EU Enlargement and the Constitutional Principle of Judicial Independence

Promoting Justice in the Southern Mediterranean

“…At a very abstract level, countries share similar principles of independence and accountability of the judiciary, but the way in which those principles are balanced against each other's is reached in different ways. A substantial disagreement, as noted by Smilov, rests in the checks and balances with the executive and legislative power (Smilov 2006). As we have seen in the German model, the Ministry of Justice, or its equivalent, has powers to promote judges and sanction them while this competence pertains to the independent agency, the judicial council, in Neo-Latin models (ibid.).…”

“…As we have seen in the German model, the Ministry of Justice, or its equivalent, has powers to promote judges and sanction them while this competence pertains to the independent agency, the judicial council, in Neo-Latin models (ibid.). The differences among European countries rely also on internal accountability, specifically in the ways continental countries have senior magistrates exercising a strong control in terms of the careers of younger judges (Smilov 2006; see also Guarnieri and Pederzoli 2002). Another differentiation among European judicial models is the degree of independence of the budget.…”

“…Without entering into the normative theory of judicial independence, and specifically explaining how and why certain countries follow a specific model of judicial independence, this book is interested in the existence of a European constitutional model as a starting point in order to analyse the reforms that non-Western countries have initiated as a consequence of European judicial support. The European normative space, as scholars argued (see, for instance, the definition provided by Smilov 2006), is more a myth than a set of constitutional principles.…”