期刊名称：International Journal for Court Administration
印刷版ISSN：2156-7964
电子版ISSN：2156-7964
出版年度：2011
卷号：3
期号：2
出版社：International Association for Court Administration
摘要：Judges and judiciaries do not understand information technology (IT). This idea crops up quite often in discussions about IT for courts. The perceived slow rate of IT adoption in courts is explained by this lack of understanding. To my mind, this is not the main issue. What needs to be understood first is at the other end of the spectrum: how courts process information. Therefore, I have studied the way courts process information and what this means for IT. I have studied IT for courts since the early 1990s. This article presents some of the findings from my 2009 book Technology for Justice (Reiling 2009)1. It uses a conceptual framework developed to (1) help IT specialists understand more about court processes, and to (2) help judges and court staff grasp what IT can do in their case processing. It has become a nifty tool showing how IT functionalities can help to implement improved case processing. It also shows innovative ways of handling information, towards more timely and adequate judicial decisions and increased access to justice. This article does not provide a systematic overview of technology in use by courts2, or a general theory of processing information across the board. However, it does present a fresh look at how knowledge about what goes on in a court can help us to understand what can be improved. Traditional approaches to improving court performance and reducing case delay have turned out to be of limited usefulness. Besides, most court systems have not changed their traditional processes under the influence of information technology. The model I use helps judiciaries, court managers and other with insights on case management, standardizing processes, information service to court users and the general public, and IT policy making. The examples I use are all from civil justice. I make no claims as to their applicability to administrative or criminal justice, but I do think the reader can find some more general lessons in my story
