(3) NEJL International Legal Aid Collections.
The NEJL has made substantial progress in assembling its
International Legal Aid Collection, especially during the past year. The
ultimate goal is to create the world’s first comprehensive library of
published materials – books, articles, studies, etc. -- about legal aid and
related developments in all countries. This includes English language
translations – or English language summaries – of materials published in
another language. A catalog of non-US as well as US materials will be included
on the NEJL’s second Website [See (8)] and staff will respond to inquiries
from other countries as well as from U.S.
Between 1998 and 2000, the National Equal Justice Library
added over 1000 publications to its collection on legal aid in England and the
rest of the United Kingdom. Most of these publications are included in a list
now maintained on one of the Library’s two websites — http://www.equaljusticeupdate.org.
In the future it expects to achieve the same coverage for legal aid programs in
continental Europe, Canada, and the Commonwealth countries.
The NEJL considers the International Collections critical to
several of its goals. Developments in this country have been inhibited by
ignorance of what has happened elsewhere during the past three decades. For
example, while the Legal Service Corporation’s budget shrunk drastically in
the 1980's and again in the mid-1990's, the governments in several comparable
industrial democracies were dramatically increasing their investments in civil
legal services for the poor. (If the U.S. funded civil legal services as
generously as England, the LSC budget would be over ten billion dollars instead
of a third of a billion dollars.)
The U.S. also has much to learn from other countries about various ways of
financing, organizing and delivering legal representation and justice to lower
income persons. (The Canadian provinces, for instance, use different
combinations of private lawyers and salaried lawyers in their delivery systems,
as do Sweden and the Netherlands.) U.S. scholars and policymakers already have
much to gain from the NEJL’s International Collections and will have more to
learn as it continues to expand. Equally important, this collection will soon
become a uniquely useful resource for the many developing countries and former
Communist nations who are now starting or improving legal aid programs.
To facilitate collection of materials from abroad, the NEJL
has recruited a committee composed primarily of non-U.S. scholars, but
co-chaired by board members Justice Earl Johnson, Jr. and Robert Rhudy. Among
the members are Professor Jeremy Cooper from England, Professor Alan Paterson
from Scotland, Professor Jon Johnsen from Norway (Scandinavian countries),
Professor Nick Huls from the Netherlands, Professor Erhard Blankenburg
(continental Europe), and Professor Fred Zemans (Canada). Committee members
identify important materials in their countries and help the Library acquire
those materials.
At this point, because of a $25,000 private donation for a
“named collection” on legal aid in the United Kingdom and because of Canada’s
proximity and the rich variety of that nation’s well-funded provincial legal
aid programs, the NEJL has given those two nations some priority in the
collection effort. But the NEJL also is actively identifying and acquiring
materials from other countries and also is pursuing funding to support this
broader acquisition campaign.
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