Judges under Stress JuS - the Breaking Point of Judicial Institutions

There are courts in Europe that are facing powerful political forces calling for illiberal measures. It is to be expected that the higher degrees of social concern and conflict that we experience in Europe today will challenge basic elements of the rule of law and thus put higher demands on the judiciary, both in the post-communist countries and in countries of Western Europe. This has been amply illustrated by the recent use of emergency powers to combat the Covid-19 pandemic. The project will look at how rulers seek judicial compliance with authoritarian measures, how judges react to such measures, and the conditions under which an independent judiciary breaks down. It will explore how the conditions of an independent judiciary differ in countries with different legal traditions. This will be studied by surveying differences in the fascist and communist approaches to law. Based on a historical comparison of in particular Norway, Czechoslovakia, Hungary, Poland and Rumania, we will explore whether variances between different countries can be explained by differences in the long historical traditions of their legal institutions. The project draws lines to the current situation in Europe and examines aspects of continuity and discontinuity, rule of law backsliding and judicial resistance against a dismantling of the rule of law. The project has shown that there are similarities, but also important differences between the countries that have been studied. The continuities in the judicial institutions are greater than expected, and prevail into the current situation.

Prosjektet har økt kompetanse og kvalifikasjonene til deltakerne, gjennom publikasjoner og nettverk. Petra Gyongyi har fått fast stilling ved Rättvetenskapeliga Institutionen, Lunds Universitet. Peter Curos har fått stilling som adjunct ved Institute of Political Studies, Polish Academy of Science, Warsaw, Poland. Lukasz Bojarski leverte Phd-avhandling høsten 2022, men fikk 6 måneders frist til å levere den inn på nytt. Han arbeider nå på det med sikte på levering i mai. I samarbeid med SWPS University i Warsawa arrangerte vi en sommerskole i Gdansk i august 2022 hvor resultatet fra prosjektet var en viktig del an innholdet. Deltakere var unge jurister fra rettsvesenet, akademia og frivillige organisasjoner, stort sett fra Sentral- og Øst-Europa, til sammen ca 40. I forbindelse med sluttkonferansen i november i Oslo, arrangerte vi i samarbeid med Domstoladministrasjonen et heldagsseminar i Oslo tingrett der 10 polske dommere deltok sammen med dommere fra tingretten, lagmannsretten og Høyesterett. Domstoladministrasjonen vil i samarbeid med oss arrangere et dommermøte høsten 2023 basert på innlegg fra vår sluttkonferanse. Det vil formidle våre resultater til et bredt utvalg av dommere i Sentral- og Øst-Europa. Hans Petter Graver har inngått avtalene med Routledge om utgivelse av boken Jussens helter på engelsk. Den engelske versjonen er nyskrevet og oppdatert med resultater fra prosjektet. Publikasjonsdato er etter planen august 2023.

The conditions under which European judges must cope with demands from authoritarian laws seem to differ in countries with legal institutions of the western tradition from countries outside of this tradition. Many European countries have recent legacies of authoritarian rule, the West predominantly Nazi and fascist, the Central and East European Countries (CEECs) predominantly communist. There were important differences in the Nazi/fascist and communist approaches to law and an independent judiciary. Most Western European countries rid themselves of legacies of their authoritarian past in shorter time than many CEECs have been able to. The basic question to be addressed by the project is how the conditions of judicial independence differ in countries with legal institutions of the western tradition from countries outside of this tradition. This will be studied by surveying differences in the fascist and communist approaches to law,and by examining the road to an independent judiciary after the fall of the authoritarian regime. Based on a historical comparison of different European countries, it will address the question of whether variances between different countries can be can be explained by differences in the long historical traditions of their legal institutions. By contrasting the situation of the judiciary under different historical conditions, and also with the situation in European countries today, it will become possible to throw new light on the normative questions of what constitutes improper influence and excessive judicial control. In its historical thesis and in its combination of historical, comparative and legal method in the comparison of judges under authoritarian conditions across different legal traditions, the project aims to be bold and innovative in the study of the functioning of courts and the judiciary and to produce results that represent new knowledge at the forefront of international research.