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Full-Text Articles in Law
Can A Little Representation Be A Dangerous Thing?, Colleen F. Shanahan, Anna E. Carpenter, Alyx Mark
Can A Little Representation Be A Dangerous Thing?, Colleen F. Shanahan, Anna E. Carpenter, Alyx Mark
Faculty Scholarship
Access to justice interventions that provide a little representation, including nonlawyer representation and various forms of limited legal services, may be valuable solutions for low- and middle-income Americans. However, a thoughtful approach to improving access to justice efforts should recognize that a little representation may have risks. In particular, one potential risk of a little representation is that while it provides assistance with a discrete legal need in a specific moment, the nature of the assistance is incompatible with challenging the law. As a result, individual litigants do not have the benefit of legal challenges in their own cases and …
Intrusive Law Reform, Katharine B. Silbaugh
Intrusive Law Reform, Katharine B. Silbaugh
Faculty Scholarship
Does law obstruct or facilitate the development of a democratic society? This is the subject of Mary Ann Glendon's recent book, A Nation Under Lawyers. It is also the subject of Anita Bernstein's Better Living Through Crime and Tort. Glendon takes the position that law obstructs, that "[p]remature and excessive resort to the courts... has been a disaster for the political health of the country."' Bernstein disagrees, saying that in many cases, law can facilitate democracy by encouraging citizens to educate themselves, engage in debate, and form communities.