What Have We Learned About Court Delay, “Local Legal Culture,” and Caseflow Management Since the Late 1970s?

Abstract

Research on court delay in the late 1970s has led us to focus more on “local legal culture” than on court resources and formal rules or procedures in our efforts to improve the pace of litigation. In the 1980s, aggressive caseflow management was an important part of our efforts to change local legal culture. Yet our overall results have been mixed. What must we do in the future? We must take further steps to refine caseflow management, but we must at the same time consider other factors possibly linked to local legal culture that could be changed through other kinds of programs. Court structure and the resources available to courts cannot be overlooked, and such theories of organization dynamics as the “Abilene Paradox” may suggest further ways to address the problem.