Conclusion

The idea of offering legal assistance to the needy—legal aid in some form—has a centuries-long history. However, the beginning of its modern history can in many countries be dated to the second half of the nine­teenth century.

There are themes that recur throughout the book. Industrialisation and the social changes it produced mark the history of legal aid in many coun­tries across the world. There was a pressing need to tackle not only societal but also legal difficulties poor people faced in increasing numbers. One motive that can be discerned is the aim to appease, or even control, the poor by providing them with legal assistance. At times, some categories of the poor have intentionally been left outside the scope of legal aid. Examples of this can be found in many places and at different times. On the other hand, legal aid can also be connected to a genuine concern for the wellbeing of the poor. A number of the chapters in this book connect it to the rise of philanthropy in the nineteenth century. Moreover, mem­bers of the first-wave women’s movement in the nineteenth century actively organised legal aid in several countries. Another recurring feature in many of the chapters is the complex, and sometimes strained, relation­ship between legal aid and the legal profession.

However, while there may be many similarities on the surface, one must also observe the many differences in how legal aid has been organised in different countries. Different kinds of legal aid services have been offered by a variety of providers: poor’s advocates, public legal aid offices, private legal aid clinics, various philanthropic associations, and private attorneys.

The chapters in this book further show that the national histories of legal aid need to be put in an international and comparative context to fully grasp why legal aid has developed in the way that it has in different countries. By examining similarities and differences between various coun­tries, common traits, and national characteristics, we can understand the complexity of the history of legal aid; that is legal aid was never just about providing free legal services to the poor. Moreover, as many of the chap­ters show, those organising legal aid often looked to other countries to find inspiration. Ideas travelled, they were actively pursued and then moulded to fit the legal reality of a given country. Finally, it is equally as important to understand the concept of legal aid in broad terms, encom­passing not only public legal aid but all the other means of providing legal advice to those in need.

Lately, free legal aid has increasingly been discussed as a fundamental and human right, a necessity for access to justice to be realised.

Yet, no matter how much legal aid exists, standing alone, it will not alleviate the drastic substantive and growing inequalities between rich and poor. One must keep in mind that the effectiveness of legal aid, and how it is measured, is historically contingent and continuously debated. Is the real measure of “success” of a legal aid system its capacity to solve a great number of individual cases or with its potential to modify structural power relations in society? Depending on the context, one can query whether legal aid has served as a truly emancipatory device or merely as a remedial mechanism that allows for the maintenance and legitimisation of struc­tural inequalities in justice systems and the entrenchment of power through the law.