Supporting public decision making in policy deliberations: An ontological approach

This is the post-print version of the Paper. The official published version can be accessed from the link below - Copyright @ 2011 SpringerSupporting public decision making in policy deliberations has been a key objective of eParticipation which is an emerging area of eGovernment. EParticipation aims to enhance citizen involvement in public governance activities through the use of information and communication technologies. An innovative approach towards this objective is exploiting the potentials of semantic web technologies centred on conceptual knowledge models in the form of ontologies. Ontologies are generally defined as explicit human and computer shared views on the world of particular domains. In this paper, the potentials and benefits of using ontologies for policy deliberation processes are discussed. Previous work is then extended and synthesised to develop a deliberation ontology. The ontology aims to define the necessary semantics in order to structure and interrelate the stages and various activities of deliberation processes with legal information, participant stakeholders and their associated arguments. The practical implications of the proposed framework are illustrated.This work is funded by the European Commission under the 2006/1 eParticipation call

Relational justice: mediation and ODR through the World Wide Web

ODR means "Online Dispute Resolution". Dialogue, negotiation and mediation are coming back as sources of contemporary law. We introduce in this paper two concepts and two related projects. We define the concepts of "relational law" and "relational justice". And, at the same time, we describe how to put them in place from a social and technological point of view. Therefore, we introduce two concrete applications: (i) the Catalan White Book on Mediation, a large project to assemble the required social and legal knowledge to draft a general statute on mediation (Catalan Government); (ii) the Ontomedia Project, a semantically-driven platform allowing end-users to negotiate and mediate their conflicts in several domains (family, commerce, environment, health care, administration…). The paper describes the state of the art of ODR services, and proposes some strategies for legal electronic institutions. A middle-out theoretical approach and a mediation core-ontology are briefly described. We situate these two projects within the next generation of Semantic Web services, and the so-called Web 2.0 and Web 3.0 developments

A model of air transport passenger incidents and rights

This paper describes a representation of the legal framework in the air transport passenger's rights domain and the foremost incidents that trigger the top of consumer complaints ranking in the EU. It comprises the development of a small network of three ontologies, formalisation of scenarios, specification of properties and identification of relations. The approach is illustrated by means of a case study based in the context of a real life cancelled flight incident. This is part of an intended support-system that aims to provide both consumers and companies with relevant legal information to enhance the decision-making process

Ontology-driven legal support-system in air transport passenger domain

This paper aims to present a preliminary version of asupport-system in the air transport passenger domain. This system relies upon an underlying on-tological structure representing a normative framework to facilitatethe provision of contextualized relevant legal information.This information includes the pas-senger's rights and itenhances self-litigation and the decision-making process of passengers.Our contribution is based in the attempt of rendering a user-centric-legal informationgroundedon case-scenarios of the most pronounced incidents related to the consumer complaints in the EU.A number ofadvantages with re-spect to the current state-of-the-art services are discussed and a case study illu-strates a possible technological application

The ontomedia project : ODR, relational justice, multimedia

More than ever, the Web is a space of social interaction. Recent trends reveal that Internet users spend more time interacting within online communities than in checking and replying to e-mail. Online communities and institutions create new spaces for interaction, but also open new avenues for the emergence of grievances, claims, and disputes. Consequently, online dispute resolution (ODR) procedures are core to these new online worlds. But can ODR mechanisms provide sufficient levels of reputation, trust ,and enforceability so as to become mainstream? This contribution introduces the new approaches to ODR with an emphasis on the Ontomedia Project, which is currently developing a web-based platform to facilitate online mediation in different domains

A Systematic Literature Review of Legal Ontologies

This article analyzes the publications concerning the topic of legal ontology as supporting processes and activities of legal nature. A systematic review of the theme and the identification of the main existing studies are carried out. This review is developed throughout three tasks: contextualization of the theme from a legal perspective; systematic literature search; analysis and synthesis of the information obtained. From these studies the present work serves as a basis for the understanding and discussion of the possibilities of applying legal ontologies to support the activities of the legislative process in the parliamentary scope, and also the judicial process. Furthermore, it is intended in the future the definition of a legal domain-specific language. This article also presents the mapping of the publications of this theme with the existing studies and presents the respective critical and comparative analysis

Case-based reasoning with precedent models: Preliminary report

Formalizing case-based reasoning is an important topic in AI and Law, which has been discussed using various approaches, such as formal dialogue games, abstract dialectical frameworks. In this paper we model case-based reasoning by using the formal argument semantics of case models. With the precedent models we present, the validity of legal arguments in the case-based reasoning process can be shown formally. We also present a case study of precedent models in a real legal domain and evaluate the validity of arguments in case-based reasoning

Mobile technology and consumer empowerment : an application for online consumer mediation in Catalonia (Geoconsum)

Today, courts proceedings remain complex and expensive for consumers. Alternative Dispute Resolution (ADR) and Online Dispute Resolution (ODR) are means of consumer redress. Nevertheless, they have not achieved its full potential, partly due to the lack of consumer awareness. Currently, there are different legislative initiatives at the EU level devoted to improving consumer empowerment as well as, more particularly, ADR and ODR. Moreover, Information technology (IT) devices such as smartphones are improving consumers' access to information and they may contribute to empowering consumers and giving them better access to justice. Further to this contextual framework, this article presents Geoconsum, an open source mobile application that contains a database on consumer mediation entities and a compendium of consumer legislation applicable in Catalonia. In the near future, this application may be integrated with an online mediation platform. This article shows the databases' methodology and implementing process. Furthermore, it shows the mobile application functionalities and the search and retrieval capabilities, based on parameterised searches as well as on geolocation technology. The device also works as a mapping service application since it offers a route planner to access the nearest consumer mediation entity