The project PON01_01286 eJRM is financed by PON Research program (www.ponrec.it) in Italy and its main target is alternative dispute resolution and civil mediation, with the objective to support both professional and citizens in their activities when involved in a civil litigation.

The eJRM project aims to create, implement and experiment new completely virtual modes to manage relationships between the Citizen and the “justice system”. in particular eJRM proposes the realisation and demonstration of an ICT platform dedicated to the judicial domain as enabling element to achieve the following radical process innovations:

• On-Line Trial: on line complete management of activities connected with the development of some judicial litigation categories;
• Online Alternative Dispute Resolution: ability for a Citizen to classify (Case Discovery), formalize (Case Definition) and resolutions (Case Resolution) of a case throught the use of the network and alternative modes of diputes, such as the use of mediation.

In eJRM document physical exchanges, verbal interaction, joint meetings are represented in the form of relationship among the various people and are supported by software tools (eFolder, Virtual Room, Document Automation, eLearning) designed and implemented to be secure, traceable, user-friendly, vertical in the application area, integrated and integrable with the existing legacy applications, capable to support and simplify resolution of cases filed by petitioners. This approach makes possible the achievement of the first objective, demonstrating the transportability and the feasibility of workflows typical of some juridical activities into a virtual environment.

Policy Context

The project operates in the area of alternative dispute resolution in civil matters, in particular mediation, as foreseen by Italian law decree of March 4th 2010 of the Ministry of Justice and several EU directives such as Directive 2008/52/EC and the European Digital Agenda.

Description of target users and groups

Target users are:

- civil justice actors;

- citizens;

- lawyers;

- mediation professionals;

- chamber of commerce, barrister associations, private subject enabled to perform mediation activities.

Description of the way to implement the initiative

The solution in implemented through an ICT framework of different services enabling the implementation of virtual civil litigation.

Technology solution

Technology choice: Standards-based technology

Return on investment

Return on investment: Not applicable / Not available

Lessons learnt

The main lessons learnt are the following:

1) the Ministry of Justice plays a fundamental role in mediation without having mediation activities. It enables both public/private organisations and professional to perform mediation activities

2) The players are profesisonal associations, chambers of commerce, private companies

3) the citizen need to be supported and to benefit of the possibilities offered by ICT technologies to implement virtual mediation

Scope: Local (city or municipality), National