"The Routledge Handbook of East European Politics is an authoritative overview that will help a wide readership develop an understanding of the region in all its political, economic, and social complexity. Including Central Europe, the Baltic republics, South Eastern Europe, and the Western Balkans, as well as all the countries of the former Soviet Union, it is unrivalled in breadth and depth, affording a comprehensive overview of Eastern European politics provided by leading experts in the fields of comparative politics, international relations, and public administration. Through a series of cutting-edge articles, it seeks to explain and understand patterns of Eastern European politics today."

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The Routledge Handbook of East European Politics

The rise of abusive constitutionalism in Central and Eastern Europe (CEE) has hit the domestic judiciaries particularly hard. Viktor Orban expanded the size of the Constitutional Court and then packed it, made sure that he can install a new president of the Constitutional Court, ousted the Supreme Court president through a constitutional amendment, disempowered the existing judicial council and created the new institution with power over ordinary judicial appointments. Jaroslav Kaczynski followed the same playbook in Poland. While most scholars have focused primarily on effects of abusive constitutionalism upon the constitutional courts, we argue that the keys to the long-term control of the judiciary are presidents of ordinary courts and judicial councils . The dismissal of the Hungarian Supreme Court President is a perfect example of this logic—by this move Orban got rid of the most important court president in the country, the head of the Hungarian judicial council and his most vocal critic. Yet, Andras Baka lodged an application to the ECtHR and won. This article analyses the Grand Chamber judgment in Baka v. Hungary, its implication for the rule of law, and the limits of what the ECtHR can achieve against abusive constitutionalism. It concludes that the Grand Chamber failed on all key fronts. It overlooked the main structural problem behind Mr. Baka’s dismissal (the broad powers of court presidents in CEE), it has blurred the Convention’s understanding of the concept of the rule of law, and it failed in delivering a persuasive judgment firmly based on the existing ECtHR’s case law .

/pdf/the-strasbourg-court-meets-abusive-constitutionalism-baka-v-2qienp22yk.pdf

The Strasbourg Court Meets Abusive Constitutionalism: Baka v. Hungary and the Rule of Law

What made democratic politicians in Central and Eastern Europe exclude themselves from governance of the judiciary? Institutional change in the judiciary is investigated through a diachronic study of the Romanian judiciary which reveals a complex causal nexus. The classical model of the ‘external incentives’ of EU accession, while explaining a general drive toward revision, played an otherwise marginal role. An institutional template prevailed, promoted by an elite transnational community of legal professionals whose entrepreneurs steering the revision of governance of the judiciary after 1989. The parliamentarians, disempowered by this revision, offered no resistance—a ‘veto-player dormancy’ that stands revealed as pre-conditional to such transnational influences.

Explaining Governance of the Judiciary in Central and Eastern Europe: External Incentives, Transnational Elites and Parliamentary Inaction

The General Council of the Judiciary is the main institution of judicial self-government in Spain. It was established to ensure the external independence of the judiciary, and in particular the independence of the judiciary vis-a-vis the executive branch of government. To what extent does the Judicial Council manage to fulfill its goal? First, the evolution of the Judicial Council will be presented in order to understand the principal reforms and reasons behind its creation. Next, the impact of the Judicial Council upon judicial independence, as well as accountability, transparency, and public confidence will be critically examined in order to assess its contribution to judicial legitimacy. In the end, it will be argued that the politicization of the Judicial Council has hindered it from protecting judicial independence from partisan interests, and has contributed to undermining public confidence in the judiciary.

/pdf/judicial-self-government-and-judicial-independence-the-3j5evini2o.pdf

Judicial Self-Government and Judicial Independence: the Political Capture of the General Council of the Judiciary in Spain

This article explores the relationship between Europeanization and EU integration in the field of judicial politics. It claims that the process of Europeanization engenders contention which creates demands for increased supranational governance. To illustrate this duality, the article draws on the waves of reforms aiming to consolidate the independence of the judiciary in the new Member States of the EU. What is at stake from a political and normative point of view is the post-conditionality debate, the discussion around the Copenhagen dilemma and — conversely — the need to define at the EU level a set of effective mechanisms and instruments of compliance. Empirically, the article discloses the dead angles of Europeanization and reveals that policy implementation in the Copenhagen framework creates functional and political pressures for further integration. In the field of judicial politics, the power of the EU oscillates between spill-over and spill-back.

The Normative Power of the EU and Contentious Europeanization: The Case of Judicial Politics

Contents: Introduction Logics of action, hypotheses and impact European standards of judicial governance Beyond legal accountabilities: Poland, Hungary and Czech Republic Highlights and shadows in Bulgaria and Romania Judicial governance as a mirror of European constitutionalism Conclusions Bibliography Index

Judicial Accountabilities in New Europe: From Rule of Law to Quality of Justice

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Judicial Accountabilities in New Europe: From Rule of Law to Quality of Justice