Shouldn’t the bench be a mirror? The diversity of the Canadian judiciary

Levin, Avner; Alkoby, Asher

doi:10.1080/09695958.2018.1489818

Cited by 3 publications

(4 citation statements)

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“…Table 4 illustrates the number of value statements and the dominant values expressed in the speeches. We note that the low number of value statements identified in each speech is consistent with Cahill-O'Callaghan's finding that judgments and extra-curial speeches by UK Supreme Court Justices similarly evinced limited numbers of values-statements (Cahill-O'Callaghan 2013, 2019. Table 5 also demonstrates -by its silence -the values that were absent from the speeches: hedonism, stimulation and security.…”

Section: Iii2 Personal Values and Judicial Swearing-in Speechessupporting

confidence: 80%

“…To explore the justices' values as expressed in the swearing-in speeches, we applied the coding framework and methodology used by Cahill-O'Callaghan (2013;2019; in her analysis of the judgments of the UK Supreme Court. Values were coded by associating text with an overarching motivation of a value defined by Schwartz.…”

Section: Personal Values and Judicial Swearing-in Speechesmentioning

confidence: 99%

“…[O]nce one acknowledges that the law does not exist as a preformed set of rules which judges simply discover and apply to the facts at hand, and that on occasions the judge must form her or his own view as to what should happen, it follows that who the judge is matters. Rackley, 2013:132 (original emphasis) Many arguments for judicial diversity have centred on demographic difference and the importance of a bench that reflects the population it serves (Rackley, 2008(Rackley, , 2013Hunter, 2015;Richardson-Oakes & Davies, 2016;Levin & Alkoby, 2019). Evidence of judicial diversity is testimony to equality of opportunity in the legal profession and provides inspiration to traditionally underrepresented populations to pursue professional and public service careers (Goldman & Saronson, 1994;Hale, 2001;Davis & Williams, 2003;Lawrence, 2010).…”

Section: Introductionmentioning

confidence: 99%

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Hidden depths: diversity, difference and the High Court of Australia

Cahill-O'Callaghan

Roberts

2021

International Journal of Law in Context

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There is a growing international emphasis on the importance of diversity in the judiciary and the impact of the individual in decision-making. However, it can be a challenge to gain insight into the individuals who sit on the bench. For instance, there is limited official information about the individuals who sit on the High Court of Australia. One of the rare glimpses provided by the justices themselves is their judicial swearing-in speech. Drawing on a case-study of the swearing-in speeches of High Court justices sitting between 2008 and 2016, this paper illustrates how these speeches can illuminate key demographic information about the judiciary, as well as facets of the individual rarely explored in studies of judicial diversity: personality and values. This study demonstrates how swearing-in speeches can assist with filling information gaps about judicial diversity, and so extend debates about judicial selection.

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Section: Iii2 Personal Values and Judicial Swearing-in Speechessupporting

confidence: 80%

Section: Personal Values and Judicial Swearing-in Speechesmentioning

confidence: 99%

Section: Introductionmentioning

confidence: 99%

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Hidden depths: diversity, difference and the High Court of Australia

Cahill-O'Callaghan

Roberts

2021

International Journal of Law in Context

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“…Sexual assault scholar and lawyer Elaine Craig (2018) argues that legislation is considered to be a potent weapon to combat myths against victims and to provide justice in sexual assault cases. However, researchers suggest that it may take many years before a newly implemented law is consistently applied to jurors' decisions (Koehler, 2006;Levin & Alkoby, 2017), because of jurors' heavy reliance on their own biases and pervasive myths about sexual assault (Leverick, 2020).…”

Section: The History Of the Legal Definition Of Consent In Canadamentioning

confidence: 99%

Let’s Get Prototypical: The Role of Complainant/Defendant Gender and Form of Sexual Act on Mock Jurors’ Decisions in Sexual Assault Trials

Starosta¹

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This mock juror study (N = 437) serves as a first examination of mock jurors' perceived prototypicality of a sexual assault case, complainant, and defendant in various conditions, to ascertain if mock jurors' sexual assault prototypes are one of the mechanisms behind their caserelated decisions. To this end, the present study offers an initial examination of the impact of the form of alleged sexual assault (forced oral sex onto the complainant vs. forced vaginal intercourse) and complainant and defendant gender (i.e., male complainant-female defendant vs. female complainant-male defendant) on mock jurors' sexual assault prototypes and, in turn, their assessments and decisions. The results of a path analysis demonstrate a cautious optimism that the form of sexual assault does not play a significant role in mock jurors' decisions. However, the complainant's gender (tied to defendant's gender) does. Mock jurors perceived the male complainant-female defendant condition as less prototypical of a sexual assault case, complainant, and defendant than the female complainant-male defendant condition, resulting in negative evaluations of the male complainant and favourable evaluations of the female defendant, which lowered mock jurors' probability of rendering a guilty verdict. Simultaneously, the present study suggests that for fixed levels of prototypicality, the female complainant received heightened negative evaluations from mock jurors, and the male defendant received more favourable evaluations from mock jurors, which lowered mock jurors' probability of rendering a guilty verdict. Collectively, these results provide evidence to suggests that prototypicality is one of the mechanisms behind mock juror decisions in sexual assault cases. My results reveal a potential bias in our legal system that should be furthered researched and mitigated to ensure fairer decisions for the 37,855 sexual assault trials held in Canada each year (Statistics Canada, 2019).Cotter, 2014). For example, in 1992, 57% of reported sexual assault cases were filtered out of the criminal justice system (Statistics Canada's Uniform Crime Reporting Survey (UCR), 1994). In one case, a judge proposed that one of the reasons for this was that these reforms did not address the broad and unclear definition of consent (R. v. Ewanchuk, 1999). As such, Canadian sexual assault laws were once again reformed in 2017, resulting in our current laws (R.S., c. C-34, s. 265).Current Sexual Assault Laws. The Government of Canada initiated Bill-C-51 on June 6, 2017, to make the definition of consent more transparent, revise previous sexual assault legislation, help ensure fairer trials, and reduce victim-blaming (Casavant et al., 2018). Major changes brought forth by this bill include (1) one cannot consent while heavily intoxicated,(2) one's sexual history cannot be used to challenge their credibility, (3) sexual assault allegations do not require evidence of forceful victim resistance, and (4) one's sexual orientation cannot be mentioned in court (S.276). To this end,...

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Gender and judging in Tunisia and the intersections of penalty and privilege

Voorhoeve¹

2023

Oñati Socio-Legal Series

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The international community encourages countries to increase the number of women in the judiciary. This is partly based on the hypothesis that female judges make the bench representative of society. However, the question arises as to which women we are referring to. While the experiences of women are different from men because of their sex, experiences of lower-class women are also different from those from the middle and upper classes, as experiences of women belonging to a minority are different from those belonging to the majority. Using the intersectionality grid of “penalty and privilege” proposed by Patricia Hill Collins (2000), this article aims to look beyond the gender-binary in the study of judges in Muslim contexts by bringing in an intersectional approach, using Tunisia as a case study. Focusing on two female judges functioning under the Tunisian authoritarian regime, this study hopes to show how different women bring different experiences to the bench.

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Shouldn’t the bench be a mirror? The diversity of the Canadian judiciary

Cited by 3 publications

References 4 publications

Hidden depths: diversity, difference and the High Court of Australia

Hidden depths: diversity, difference and the High Court of Australia

Let’s Get Prototypical: The Role of Complainant/Defendant Gender and Form of Sexual Act on Mock Jurors’ Decisions in Sexual Assault Trials

Gender and judging in Tunisia and the intersections of penalty and privilege

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