Reimagining and Reconciling Antitrust and Access to Justice in the Political Economy ArticleForthcoming
Date of Publication:
Recommended Citation
Ashley Krenelka Chase, Reimagining and Reconciling Antitrust and Access to Justice in the Political Economy, 21 FIU L. Rev. (2026)Clicking on the button will copy the full recommended citation.
The intersection of antitrust law and access to justice is most noticeable where concentrated control over legal information systems has created barriers that undermine both competitive markets and equitable access to the judicial system. While antitrust law traditionally focuses on market efficiency and consumer welfare, this narrow economic framework fails to address how information monopolies in the legal sector systematically exclude marginalized communities from accessing justice.
The tension between data-driven innovation and market concentration is particularly acute in the legal sector, where the accumulation and control of legal information directly impacts democratic participation and the rule of law. Current antitrust enforcement, constrained by the consumer welfare standard, rarely extends beyond basic economic analysis to consider broader social justice implications. This limitation represents a fundamental mismatch between antitrust theory and the realities of information-dependent democracy.
Through a political economy lens, this article demonstrates that barriers to legal information access are not market accidents but the predictable result of institutional arrangements that treat antitrust as a neutral, efficiency-maximizing toolbox while masking its distributive choices. The narrow focus on economic competition limits interventions that could foster innovative legal service models and expand access to justice for underserved communities.
Reconciling traditional antitrust goals with access to justice requires acknowledging the ideological tensions inherent in treating legal information as a commodity. Only by expanding antitrust analysis beyond consumer welfare to encompass broader democratic values can policymakers address the systematic exclusion of marginalized groups from legal representation and court access. This expanded framework would recognize that competition in legal information markets is not merely about efficiency but about preserving the foundational promise of "equal justice under law."
