The Civil Justice Review: Rational Failure and Political "Success"?

Abstract

How should we read the final report of the Civil Justice Review Body?1 Two broad approaches might be taken to understanding its proposals: rational policy analysis and an interest group approach. In the former framework, we should view it as a set of policy proposals fashioned from a rational analysis of the problems and objectives of the civil justice system and drawing on specialist expertise. We could judge it according to standards of expertise - probing such issues as the clarity of its objectives, the soundness of its research, and the fallacies in its arguments. From the second perspective it might be viewed as a political document reflecting the interests of powerful players in the political process. Within this model scientific knowledge is primarily used to promote particular sectional interests, and normative goals function as rhetorical tools.2 From this perspective if substantive proposals appear undesirable then attention ought perhaps to be focused on changes to the process which produced such results. The report of the Civil Justice Review Body is clearly a failure if judged by the standards of rational policy analysis. Whether it will be a political success is more difficult to assess. While its recommendations can only be understood fully in the context of changes in the market for legal services, the key role of the government in financing legal aid and the dominant ideology of consumerism,3 I would guess that the propoals will be regressive in their impact. However, viewed through the lens of interest group analysis the crucial issue is not the outcome but the limitations of existing political processes of reform. In this article I shall focus on the objectives, assumptions, and analysis of the review and the role of social science research and the academy in the reform process.