Legal Aid in the Low Countries

Access to justice is a fundamental democratic right for all citizens. In order to exercise this right, people need lawyers or other legal professionals to translate their everyday problems and conflicts to the distant legal world, and to translate legal language into the ordinary language of the average (potential) litigant. In Belgium and the Netherlands, the legal aid system is under pressure partly due to the economic crisis, partly because of the increasing demand for and use of legal aid. These Low Countries live in times of austerity and the legal aid system is considered to be too expensive. Both countries have seen cutbacks and proposals to reform the legal aid system. This book deals with the system of legal aid in Belgium and the Netherlands. The central questions are whether the conditions for a sound legal aid system are met, especially in the fields of law that mainly concern the 'have nots'; the main ethical considerations that legal aid providers have to take into account; and the alternatives for legal aid and complementary solutions to enhance access to justice. The approaches to legal aid are quite varied: the socio-legal approach, the policy approach, the critical approach, the legal approach, etc. The book is unique in how it brings these disciplines together. It broadens the debate on legal aid and sheds light on these questions from the perspectives of all these disciplines. (Series: Ius Commune: European and Comparative Law - Vol. 130)

Bernard Hubeau is a full professor in Sociology and Sociology of Law at the Faculty of Law of Antwerp University since early 2008. He teaches “Sociology and Sociology of Law”, “Sociology of Law”, “Urban Planning Law” and “Legal aspects of the relation Administration-Citizen”. He teaches “Legal Aspects of Social Work” at the Faculty of Social and Political Sciences of Antwerp University. He also teaches “Sociology of Law” at Brussels University (Faculty of Law and Criminology). He is the former Ombudsman of the City of Antwerp (1996-1999) and of the Flemish Parliament (1999-2007). He was professor at the University of Utrecht (Netherlands) from 1991 to 1996 and Lecturer in a School for Architecture and a School of Police Studies. He’s editor in chief of a Legal Journal (“Juristenkrant”) and president of the Flemish Housing Council and a Social Housing Company. He’s a member of the Bureau of Integrity of the city of Antwerp.

Ashley Terlouw is a Professor of Sociology of Law at the Radboud University Nijmegen. She is a Deputy Judge at the Arnhem Court, Chairman of the interdisciplinary research group in- and exclusion, board member of the Dutch Association for Migration Research (DAMR), Chairman of the Editorial Board of "A&MR" and a member of the board of the Centre for Migration Law (CMR). She previously worked at the Staff Office of Migrant Affaires at the Court of The Hague and as head of the Department of refugees at Amnesty International Netherlands. She gained her PhD in 2003 at the Radboud University of Nijmegen on a research of the cooperation between foreign judges. Between 2004 and 2008 she was a member of the Equal Treatment Commission. She has published in the area of equality, justice and migration law. She carries out research on discrimination on grounds of race, nationality and religion and has a particular interest in the tension between uniformity and diversity.