Search results

Technical advantages embraced by blockchain, such as distributed ledger, P2P networks, consensus mechanisms and smart contracts, are highly compatible with addressing the security issues of transferring and storing judicial documents and obtaining the feedback and evaluation of judicial translation services in cases with foreign elements. Therefore, based on this, a consortium blockchain-based model for supervising the overall process of judicial translation services in cases with foreign elements is proposed.

Some judicial documents are required to be translated when there are language barriers in cases with foreign elements. The purpose of this paper is expected to address security issues, which is ignored, in the process of translating judicial documents.

The experimental results show that the model constructed in this paper can effectively guarantee the security and privacy of transferring and storing translated judicial documents in cases with foreign elements, and realize the credibility and traceability of feedbacks and evaluations of judicial translation services. In addition, the underlying network communications is stable and the speed for processing data can meet the requirements of practical application.

The research in this paper provides an innovative scheme for judicial translation services in cases with foreign elements. The model constructed is conducive to protecting the security of the transfer and storage of judicial documents and improving the efficiency and modernization ability of hearing cases with foreign elements.

Investigates the differences in protocols between arbitral tribunals and courts, with particular emphasis on US, Greek and English law. Gives examples of each country and its way of using the law in specific circumstances, and shows the variations therein. Sums up that arbitration is much the better way to gok as it avoids delays and expenses, plus the vexation/frustration of normal litigation. Concludes that the US and Greek constitutions and common law tradition in England appear to allow involved parties to choose their own judge, who can thus be an arbitrator. Discusses e‐commerce and speculates on this for the future.

The paper aims to reach a better understanding of accountability and social reporting in the Italian justice system, by examining the state of the art of both literature and practice. The case study highlights the critical elements in drawing up the social report of one of the most important Prosecutor Offices in Italy.

The case study analyzes the activities of the actors involved in the report building process by detailing all the steps involved in a research diary, in order to examine such process from the inside, thus reversing its perspective.

The study shows that both the lack of guidelines for judicial administrations and a consolidated trend of transforming administrative facts into documents useful to stakeholders slow down the evolution of practices, which are stuck in a perpetual trial stage.

The limitations are mainly related to the adoption of a single case study, which does not include any comparison with other reporting experiences in the justice sector.

This paper adds evidence to the theoretical debate on social reporting in the justice sector which has so far received the attention of a limited number of scholars. Furthermore, unlike other studies focusing exclusively on the final report while overlooking the process that turns input into output, this research deals with the core of the social reporting process and practices in their development, capturing their most intimate and controversial aspects from the inside.

Several recent statistical analyses provide overwhelming evidence for substantial injustice in immigration court decisions. Writers also explored the data for evidence of bias. Several ended with recommendations for more legal training for judges and more professional appellate review. These recommendations assume that the problem is in the interpretation of the law and conduct of the trial. My own experience has been that there is actually a greater problem in the interpretation of facts, at several levels. Courts provide for translators, but merely verbal translation is not enough. Cultural translation is required. In this chapter I illustrate what cultural translation is with instances from five different asylum cases that I have been involved in as an expert witness. I conclude with recommendations to support better use of this kind of information.

The purpose of this paper is to develop an assessment guide based on the European Foundation for Quality Management (EFQM) model criteria. Courts have been under pressure to become more accountable and responsive organisations. In this context, self-assessment models that drive attention to the way resources are being used and to the results that are being achieved, incorporating the views of different stakeholders, are of particular interest.

A case study approach was used. The meaning of the quality principles that underline the EFQM model was discussed with the court administrator, judges, prosecutors and justice officers. Those perspectives were taken into account when translating the criteria and criterion parts of the EFQM model. The assessment guide was validated by an experts’ panel.

The EFQM model captures the essential features of a court even if the courts terminology and governance models challenge the translation of some criteria. The resulting guide includes a description of the various criteria and criterion parts and the identification of key focus areas, while giving some illustrative examples of initiatives and indicators that could be looked at under each model dimension.

The assessment guide can be used to undertake self-assessment exercises in different courts.

There is a lack of studies on the measurement of courts’ performance apart from the publication of simple lists of process indicators. The assessment guide developed in this study is perhaps one of the most comprehensive resources for assessing the quality of a court.

The object of this research is the reconstruction of the existing legal response by European Union states to the phenomenon of immigration. It seeks to analyse the process of conferral of protection.

One main dimension is selected and discussed: the case law of the national courts. The study focuses on the legal status of immigrants resulting from the intervention of these national courts.

The research shows that although the courts have conferred an increasing protection on immigrants, this has not challenged the fundamental principle of the sovereignty of the states to decide, according to their discretionary prerogatives, which immigrants are allowed to enter and stay in their territories. Notwithstanding the differences in the general constitutional and legal structures, the research also shows that the courts of the three countries considered – France, Germany and Spain – have progressively moved towards converging solutions in protecting immigrants.

The research contributes to a better understanding of the different legal orders analysed.

The purpose of this monograph is to present the first English translation of a unique French colonial report on women living under colonial rule in West Africa.

The issue begins with a discussion of the contribution this report makes to the history of social development policy in Africa, and how it serves the on‐going critique of colonisation. This is followed by the English translation of the original report held in the National Archives of Senegal. The translation is accompanied by explanatory notes, translator’s comments, a glossary of African and technical terms, and a bibliography.

The discussion highlights contemporary social development policies and practices which featured in identical or similar forms in French colonial social policy.

As the report demonstrates, access to basic education and improving maternal/infant health care have dominated the social development agenda for women in sub‐Saharan Africa for over a century, and will continue to do so in the foreseeable future in the Millennium Development Goals which define the international community’s agenda for social development to 2015. The parallels between colonial and post‐colonial social policies in Africa raise questions about the philosophical and cultural foundations of contemporary social development policy in Africa and the direction policy is following in the 21st century.

Though the discussion adopts a consciously postcolonial perspective, the report that follows presents a consciously colonial view of the “Other”. Given the parallels identified here between contemporary and colonial policy‐making, this can only add to the value of the document in exploring the values that underpin contemporary social development practice.

In this chapter I discuss judicial contributions to Italian penality. I look at the penal incentives produced by interactions between judicial and political classes, and ask whether judges and prosecutors have been forces for punitiveness or moderation. I discuss the relevance of the Italian case for broader analyses of Western penality.

My chapter offers a political-sociological account of judicial contributions to punishment. I analyse the penal incentives created by different national institutional set-ups, specifically addressing judicial contributions to penality using a framework developed by Joachim Savelsberg and Nicola Lacey. The framework examines judicial structure in the institutional context looking at the penal implications of bureaucratisation of the judiciary and the capacity for co-ordination between judges and politicians. I include judicial legitimacy as an additional dimension in this framework.

I conclude that the Italian judiciary have been forces for punitiveness and moderation. Their contributions can be systematised by looking at the waxing and waning of judicial legitimacy, and the consequent expansion and contraction of judicial powers. I claim that judicial legitimacy is also relevant to other (‘non-Italian’) analyses of judicial contributions to contemporary Western penality.

By adding legitimacy to investigations of judicial contributions to penality I provide an organising principle with which to analyse the penal role of Italian judicial actors. I thus allow Italy to be kept in conversation with existing comparative models, without assuming that it either conforms to the models entirely, or that the models should otherwise be eschewed. I use the Italian case to demonstrate the relevance of legitimacy when analysing judicial contributions to Western penality, arguing that changing legitimacy affects the terms and effect of interaction between judicial and political classes.

Language use is a highly controversial issue in the United States (Schmidt, 2000). Among all the linguistic access issues (e.g., bilingual education, multilingual ballots), however, the issue of access to justice is probably the least contentious. Most people in the United States seem to agree and appreciate the fact that access to justice premises on the ability of court users to understand the process in which they participate. The integrity of the legal process, particularly for the common law system (like the American legal system), which features an adversarial trial process, would be compromised if litigants were unable to communicate with or understand the judge, witnesses, or opposing parties or counsel. The guiding theory behind the common law is that adversarial trials set up two or more parties to be in conflict with one another in a zero-sum game; it is therefore important for all participating parties to be on equal footing (Thibaut & Walker, 1975).