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Legal Research without Barriers: Free Legal Databases as Alternatives for Law Students

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  15 August 2025

Raliat Alabi
Raliat Alabi*
Affiliation:
Raliat Alabi holds a PhD in Library and Information Science and a Degree in Law. She is the head of the Law Library, https://ror.org/00ah3j950 Fountain University , Osogbo, Nigeria. Email: raliatbola@gmail.com.
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Abstract

In many developing countries, law students face challenges in accessing authoritative legal resources, including statutes, case law, and journal articles, due to the high costs of subscription-based databases such as LexisNexis, HeinOnline, and Westlaw. In Nigeria, additional subscription online resources are available, including LawPavilion, Legalpedia, and Compulaw. These platforms are all rich in content and currency; however, they are often unaffordable for both law students and law libraries. To overcome these challenges, there are many initiatives and movements administered by government institutions, universities, and non-governmental organizations (NGOs) that provide access to both primary and secondary sources of law. Included in the latter group are the Legal Information Institutes (LIIs), Google Scholar, the Social Science Research Network (SSRN), and Justia. This paper examines the role of free legal databases as an alternative for law students and how these freely accessible platforms can support the access gaps that subscription-based legal research tools have often created. The study is conceptual in nature, with reliance on existing literature and analysis of freely available legal information resources to support legal education.

Keywords

legal researchfree legal databaseslaw studentslegal educationlegal information accessLIIsNigeria

Information

Type
Article
Information
International Journal of Legal Information , Volume 53 , Issue 2 , Summer 2025 , pp. 148 - 154
Copyright
© The Author(s), 2025. Published by International Association of Law Libraries

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