PhD / Access to justice is an important human right that ensures adequate redress for harm, and which consequently helps deter future wrongdoing. Without access to justice citizens are precluded from the full enjoyment of their economic and social entitlements. The cost of litigation is a significant impediment to access to justice. Although the courts have attempted to increase access to justice by broadening the range of available dispute resolution options and by improving productivity through the implementation of case flow management systems, the cost of prosecuting claims remains disproportionately high and unaffordable for most small to medium sized claimholders. Legal claim assignment to parties able to aggregate claims and to apply their expertise as litigation entrepreneurs to deal with claim prosecution efficiently is one means of redressing the imbalance between the cost of claim prosecution to individual claimholders compared to the value of their claims. However, the well-entrenched doctrines of maintenance and champerty prohibit legal claim assignment. The continued resort to the doctrines of maintenance and champerty despite a strong and independent modern judiciary reflects distaste for claim commodification. However, the advent of litigation funding and its acceptance by the High Court of Australia in Campbell’s Cash and Carry v Fostif Pty Ltd (and to some extent United Kingdom and United States courts) on access to justice grounds has challenged conventional maintenance and champerty dogma. Together with other measures such as the introduction of conditional fee agreements that shift the cost of funding access to justice from the public to the private purse, the resistance to full claim alienability has been significantly weakened. The thesis argues that full claim alienability is favoured on normative and efficiency grounds and examines developments in Australia, England and the United States, which portend toward claim commodification. In addition, the thesis examines regulatory instruments required to ensure that the present partial claim market and the potential full claim market operates fairly and efficiently. It also considers how claim commodification may affect the relationship between legal practitioners and claim holders. [Please note: For any information on access to the full text please conact the author.]

PhD / Access to justice is an important human right that ensures adequate redress for harm, and which consequently helps deter future wrongdoing. Without access to justice citizens are precluded from the full enjoyment of their economic and social entitlements. The cost of litigation is a significant impediment to access to justice. Although the courts have attempted to increase access to justice by broadening the range of available dispute resolution options and by improving productivity through the implementation of case flow management systems, the cost of prosecuting claims remains disproportionately high and unaffordable for most small to medium sized claimholders. Legal claim assignment to parties able to aggregate claims and to apply their expertise as litigation entrepreneurs to deal with claim prosecution efficiently is one means of redressing the imbalance between the cost of claim prosecution to individual claimholders compared to the value of their claims. However, the well-entrenched doctrines of maintenance and champerty prohibit legal claim assignment. The continued resort to the doctrines of maintenance and champerty despite a strong and independent modern judiciary reflects distaste for claim commodification. However, the advent of litigation funding and its acceptance by the High Court of Australia in Campbell’s Cash and Carry v Fostif Pty Ltd (and to some extent United Kingdom and United States courts) on access to justice grounds has challenged conventional maintenance and champerty dogma. Together with other measures such as the introduction of conditional fee agreements that shift the cost of funding access to justice from the public to the private purse, the resistance to full claim alienability has been significantly weakened. The thesis argues that full claim alienability is favoured on normative and efficiency grounds and examines developments in Australia, England and the United States, which portend toward claim commodification. In addition, the thesis examines regulatory instruments required to ensure that the present partial claim market and the potential full claim market operates fairly and efficiently. It also considers how claim commodification may affect the relationship between legal practitioners and claim holders. [Please note: For any information on access to the full text please conact the author.]

En el presente proyecto de tesis se desarrolló una propuesta de software para la “Defensoría del Pueblo” que es un organismo autónomo encargado de defender los derechos fundamentales, supervisar los deberes de la administración estatal y la eficiencia en la prestación de servicios públicos a nivel nacional. En la actualidad, ante la coyuntura de la emergencia sanitaria y la cuarentena obligatoria gran parte de la atención a los ciudadanos se realiza de manera remota con asesoramiento a distancia, la organización se ha planteado aplicar la Transformación Digital en gran parte de sus procesos para facilitar la atención a los ciudadanos de manera automatizada y en tiempo real. Se ha detectado que existe la perdida de información de los plazos de las sentencias, la información de los casos se encuentra descentralizada y existe demora en las consultas en el sistema del Poder Judicial. Este proyecto optimiza el proceso de “Seguimientos de Procesos Jurídicos” automatizando las actividades para que sean eficientes, lo cual permite aumentar la atención de los casos dentro de los plazos mediante una solución web, repositorio de base de datos centralizada y la utilización de notificaciones push para alertar a los asesores de la emisión de sentencias. Con los prototipos presentados a la organización permitirá proyectarse en la navegación del sistema y de interfaz amigable e intuitiva, asimismo, las comunicaciones con sistemas externos se realizarán por medio de API de servicios; esto beneficiará a la organización y estará alineado al objetivo estratégico de “Modernización de la Gestión Institucional”. / In this thesis project, a software proposal was developed for the “Defensoría del Pueblo” which is an autonomous entity in charge of defending fundamental rights, supervising the state administration´s duties, and the efficiency in the provision of public services at the national level. Nowadays, given the situation of the health emergency and the mandatory quarantine, much part of the attention to citizens is carried out remotely with distance advice, the organization has considered applying Digital Transformation most part of its processes to facilitate the attention to the citizens in an automated way and real-time. It has been detected that there is an information loss on the terms of judgments, the information of cases is decentralized, and exists a delay of consultations in the Judicial Power system. This project optimizes the process of "Legal processes follow-up" automating activities to be efficient, which allows increasing the attention of cases within the deadlines through a web solution, centralized database repository, and the use of push notifications. to alert the assessors of judgments issuance. With the prototypes presented to the organization, it will allow to project itself in the navigation of the system and of a friendly and intuitive interface, also, communications with external systems will be carried out through API services; this will benefit the organization also it´ll be aligned with the strategic objective of "Modernization of Institutional Management". / Tesis