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Personal Action Plans: evaluating self-management initiatives in family law

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  13 October 2008

Angela Melville  and
Karen Laing
Angela Melville
Affiliation:
School of Law, University of Manchester
Karen Laing
Affiliation:
School of Geography, Politics and Sociology, Newcastle University
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Abstract

Personal Action Plans (PAPs) have been used to encourage client self-management within healthcare services, and are a novel innovation within legal services. This paper examines the use of PAPs by publicly funded family lawyers in England and Wales. It was intended that PAPs were written collaboratively between lawyers and clients in order to assist clients to clarify and resolve issues independently, and aid referrals to other service providers. Whereas self-management initiatives work best when service providers take a client-aligned approach, our research demonstrates that the PAPs were used as a means of managing clients’ expectations. We conclude by suggesting that while PAPs and other forms of self-management tools may work well in healthcare, they have limited potential in the provision of legal services for family law clients.

Type
Research Article
Information
International Journal of Law in Context , Volume 4 , Issue 2 , June 2008 , pp. 149 - 167
Copyright
Cambridge University Press 2008

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