First meeting of the ACT Research Partnership

On Tuesday, June 19th, the Autonomy through Cyberjustice Technologies (ACT) project, one of the most important research projects on Justice and artificial intelligence, was launched in Montreal thanks to an important grant from the Social Sciences and Humanities Research Council (SSHRC). About a hundred researchers and partners from a dozen different countries met over two days to review the research objectives as well as the project’s structure and methodology.

 

The first day started with an opening address from the research director, Professor Karim Benyekhlef, in the Cyberjustice Laboratory’s state-of-the-art courtroom which integrates cutting-edge legal technology. He highlighted the importance of the ACT’s objective which is to leverage artificial intelligence (AI) to prevent and resolve conflicts, to the benefit of justice stakeholders.

 

Then, the four working group leaders, professors Tom van Engers, Fabien Gélinas, as well as Jacquie Burkell and Jane Bailey, revealed the sixteen sub-projects under their leadership. Moreover, they introduced deliverables, such as inventories, case studies, good practices and guidelines, to be shared throughout the legal community in the following six years. These deliverables will lead to evidence-based models and frameworks that will unquestionably aid justice stakeholders in their decision-making and planning when integrating IA tools to their justice processes.

 

 

Following a lively lunch break, the sixteen sub-project chiefs, either established researchers or cyberjustice rising stars, led highly dynamic and interactive brainstorming workshops with their research groups. This activity allowed the researchers to specify their research objectives, identify case studies, and select activities and milestones in order to ensure the progress of each sub-project, together with the 44 public or private ACT partners.
 

 

 

 

The first day ended with a summary of the afternoon activities presented by the sub-project chiefs in plenary.

On Wednesday, June 20th, the morning began with the nomination of the Scientific Committee’s student and partner representatives. Karima Smouk, a doctoral student at the Cyberjustice Laboratory, and Marie-Claude Gervais, a lawyer at the Department of Justice Canada, were appointed by the assembly. The remaining part of the plenary was dedicated to the presentation of some of the most exciting projects currently unfolding at the Cyberjustice Lab. Ivan Galindo da Fonseca, from the Lab, and Nareg Froundjian, student-at-law at Gowling WLG, introduced the Procezeus chatbot, a conversational agent that is currently being developed with the Régie du logement, whose purpose is to help resolve housing disputes between tenants and landlords. It was followed by a presentation by Adrien Mitchell, a student-at-law at BCF Avocats d’affaires, of the Blocks for Active Transparency (BAT) project. This innovative project’s purpose is to enhance transparency and increase predictability in the field of construction through use of smart contracts.

The meeting ended on highly positive notes by allowing partners and researchers to fully appreciate the potential of IA in the field of justice. Exciting new projects will undoubtedly take shape shortly with the start of eight of the sixteen sub-projects this year spanning from conflict prevention, to conflict resolution, as well as touching on governance and policies.

Other photos of the meeting

This content has been updated on 4 July 2019 at 16 h 19 min.

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