Assessing the courts in Russia: Parameters of progress under Putin

Demokratizatsiya

Volumn 16, Issue 1, 2008, Pages 63-73

  Solomon Jr , Peter H ^a  

^a UNIVERSITY OF TORONTO   (Canada)

Author keywords

Criminal justice; Judicial independence; Judicial power; Judicial reform

Indexed keywords

PUBLIC ATTITUDE; REFORM PROCESS; SOCIAL HISTORY; SOCIAL JUSTICE;

EURASIA; RUSSIAN FEDERATION;

EID: 42549139799     PISSN: 10746846     EISSN: None     Source Type: Journal    
DOI: 10.3200/DEMO.16.1.63-74     Document Type: Article

References (27)

1. For a more intricate set of indicators of progress in judicial reform see the CEELI "Judicial Reform Index," which includes thirty different markers falling into six groups: quality, education, diversity; judicial powers; financial resources; structural safeguards, accessibility, and transparency; and efficiency. Teams of assessors have applied these tools of assessment to the courts of eighteen countries (mainly postcommunist), including Ukraine (twice), but not Russia, to produce standardized judicial reform index assessment reports. The assessment process includes a battery of interviews with participants in the judicial process, as well as legal analysis (see http:/ /www.abanet.org/rol/europe_and_eurasia/). In her new book, Linn Hammergren provides a thoughtful analysis of the varieties of judicial reform activities and their effects in reaching particular goals. See Linn Hammergren, Envisioning Reform: Improving Judicial Performance in Latin America (University Park: Pennsylvania State University Press, 2007).
2. Peter H. Solomon Jr., "Informal Practices in Russian Justice: Probing the Limits of Post-Soviet Reform," in Russia, Europe, and the Rule of Law, ed. Ferdinand Feldbrugge, 79-92 (Leiden, Netherlands: Martinus Nijhoff, 2007).
3. See Peter H. Solomon Jr., "The Criminal Procedure Code of 2001: Will It Make Russian Justice More Fair?" in Ruling Russia: Law, Crime and Justice in a Changing Society, ed. William Pridemore, 77-100 (Lanham, MD: Rowan and Littlefield, 2005).
4. Peter H. Solomon Jr., "Courts in Russia: Independence, Power and accountability," in Judicial Integrity, ed. Andras Sajo, 225-53 (Leiden, Netherlands: Martinus Nijhoff, 2004).
5. The plans are available on the Web site of the High Arbitrazh Court (http://www.arbitr.ru) under the heading "Federal'nye tselevye programmy."
6. On Yeltsin era judicial reform, see Peter H. Solomon Jr. and Todd S. Foglesong, Courts and Transition in Russia: The Challenge of Judicial Reform (Boulder, CO: Westview, 2000).
7. See Peter H. Solomon Jr., "Putin's Judicial Reform: Making Judges Accountable as Well as Independent," East European Constitutional Review 11 (2002): 101-7, no. 1/2; "Courts and Federalism in Putin's Russia" (with Alexei Trochev), in The Dynamics of Russian Poliitics: Putin's Reform of Federal-Regional Relations, ed. Peter Reddaway and Robert Orttnung, 91-122 (Lanham, MD: Rowan and Littlefield, 2005)
8. "Threats of Judicial Counterreform in Putin's Russia," in Remaking the Role of Law: Commercial Law in Russia and the CIS, ed. Kathryn Hendley, 1-40 (Huntington, NY: Juris, 2007).
9. Solomon, "Informal Institutions"; Alexei Trochev, "Judicial Selection in Russia: Towards Accountability and Centralization," in Appointing Judges in an Age of Judicial Power: Critical Perspectives from around the World, eds. Kate Malleson and Peter H. Russell, 375-94 (Toronto: University of Toronto Press, 2006).
10. Note that payments, to judges often constitute service fees more than bribes and often do not affect the outcome of cases. Both sides may pay; the real winner may be "taxed"; or the decision may be reversed by a higher court.
11. Solomon, "The Criminal Procedure Code of 2001."
12. Data from 2006 on the work of regional and district courts and the justices of the peace are on the Web site of the judicial department (http://www.cdep.ru), under the "statistika" heading.
13. Peter H. Solomon Jr., "Judicial Power in Russia: Through the Prism of Administrative Justice," Law and Society Review 38 no. 3 (2004): 549-82.
14. See Alexei Trochev, The Role of the Constitutional Court in Russian Politics, 1990-2006 (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2008).
15. Solomon, "Threats of Judicial Counterreform."
16. Peter H. Solomon Jr. and Pamela Ryder-Lahey, Model District Courts in Action: Achievements and Lessons in a Russian-Canadian Collaboration (Ottawa: Office of the Commissioner for Federal Judicial Affairs, 2004)
17. Vladimir Maksimov and Peter Solomon, eds., Rol' administratorov v organizatsionnom obespechenii deiatelnosti sudov obshchei iurisdikitsii: Prakticheskoe posobie (Moscow: Sudebnyi Department, 2005).
18. See Pamela Jordan, Defending Rights in Russia: Lawyers, the State, and Legal Reform in the Post-Soviet Era (Vancouver: University of British Columbia Press, 2005)
19. and Eugene Huskey, "The Bar's Triumph or Shame? The Founding of Chambers of Advocates in Putin's Russia," in Public Policy and Law in Russia: In Search of a Unified Legal and Political Space, eds. Robert Sharlet and Ferdinand Feldbrugge, 149-68 (Leiden, Netherlands: Martinus Nijhoff, 2005).
20. Peter H. Solomon Jr., "The New Justices of the Peace in the Russian Federation: A Corner-stone of Judicial Reform?" Demokratizatsiya 11, no. 3 (2003): 363-80.
21. Data in this paragraph come from the Web sites of the Judicial Department of the Russian Federation and the High Arbitrazh Court (see notes 6 and 11).
22. Anastasia Kornia, "Sudam ne veriat," Vedomosti, August 9, 2007; "Posetiteli saita arbitrazhnogo suda veriat v pravosudie," Fontanka.ru, August 22, 2007
23. Jose Juan Toharia, "Evaluating Systems of Justice through Public Opinion," in Beyond Common Knowledge: Empirical Approaches to the Rule of Law, ed. Erik Jensen and Thomas Heller (Stanford, CA: Stanford University Press, 2003).
24. See Peter H. Solomon Jr., "Law in Public Administration: How Russia Differs?" Journal of Communist Studies and Transition Politics 24 (March 2008): 115-35.
25. Alena Ledeneva, How Russia Really Works: The Informal Practices That Shaped Post-Soviet Politics and Business (Ithaca, NY. Cornell University Press, 2006).
26. Maria Popova, "Judicial Independence and Political Competition: Electoral and Defamation Disputes in Russia and Ukraine" (PhD diss., Harvard University, 2006).
27. See Marina Kurkchiyan, "The Illegitimacy of Law in Post-Soviet Societies," in Law and Informal Practices: The Post-Communist Experience (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2003), 25-46.