Hart Studies on Judging and the Courts – serie

This book examines the significance of values in Supreme Court decision making. Drawing on theories and techniques from psychology, it focuses on the content analysis of judgments and uses a novel methodology to reveal the values that underpin decision making. The book centres on cases which divide judicial opinion: Dworkin’s hard cases 'in which the result is not clearly dictated by statute or precedent’. In hard cases, there is real uncertainty about the legal rules that should be applied, and factors beyond traditional legal sources may influence the decision-making process. It is in these uncertain cases – where legal developments can rest on a single judicial decision – that values are revealed in the judgments. The findings in this book have significant implications for developments in law, judicial decision making and the appointment of the judiciary.

This book explores the use of foreign judges on courts of constitutional jurisdiction in 9 Pacific states: Fiji, Kiribati, Nauru, Papua New Guinea, Samoa, Solomon Islands, Tonga, Tuvalu and Vanuatu.We often assume that the judges sitting on domestic courts will be citizens. However across the island states of the Pacific, over three-quarters of all judges are foreign judges who regularly hear cases of constitutional, legal and social importance. This has implications for constitutional adjudication, judicial independence and the representative qualities of judges and judiciaries.Drawing together detailed empirical research, legal analysis and constitutional theory, it traces how foreign judges bring different dimensions of knowledge to bear on adjudication, face distinctive burdens on their independence, and hold only an attenuated connection to the state and its people. It shows how foreign judges have come to be understood as representatives of a transnational profession, with its own transferrable judicial skills and values.Foreign Judges in the Pacific sheds light on the widespread but often unarticulated assumptions about the significance of nationality to the functions and qualities of constitutional judges. It shows how the nationality of judges matters, not only for the legitimacy and effectiveness of the Pacific courts that use foreign judges, but for legal and theoretical scholarship on courts and judging.

This book explores the use of foreign judges on courts of constitutional jurisdiction in 9 Pacific states: Fiji, Kiribati, Nauru, Papua New Guinea, Samoa, Solomon Islands, Tonga, Tuvalu and Vanuatu.We often assume that the judges sitting on domestic courts will be citizens. However across the island states of the Pacific, over three-quarters of all judges are foreign judges who regularly hear cases of constitutional, legal and social importance. This has implications for constitutional adjudication, judicial independence and the representative qualities of judges and judiciaries.Drawing together detailed empirical research, legal analysis and constitutional theory, it traces how foreign judges bring different dimensions of knowledge to bear on adjudication, face distinctive burdens on their independence, and hold only an attenuated connection to the state and its people. It shows how foreign judges have come to be understood as representatives of a transnational profession, with its own transferrable judicial skills and values.Foreign Judges in the Pacific sheds light on the widespread but often unarticulated assumptions about the significance of nationality to the functions and qualities of constitutional judges. It shows how the nationality of judges matters, not only for the legitimacy and effectiveness of the Pacific courts that use foreign judges, but for legal and theoretical scholarship on courts and judging.

This book examines the significance of values in Supreme Court decision making. Drawing on theories and techniques from psychology, it focuses on the content analysis of judgments and uses a novel methodology to reveal the values that underpin decision making. The book centres on cases which divide judicial opinion: Dworkin’s hard cases 'in which the result is not clearly dictated by statute or precedent’. In hard cases, there is real uncertainty about the legal rules that should be applied, and factors beyond traditional legal sources may influence the decision-making process. It is in these uncertain cases – where legal developments can rest on a single judicial decision – that values are revealed in the judgments. The findings in this book have significant implications for developments in law, judicial decision making and the appointment of the judiciary.

This book presents an empirical analysis of the UK Supreme Court’s output over its first ten years, with a specific focus on each individual judge’s contribution to each case. It shows that judges, like all of us, are human; it would be difficult to imagine that any of us, even in our most professional capacity, could act completely independently of our predilections, motivations and biases. The same is true for the judges sitting on the UK’s highest court.Drawing on insights from a bespoke dataset of judgments, this work discerns trends and tendencies across each judge’s voting patterns and the reasoning they adopt when disposing of cases. It not only highlights areas of divergence, but also shows how each of the judges tended to vote in different contexts, including which were more likely to overturn appeals from lower courts, side with certain parties such as the state or underdogs, and find liability in various areas (tort, contract, criminal, EU, immigration and tax law, with a special focus on human rights cases). Another section illustrates the differences between the judges when it comes to judicial reasoning, such as their approach to precedent and preferred methods of statutory interpretation. This work shows that different judges exercise their power in different ways. Some are more comfortable with pushing boundaries whilst others are more restrained. Some grant the state a lot of leeway whilst others apply heavy scrutiny. Some are, as Lord Denning suggested, ‘bold spirits’ whilst others are ‘timorous souls’. It shows, at least when it comes to the Supreme Court, that it matters who our judges are.

This book presents an empirical analysis of the UK Supreme Court’s output over its first ten years, with a specific focus on each individual judge’s contribution to each case. It shows that judges, like all of us, are human; it would be difficult to imagine that any of us, even in our most professional capacity, could act completely independently of our predilections, motivations and biases. The same is true for the judges sitting on the UK’s highest court.Drawing on insights from a bespoke dataset of judgments, this work discerns trends and tendencies across each judge’s voting patterns and the reasoning they adopt when disposing of cases. It not only highlights areas of divergence, but also shows how each of the judges tended to vote in different contexts, including which were more likely to overturn appeals from lower courts, side with certain parties such as the state or underdogs, and find liability in various areas (tort, contract, criminal, EU, immigration and tax law, with a special focus on human rights cases). Another section illustrates the differences between the judges when it comes to judicial reasoning, such as their approach to precedent and preferred methods of statutory interpretation. This work shows that different judges exercise their power in different ways. Some are more comfortable with pushing boundaries whilst others are more restrained. Some grant the state a lot of leeway whilst others apply heavy scrutiny. Some are, as Lord Denning suggested, ‘bold spirits’ whilst others are ‘timorous souls’. It shows, at least when it comes to the Supreme Court, that it matters who our judges are.