Just, Speedy, and Inexpensive? An Evaluation of Judicial Case Management Under the Civil Justice Reform Act

The Civil Justice Reform Act of 1990 (CJRA) required each federal district court to develop a case management plan to reduce costs and delay. The legislation also created a pilot program to test six principles of case management, and required an independent evaluation to assess their effects. This executive summary provides an overview of the purpose of the CJRA, the basic design of the evaluation, the key findings, and their policy implications. Detailed results appear in three other reports: MR-801-ICJ, which traces the stages in the implementation of the CJRA in the study districts; MR-802-ICJ, which presents the main descriptive and statistical evaluation of how the CJRA case management principles implemented in the study districts affected cost, time to disposition, and participants' satisfaction and views of fairness; and MR-803-ICJ, which describes the results of an evaluation of mediation and neutral evaluation designed to supplement the alternative dispute resolution assessment contained in the main CJRA evaluation.