Access to Justice and Public Defense in Federal Contexts: who accesses and why in the argentinian provinces?

Abstract

The article compares the ways in which Argentine provinces provide free legal services and analyzes the factors that account for the differences in their provision. It claims that public defenders’ provision and access to justice are quite heterogeneous among jurisdictions, since Argentine federalism grants great legislative power to provinces to define their local legal system. The article describes the variation in the way provinces allocate public defenders and analyzes if the latter can be attributed to administrative factors, local needs, the supply of private lawyers or the levels of political competition. Empirical results reveal that the manner in which provinces allocate public defenders is not related to the population needs, but instead to administrative factors and the size of the local market of private lawyers.