The Civil and Social Justice Survey was first conducted in 2001 (as the National Periodic Survey of Justiciable Problems), to provide a broad evidence base for the development of the Community Legal Service, facilitate the development of small area ‘legal need’ models, and enable monitoring of progress against government targets.

The methodology of the 2001 survey was developed from that of Hazel Genn’s seminal Paths to Justice study (Genn, H. (1999) Paths to Justice, Oxford: Hart Publishing) and many questions from the Paths to Justice survey were included. Important refinements were made, though, to ensure that the new survey addressed limitations of the earlier survey (e.g. the absence of comprehensive social and demographic information), focused in greater detail on matters of strategic interest (e.g. the pivotal early stage when respondents are making decisions about how to deal with their problems) and provided an appropriate basis for measuring change over time. The survey was repeated in 2004 and, on a continuous basis, between 2006 and 2008. The 2004 and 2006-2008 surveys also involved numerous developments and refinements to allow for new forms of analysis and introduce new areas of study.

To date, all surveys have centred upon 18 categories of civil justice problem: discrimination; consumer; employment; neighbours; owned housing; rented housing; money/debt; welfare benefits; divorce; problems ancillary to relationship breakdown; domestic violence; children; personal injury; clinical negligence; treatment for mental illness; immigration; unfair treatment by the police; and homelessness. Since 2004, basic information on criminal offending and victimisation has also been obtained.

For each civil justice problem identified, the Civil and Social Justice Survey collects detailed information on problem resolution strategy, use of advisers, use of dispute resolution processes, outcomes and the social, health and economic consequences of problem experience. The survey also collects details of individual and household characteristics.

Areas of analysis of Civil and Social Justice Survey data have included: patterns of vulnerability to problems; patterns of problem resolution behaviour; reasons for inaction in the face of problems; use of advice and legal services; modes of advice; barriers to advice; effectiveness of referrals; relative problem severity; spatial dimensions of vulnerability and behaviour; links between problem experience and social exclusion; links between problem experience and general and psychiatric morbidity; the nature and impact of family breakdown; the experience of differently constituted families; the impact of advice; and the impact of recession on problem experience and demand for legal services.

The Civil and Social Justice Panel Survey, which will commence in 2010, will: enable complete data to be collected for all problems identified; make possible more detailed examination of how problem resolution strategies develop over time; allow better understanding of problem ordering and clustering; facilitate analysis of links between civil justice and wider social, health and economic problems; and assist analyses of links between civil justice problems and life events.

First reporting of results from the Civil and Social Justice Panel Survey will be in late 2010.