A just state for everyone? Researching access to administrative justice in the digital era

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In this special episode we will hear about the new Research Line 'AI and New Technologies' introduced by the International Institute for the Sociology of Law (IISL) in 2026. The Institute was established in Oñati, Gipuzkoa, Spain in 1988 by the International Sociological Association’s Research Committee on the Sociology of Law and the Government of the Basque Country. 'AI and New Technologies' is one of six Research Lines; it is coordinated by Germano Schwartz (University La Salle) and Stefan Larsson (Lund University). The Research Line brings together scholars from around the world to explore how AI and emerging technologies are reshaping society and legal systems, focusing on challenges in legitimacy, accountability, rights, and institutional adaptation. In this podcast episode I will talk with Camilo Umaña, Director of the Institute, Germano Schwartz and Stefan Larsson to learn more about the aims and ideas of the new Research Line. The episode thus deals with the broader research context to which my project and the previous episodes are related. 
Find more details about the Research Line and the IISL here: https://www.iisj.net/en/research/2026-research-lines/3-ai-and-new-technologies

See more on the project: https://www.hcw.ac.at/en/forschung/projekte-und-aktivitaeten/digital-public-services-and-ombuds-role-in-access-to-justice.html

See more on my work: https://personen.hcw.ac.at/julia-dahlvik/

This research is funded by Austrian Science Fund (FWF) [grant DOI 10.55776/V970].

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This is part II of collaborators' experiences: In this episode, you will learn about the experiences of interviewers and colleagues who actively contributed to the research process in the scope of this project. Colleagues from South Africa, Sint Maarten and Austria will share how they perceived the research process in their local contexts. They will talk about the moments they liked as well as the challenges they encountered both concerning interviewing citizens about their experiences with public services in the digital era and concerning the project more generally. 
See more on the project: https://www.hcw.ac.at/en/forschung/projekte-und-aktivitaeten/digital-public-services-and-ombuds-role-in-access-to-justice.html

See more on my work: https://personen.hcw.ac.at/julia-dahlvik/

This research is funded by Austrian Science Fund (FWF) [grant DOI 10.55776/V970].

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In this and the next episode, you will have the chance to meet the people I collaborated with during field research and for data generation. In today's episode, we will hear about the experiences of three persons who contributed to the research in the scope of my field research in South Korea. Jiin, Anna and HyunSeung Joo explain what they liked about our collaboration and their work in the project as well as the challenges they encountered. They each contributed to the study in different and essential ways: by facilitating field access, by conducting interviews, and by interpreting interviews. 
See more on the project: https://www.hcw.ac.at/en/forschung/projekte-und-aktivitaeten/digital-public-services-and-ombuds-role-in-access-to-justice.html

See more on my work: https://personen.hcw.ac.at/julia-dahlvik/

This research is funded by Austrian Science Fund (FWF) [grant DOI 10.55776/V970].

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In this episode we explore a topic that has come up in all our case studies in the different world regions, even though in different forms, namely opposition and resistance to the state’s increasing use of digital tools and AI. From South Africa to Canada, from the Caribbean to South Korea – everywhere there are at parts of the population that do not necessarily agree with how their public administration digitalizes and automates its services. Scholars agree that modern society functions as a complex human-machine social system, where machines are not merely tools but active participants in shaping social outcomes. This presumption becomes particularly prevalent in the context of citizen-state interaction, where a power imbalance is already inscribed. In this episode we thus look at citizens’ resistant practices vis-à-vis governments’ use of technology.
See more on the project: https://www.hcw.ac.at/en/forschung/projekte-und-aktivitaeten/digital-public-services-and-ombuds-role-in-access-to-justice.html

See more on my work: https://personen.hcw.ac.at/julia-dahlvik/

This research is funded by Austrian Science Fund (FWF) [grant DOI 10.55776/V970].

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In this episode I share insights from my field research in South Korea, one of the leading countries in the domain of digitalization and AI. I discuss the omnipresence of digitality, which refers to the condition of living in a digital culture, as I encountered it in public space and in interviews with people working in the public sector. The interview partners highlight that there are certain things AI cannot do (yet) and that in some cases there is only a thin line between protection and surveillance, for instance, regarding the so-called smart plug which monitors movements in people's homes. The full photo documentation can be found here: juliadahlvik.wordpress.com
See more on the project: https://www.hcw.ac.at/en/forschung/projekte-und-aktivitaeten/digital-public-services-and-ombuds-role-in-access-to-justice.html

See more on my work: https://personen.hcw.ac.at/julia-dahlvik/

This research is funded by Austrian Science Fund (FWF) [grant DOI 10.55776/V970].