordable to all. To this end, we support innovative models like alternative business structures and regulatory sandboxes to lower costs and make legal help more available. But we also emphasize that these new approaches are only one part of a larger solution, and that lowering costs must be combined with ensuring the quality of legal help, particularly in complex areas like immigration law.
Legal systems are dynamic, and change is central to them. Almost all parties, whether candidates for office or legal professionals, feel obliged to present an agenda, an “agenda” of change (with the exception of dictatorships). Even constitutional court judges are expected to issue rulings that shift the law in some direction or another.
The old law and development orthodoxy was that top-down reforms supported by Western legal expertise are the best way to create a rule of law. But these reforms do not always deliver the desired results. It is critical to examine how the law is crafted and what forces influence the emergence of a legal order that works well for everyone.
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