Access to administrative justice and the role of outreach measures: empirical findings on the Austrian Ombudsman Board

Abstract

While access to civil-law institutions has been a traditional area of socio-legal research, access to administrative justice still constitutes an underresearched field. In the field of administrative law, public ombuds institutions represent an important pathway to resolve disputes without invoking a court. To date, we have little knowledge about who uses these ombuds institutions and which factors facilitate access to the ombuds. In this paper, on the basis of our survey among users of the Austrian Ombudsman Board (n = 8,274), we explore the effects of institutional design on the user population. The findings suggest that the two outreach measures – regular consultation days and a weekly TV broadcast – contribute to reducing existing inequalities with regard to users’ sociodemographic characteristics.

Justice for rural women: An exploratory analysis of institutions and mechanisms to access justice in Chimborazo, Ecuador

“…The right to access justice implies that women have the possibility of adequate protection of their rights. Moreover, it is a matter of strengthening and building democracies; therefore, gender justice serves as a benchmark for the State's actions [ 10 ]. Access to justice is understood as the existence of facilities that enable all individuals, without any discrimination, to enjoy all the resources and services that ensure their safety, mobility, communication, and understanding of judicial services, thereby guaranteeing prompt and effective justice [ 11 , 12 ].…”

Leaving No One Behind, Leaving No One Unaccountable

“…An excellent example of the cooperation between an ombuds institution and public media is found in Austria. Since 1979Since (with a hiatus between 1991Since and 2002, the Austrian Ombudsman Board (AOB) has a weekly broadcast on public TV (Bürgeranwalt) in which recent cases are discussed in the presence of an ombudsperson, a complainant, and sometimes representatives of the relevant authority (Dahlvik and Pohn-Weidinger 2021). Through this show, the ombuds institution is provided with the opportunity to present its work, elaborate on its mandate and approach, and demonstrate the power to find solutions not only for individual problems of citizens but also to address more systemic issues.…”

“…Through this show, the ombuds institution is provided with the opportunity to present its work, elaborate on its mandate and approach, and demonstrate the power to find solutions not only for individual problems of citizens but also to address more systemic issues. As noted by Dahlvik and Pohn-Weidinger (2021), the broadcast is highly popular, attracting an average of 324,000 viewers in 2017 (a 23 percent market share at that time slot). According to the head of the public broadcasting company, between 2007 and 2018, around 1,000 cases were discussed on the program (Hadler 2018).…”