Complexity Faced by Legal Clinics in Afghanistan: Addressing the Challenges

Abstract

This article studies the burgeoning legal clinics in Afghanistan and describes the complexity that influences their effectiveness and accessibility. This complexity arises from conflicts among statutory law, Sharia and customary laws, exacerbated by the dual legal education in law and Sharia faculties in the highly challenging environment of the country. The main objective of this qualitative research is to illustrate these challenges faced by pro bono legal aid and legal clinics, and its main claim is that unsettled conflicts between statutory law, Sharia and customs and between legal education systems negatively affect legal aid provision in the country. Legal education, provided by faculties of law and Sharia to suit the aims of the two recognized legal systems of statutory law and Sharia, is considered the internal challenge to the clinical legal service, and the highly adverse environment in which legal clinics operate is considered the external challenge. Since some of the external challenges are related to traditional dispute resolution mechanisms, they are inevitably related to legal and legal education systems, and hence, addressing them improves the effectiveness of the legal clinics. This research uses available data to support its claims. As part of a sustainable solution to the acute shortage of legal aid throughout Afghanistan, legal education should emphasize practical aspects of law, improve curricular development in both law and Sharia faculties, train more female lawyers, use more broadly accepted frameworks of human rights and social justice and highlight the values of voluntarism.