The Buenos Aires City Magistracy Council launched this week the Second Access to Justice Survey, an institutional study aimed at surveying the perceptions, experiences, and legal needs of the population regarding the local justice system. The initiative is driven by the Administration and Budget Secretariat, through the general coordination of the Citizen Participation, Access to Justice, and Universal Rights Directorate (PAJDU), and is part of an institutional strategy to strengthen access to justice as an evidence-based judicial policy. The survey constitutes the first comprehensive update in over ten years of the 2014 citizen perception study and will incorporate into the diagnosis the institutional, social, cultural, and technological changes that the Judicial Power and society have undergone during this period. In this sense, the study is projected as a key input for strengthening access to justice policies, the strategic planning of the Judicial Power, the development of data-driven institutional tools, and the consolidation of an organizational culture oriented towards continuous improvement and accessibility. The main objective of the survey is to generate empirical evidence that allows for knowing citizens' perceptions of the justice system, identifying access barriers—both material and symbolic—surveying unmet legal needs, and analyzing the level of knowledge, trust, and connection of the population with judicial institutions. Likewise, it aims to strengthen the design, implementation, and evaluation of judicial policies with a focus on rights and accessibility. The Secretary of Administration and Budget, Genoveva Ferrero, highlighted the initiative within the framework of 'understanding what citizens expect from Justice today, in the face of the enormous challenges that lie ahead.' 'The idea is to have a clear picture of how the City stands today in terms of access to justice in order to adjust what needs to be adjusted in the face of the challenges to come,' Ferrero valued.
