ABA

The American Bar Association was founded in 1878 on a commitment to set the legal and ethical foundation for the American nation. Today, it exists as a membership organization and stands committed to its mission of defending liberty and pursuing justice.

The ABA works to promote the best quality legal education, competence, ethical conduct and professionalism, and pro bono and public service work in the legal profession.

In 2007, ABA President William Neukom established the World Justice Project. The World Justice Project recognizes the problem that “the ‘rule of law’ is a frequently used term that is rarely defined.” One goal of the World Justice Project is to develop a broadly accepted definition of the rule of law that could be used to measure adherence to the rule of law both in the United States and abroad. Based on the belief that the rule of law is a prerequisite for building societies that offer opportunity and equity to all their citizens, the World Justice Project proposes to use its definition of the rule of law to create an index that will measure how nations around the world are—or are not—following the rule of law.