Elementos internacionais para um modelo global de assistência jurídica

Abstract

This paper presents access to justice beyond the simple formal access to the Judiciary, comprising, from the waves of Cappelletti and Garth, legal assistance for the poor, representation of diffuse and collective interests, an instrumental view of the process, adoption of alternative means conflict resolution, better technical training for rights operators, ethics in the legal profession, process of globalization of human rights protection, promising initiatives and new technologies to improve access to justice. Considering the right to legal assistance as a human/fundamental right that the underprivileged or vulnerable citizen must demand a Public Defender from the State, the paper analyzes elements/characteristics of legal assistance in several countries, especially in Brazil and in the States United States, submitting them to the requirements of Human Rights and UN and OAS Resolutions and Recommendations, so that a global standard can be built to be observed. The objective is to explain free legal assistance from a model that enshrines it as a fundamental, universal Human Right and duty of the States, therefore inviolable, provided by an autonomous institution functional, administrative, budgetary, with members with public selection and free from external interference. The method adopted is the hypothetical deductive one, as based on the elements present in the UN and OAS resolutions, a standard is delineated for the legal assistance service and, then, compliance verification of the various state formats, especially in Brazil and the U.S.A. The research is bibliographical, based on the waves of access to justice by Cappelletti and Garth, analysis of UN and OAS resolutions dealing with legal assistance/Public Defenders, comparative study of the way in which States ensure this human right, analyzing websites and official statistics, foreign law, and international human rights law.