Conducting socio-legal research in Portugal: From the experience of the Permanent Observatory for Justice to the study of working conditions in courts

Abstract

Empirical research on judicial systems requires diversified methodologies adapted to the contexts of courts and judicial actors. The experience gathered through the Permanent Observatory for Justice tells us that the support of judicial and political institutions and professionals’ associations are essential to reach a ‘hard-to-reach population’ and obtain robust results. The Observatory, with its interdisciplinary approach, had a significant public impact and contributed to public policies on justice. It was also fundamental to design and implement judicial training actions, through the Observatory’s Legal and Judicial Training Unit. The aim is to discuss the developed strategies to ensure the involvement of the institutional and judicial actors, build trust, and achieve valid results. The use of the project QUALIS, which assessed working conditions in Portuguese courts, allows us to focus on a concrete example of use of strategies and methodologies, with impacts on the improvement of the judicial system. La investigación empírica sobre justicia requiere metodologías diversificadas y adaptadas a los contextos de los tribunales y de los actores judiciales. La experiencia del Observatorio Permanente de la Justicia nos dice que el apoyo de las instituciones judiciales y políticas y de las asociaciones de profesionales es esencial para llegar a una “población difícil” y obtener resultados sólidos. El Observatorio, con su enfoque interdisciplinar, tuvo un impacto público significativo y contribuyó a las políticas públicas de justicia. También fue fundamental el desarrollo de acciones de formación, a través de la Unidad de Formación Jurídica y Judicial del Observatorio. El objetivo es discutir las estrategias desarrolladas para asegurar la participación de los actores institucionales y judiciales, generar confianza y alcanzar resultados válidos. El uso del proyecto QUALIS, que evaluó las condiciones de trabajo en los tribunales portugueses, nos permite centrarnos en un ejemplo de uso de estrategias y metodologías, con impactos en la mejora del sistema judicial.

Empirical research with judicial officers: The biography of a research project

“…One feature that stands out in this Project is the extensive engagement with professional associations, courts, judicial officers, court administrators and other staff, as well as government departments, at inter-personal and organisational levels. This involvement engendered mutual trust in several ways, especially by careful explanations of and scrupulous attention to confidentiality and anonymity for participants, and a commitment to voluntary participation (see Dias et al 2023, for discussion on "building a trustful environment").…”

“…Our multi-year national research project into Australia's judicial officers and their courts commenced in 2000 as the MRP, with a national focus on the first instance courts. As the research grew and expanded to include courts at all levels, it was renamed the JRP, after consultation with individuals and organisations who had been collaborators in the first phase of the research 2 (see Dias et al 2023 for a biography of a similarly large-scale, longterm collaborative multi-method project).…”

Introduction. Empirical research with judicial professionals and courts: Methods and practices

“…Problems of access, time constraints and perceived utility of socio-legal and social science research, in general, have proved to be significant challenges for designing research involving courts and directly seeking information from judicial officers. Dias et al (2023) and Roach Anleu and Mack (2023) show the relevance of partnerships with courts and judicial organisations to facilitate access to this 'difficult population', through the example of the Permanent Observatory for Justice (Observatório Permanente da Justiça [OPJ], Portugal) and a large multi-year, national empirical research project (Australia). Dias et al (2023) highlight that since the foundation of the OPJ, the involvement of legal and judicial professionals and the collaboration of judicial and political institutions have proved to be key features in building a trusting environment, with fruitful results based on access to relevant sources of information.…”

“…Furthermore, as mentioned by Dias et al (2023), regular cooperation with judicial actors and professionals is an added value to accomplish the research objectives and obtain better and more far-reaching results. Nevertheless, this proximity entails several risks, and they canvass issues of trust, rapport, buy in, judicial values, and reflexivity regarding the relationship of the researcher to the research setting.…”

“…Socio-legal researchers often rely on secondary, unobtrusive data, such as court statistics and administrative data (Opeskin 2013), and on documents such as cases, biographies, and other publicly available or accessible material, including photographs, paintings, and architecture (Mulcahy 2011, Roberts 2014, Moran 2015. Secondary data can be a viable alternative when surveys, interviews, or observations are not feasible due to access limitations and due to funding constraints (see Dias et al 2023 and Roach Anleu and Mack 2023 on difficulties related to the lack of funds to support data collection).…”