Monitoring the EU Accession Process - Judicial Independence

This report looks at judicial independence in the following ten countries, prior to their accession into the European Union: Bulgaria, Czech Republic, Estonia, Hungary, Latvia, Lithuania, Poland, Romania, Slovakia, and Slovenia. Each of the states are assessed in light of the European Union’s own standards, which are thoroughly discussed in the first part of the report. This part canvasses topics such as the issue areas for the candidate states, the constitutional and legal foundations of judicial independence, the administration of the court system and judicial independence, the importance of financial autonomy of the judiciary and the corollary level of funding, and the logistics of judicial office, including the selection and removal processes and the promotion and discipline provisions. The report also looks at intra-judicial relations, and the enforcement of professional standards along with the risk of corruption. The end of part one sets out a number of ways the accession process into the European Union could contribute to the judicial independence in the candidate states. The rest of the report looks at these same topics as they manifest themselves in the states under review.
Keywords: Case Study/Studies, Judiciary/Judicial, Judicial/Judiciary Independence, Judiciary Structure, Judicial Council, Judiciary Selection and Removal, Judicial Eligibility, Judiciary Term of Office, Tenure, Constitutional Court. Example. Request Copyright.