Single judge-panel.
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measuring the performance of judicial systems and courts
During the study session of the CEPEj about "Measuring the performance of judicial systems and courts" (DEC 9th, 2009) MEDEL issued a paper stressing the that the good functioning of Justice is the result of its capacity to put itself in question, of accepting the critiques, and developing a democratic evaluation. (paper in french only)
State of the judiary in Europe
Bucarest, June 2008
In the aim to audit European judicial systems, MEDEL asked its members to answer a questionnaire on the main elements of a judicial system.
The Medel audit project
The questionnaire
The answers :
Germany
Cyprus
Spain (criminal questions in english)
France
Greece
Italy
Poland
Czech Republic
Serbia
The answers in french are on the french pages of the website.
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The challenge of evaluating the performance of the judiciary
The intention of the Serbian politicians is to perform reelection of all the judges (opposite to Serbian Constitution, as shown in the documents submitted to MEDEL members timely) and reduce their number for 1/3 of the current number.
There is a misunderstanding and certain amount of fear that only Serbia faces serious problems in judiciary, especially long lasting court proceedings. According to some politicians' opinion this problem is more present in Serbia than in any other member state of Council of Europe. Achievement of the EU standards is used as an excuse for demanding from judiciary to reduce the number of cases as soon as possible - regardless the quality of decisions. Thus, it is about to expect that relevant judicial and state bodies could adopt the criteria for evaluation of judges' performance based on quantity of their performance mostly.
Bearing in mind all the mentioned above, JAS' conference is aiming to point out the need for understanding of all aspects of judges' work, including both quantitative and qualitative aspect, in order to increase the citizens' trust in courts and Rule of Law. Besides, we would like to underline that quantity indicators should be used as parameters for determination of the number of judges needed in our future judicial systems rather than for evaluation of judges' performance.
JAS insists that arbitrarily determining of the number of judges needed in the new court system of Serbia, based on new Constitution, must be avoided. The only way to do so is through calculation of the needed time for solving of all cases of various complexities in compare to the time that judges devote to their work during the working days in the whole year.
Papers:The evaluation of judges and prosecutors in the italian system (Luca de Matteis)
Preconditions for high quality and rational judicial system (Dragana Boljevic)
Performance Indicators
A step ahead for a (more) effective justice.
This study has been issued within the project Performance indicators - a fundamental instrument for the improvement of the quality in Romanian judicial act-, developed by the Institute for Public Policy (IPP) in partnership with the National Institute of Magistracy (NIM), financed by the European Commission through Phare 2005 - Consolidating Democracy in Romania.
The main objective of the study is to debate with specialists from the judiciary the issue of measuring the performance of the courts and prosecutor's offices in Romania, as an element that successfully completes the efforts already undertaken for improving the efficiency of the judicial act. Being ascertained that the evaluation process of the Romanian magistrates has to be transposed from the individual level to the aggregate, systemic level, as confirmed by the most recent sociological research developed for the judiciary at the national level – Romanian Judiciary Barometer - the present material proposes, among others, a set of indicators that can be used in the future in order to determine the modality in which the courts and the prosecutor's offices carry on the duties assigned under their competences. The purpose of this study is a constructive one, as it comes to support both the institutions involved in the coordination of this process: Superior Council of Magistracy, Public Ministry, Ministry of Justice - and the presidents of different courts and prosecutor's offices in order to achieve objective analysis towards these institutions, the budgetary assignments, rationalization / efficient measures for the legal proceedings etc.
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Management and independance
Alternative conference in Paris Court (january, 2010)
Available in french only
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Analysis of judicial systems
Program
Quality of judicial acts (by Eric Alt) : the studies on the logic of the absurd
decisions allow
to understand certain dysfunctions in the judicial area. This way, the routine,
the deformed vision of the real thing by some of its persons in charge, the
fear of being opposed to the majority opinions or the blind respect to the
rules, are in the origin of the majority of the bad practices.
On the
contrary, the good functioning of an organisation is the result of its capacity
to put itself in question, of accepting the critiques, of developing the
evaluation checking the result of the experience. All of them practices
difficulty accepted by the judicial institution.
Justice and modernisation
Colloquium in Lübeck, 26-27 october 2007
The role of the judiciary in Germany (Hans-Ernst Boettcher)
(extract of the German Law journal)
Evaluation of judicial performance (Dragana Boljevic)
The Quality of Justice
Crisis of Efficiency of Civil Justice in
What is hidden behind the expression «crisis of justice»? Civil justice
isn't responding to the expectations of citizens anymore. Why are the decisions
of the courts, always increasingly solicited and accumulating delays, declining
in quality? It is undoubtedly the sign of the waning of the Welfare State: the
courts are called upon to resolve issues left without answer.
Faced with an influx of litigations, the role of the judge must be
redefined: it is one of the subjects of this colloquium. At the same time, we
have to assert our concern for guaranteeing the impartiality and independence
of the judge: for MEDEL, the first goal of efficiency must aim at respecting
those principles, which are the pillars of the European model of justice.