Abstract
Although often assumed by economic theory, the idea of an efficient judicial system often sounds like an oxymoron. In this work, we suggest an innovative approach to investigating the determinants of court performance. Our focus is on determining the ideal institutional environment for fostering the appropriate set of incentives for judges to operate efficiently. In this setting, we find evidence that greater independence enjoyed by the judiciary from politics induces more competition among judges to obtain professional upgrades. Such an environment will incentivize ambitious individuals to be more efficient, thus positively affecting the aggregate performance of the judiciary.
Appendix
Variables descriptions.
| Variable Name | Description |
| CIVLIB | Civil Liberties indexb |
| BUDGET | Per capita public expenditure allocated to justice sector workers’ gross salaries (Purchase Power Parity adjusted & logarithmic transformation)a |
| LITIGATION | Litigation rate calculated as quantity of cases filed to courts for every 10,000 citizensa |
| FRENCH | Dummy = 1 if legal system belongs to French tradition.c |
| GERMAN | Dummy = 1 if legal system belongs to German tradition.c |
| SCANDINAVIAN | Dummy = 1 if legal system belongs to Scandinavian tradition.c |
Correlation matrix.
| JI | CIVLIB | BUDGET | LITIGATION | GERMAN | FRENCH | SCANDINA | |
| JI | 1 | ||||||
| CIVLIB | –0.1316 | 1 | |||||
| BUDGET | –0.1800 | 0.5466* | 1 | ||||
| LITIGATION | –0.1486 | −0.2480 | 0.1722 | 1 | |||
| GERMAN | 0.3846* | 0.1769 | 0.3024 | −0.1304 | 1 | ||
| FRENCH | –0.0591 | 0.2992 | 0.2948 | 0.1304 | −0.1750 | 1 | |
| SCANDINAVIAN | 0.0249 | 0.3577* | −0.0038 | −0.3785* | −0.1004 | −0.2050 | 1 |
Acknowledgment
We are very grateful for the helpful comments and suggestions provided by Theodore Eisenberg, Giuseppe Di Vita, Richard Jong-A-Pin, Peter Grajzl, Mathias Siems and participants at the Italian Society of Law & Economics (Lugano, Switzerland), European Public Choice Society Conference (Cambridge, UK), Economic Analysis of Litigation Workshop (Catania, Italy), Spanish Association of Law & Economics Conference (Malaga, Spain), POLIS Summer Seminar (Alessandria, Italy), European Association of Comparative Economic Studies Conference (Budapest, Hungary) and European Association of Law & Economics Conference (Aix En Provence, France). Alessandro Melcarne would like to acknowledge the financial support of the “Alberto Musy” fellowship granted by Centro di Ricerca e Documentazione “Luigi Einaudi”. The usual disclaimers apply.
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©2015 by De Gruyter
Artikel in diesem Heft
- Frontmatter
- Editorial
- Foreword to the special issue on Economic Analysis of Litigation
- Articles
- Rent-Seeking and Litigation: The Hidden Virtues of Limited Fee Shifting
- Judicial Independence, Judges’ Incentives and Efficiency
- Tipping the Scales – Settlement, Appeal and the Relevance of Judicial Ambition
- Third-Party Punishment under Judicial Review: An Economic Experiment on the Effects of a Two-Tier Punishment System
- A Commitment Mechanism to Eliminate Willful Contract Litigation
- Centralization versus Decentralization of Legislative Production and the Effect on Litigation: A Case Study
- An Empirical Analysis of Case Disposition Time in Belgium
- Bottlenecks or Inefficiency? An Assessment of First Instance Italian Courts’ Performance
- Does Patent Quality Drive Damages in Patent Lawsuits? Lessons from the French Judicial System
Artikel in diesem Heft
- Frontmatter
- Editorial
- Foreword to the special issue on Economic Analysis of Litigation
- Articles
- Rent-Seeking and Litigation: The Hidden Virtues of Limited Fee Shifting
- Judicial Independence, Judges’ Incentives and Efficiency
- Tipping the Scales – Settlement, Appeal and the Relevance of Judicial Ambition
- Third-Party Punishment under Judicial Review: An Economic Experiment on the Effects of a Two-Tier Punishment System
- A Commitment Mechanism to Eliminate Willful Contract Litigation
- Centralization versus Decentralization of Legislative Production and the Effect on Litigation: A Case Study
- An Empirical Analysis of Case Disposition Time in Belgium
- Bottlenecks or Inefficiency? An Assessment of First Instance Italian Courts’ Performance
- Does Patent Quality Drive Damages in Patent Lawsuits? Lessons from the French Judicial System