Many developing countries are giving priority to judicial reform as a neccessary condition for encouraging new investment. Governments in Eastern Europe and Latin America realise that they cannot complete their economic reforms until they have made a corresponding change in laws and legal processes. This study by the World Bank assesses the progress of such pilot programmes in Colombia, Peru, Ukraine and Argentina.
The adoption of reforms varies from region to region. While some Eastern European countries included the judiciary as part of their initial public-sector reforms, Latin America has left it until last. It has made changes to the judiciary part of a second generation of reforms that focuses on institutional strengthening. However, reformers in both regions share four core goals. Each country aims to have a judicial system that is (1) impartial, (2) predictable, (3) accessible and (4) efficient.
The pressure on governments to reform comes from both local and foreign interests. At the national level, privatisation of large state enterprises has raised issues concerning contracts, labour, and competition that the judiciaries were ill-equipped to handle. In addition, as democracies stabilise, public opinion has begun to play a larger role in decision-making, and public dissatisfaction with the judiciary runs high in many countries. At the international level, economic integration pushes countries to change their laws and legal processes. Not only is there greater pressure for efficient enforcement of laws, there is also a need (1) to rewrite legislation to conform to regional and international standards, and (2) to establish new institutions.
The number of pilot programs in operation for judicial reform is still low, and there is a dearth of information on those that have been implemented. However, evidence from the above countries suggest that pilot reform programmes can be beneficial in several ways:
- They offer an informative, low risk alternative for countries considering how best to implement judicial reforms.
- They can be less costly than large-scale reforms, and can be financed by the private sector or by international organisations.
- Some organisations, including the World Bank, have designed new instruments specifically to facilitate learning and innovation projects.
- These instruments allow for (1) flexible designs, (2) experimentation and (3) partnership-building.
- They also represent a new paradigm in the role of multilateral cooperation, in that they encourage governments to use pilots to bring innovation to their normal process of development.
Today, judiciaries in many countries are experiencing similar challenges. Furthermore, there is a movement toward a globalisation of judicial reform. These developments have several key policy implications which include the following:
- The need for greater cooperation has increased.
- Investment in learning and in the sharing of knowledge is essential for the innovation process.
- Countries such as Colombia, Peru, Ukraine and Argentina need to disseminate their experiences to expand awareness of the challenges of judicial reform.
- Globalisation of reform can increase the likelihood that courts will be able to provide better quality, greater efficiency and better public access to the services they offer.
