Open Access

Amely Zacharias

• This thesis examines the topic of access to justice from a contrastive perspective and observes how the capability of taking advantage of the judicial system is ensured for people through the lens of the Capability Approach. The question addressed here is whether the constitutional right to education enables the surpassing of a certain capability threshold and thereby promotes access to justice. This approach offers a broad perspective of the implications of constitutional rights to education, and interconnects it with ethical considerations of justice. The thesis begins with a short overview of access to justice (2.) and how it relates to the Capability Approach (3.). This is followed by a conceptualized functionalist comparison of the German and Indian constitutional rights to education (4.). Subsequently, the implementation in practice is analyzed using the 4-A scheme developed by the United Nations (5.). The final segment relates to the capability threshold and utilizes the results of the comparison to establish guidelines for policymakers in the education sector (6.). Overall, this thesis finds that achieving the capability of literacy, a major aspect of legal literacy, can ultimately lead to the promotion of access to justice.