Wim Voermans* LEX EX MACHINA: USING COMPUTERTECH- NOLOGY FOR LEGISLATIVE DRAFTING * Dr. Voermans is assistant professor in constitutional and administrative law at Tilburg University, the Netherlands 1. INTRODUCTION: THE LEGIMATIC I n t e r e s t T h e use of computers in the legal profession is widespread. Modern lawyers cannot perform their work any more without the aid of word processors and legal databanks. Legislators, especially departmental legislative draughtsmen, are equally dependant on computertechnology, when draughting legislation. However, on this moment legislative draughtsmen use their computers solely for administrative purposes. The power of computertechnology to substantially and intelligently assist in the draughting of legislation is not fully exploited. In this contribution I will explore some projects and approaches which are aimed at substan- tial, (semi-) intelligent computerassistance during the draughting of legislation. Especially in Europe interest and research into legimatics, i. e. the field that concerns the study of and the research into the possibilities of informatics for legislative draughting') are booming. After, among oth- I The concept and name `Legimatics' or 'Legimatica' was introduced by C. BIAGOLI, P. MERCATALI, G. SARTOR, ELEMENTI Di LEGIMATIC. (Milan: CEDA, 1993)