A Survey of Judicial Effectiveness: The Last Quarter Century of Empirical Evidence

Courts around the world are often perceived to be ineffective in the delivery of justice. The resolution of cases takes too long, costs too much, and is biased in favor of the rich and politically connected. These stylized facts motivate judicial reform. With the benefit of a quarter century of empirical research, this paper finds that judicial reform is successful in improving court effectiveness when it coincides with or is motivated by periods of extraordinary politics. We study the four most discussed ingredients of judicial effectiveness—independence, access, efficiency, and quality—and find that transformative judicial reform is most likely to succeed in countries emerging from conflict and violence or those that are pursuing accession to regional or international groups. Absent such conditions, reformers are better off focusing on the adoption of procedural rules that increase the effectiveness of the existing judicial system. The survey highlights procedural reforms that deliver better outcomes.