The Performance of the Courts Index

the performance of the courts index

romania

2014

research methodology

This first assessment occurs in a context in which the Romanian justice system, although still under the oversight of the European Commission under the Cooperation and Verification Mechanism, has registered significant progress, both in terms of its own internal reform and in terms of public trust in it.

We define the performance of the courts in Romania as a set of indicators and factors that determine the level of predictability in the administration of the justice act. The predictability itself leads to a greater trust of the citizens in the act of justice, a key element in strengthening the rule of law. In other words, a more performing court has a higher probability to be predictable over time.

The concept of performance of the courts involves both dynamic components (such as the number of cases registered) and static (such as the scheme of judges for a court). The Performance of the Courts Index focuses on multiple elements that must be taken into account in order to assess the performance in the administration of justice because they affect the predictability of justice and therefore the confidence in the judicial system. The courts activity is evaluated through three pillars of the administration of justice, that we have identified as being essential in order to generate performance and, as a consequence, predictability and trust in the judiciary.

Some elements seem to influence the predictability of the justice act more than others and, based on this assumption, the research aims to assess potential indicators not only through a quantitative perspective, but also a qualitative one.

This means that it is possible for a court that has a longer duration proceedings or a higher invalidation rate to the higher level to have a good performance if it scores well to the standardized indicators.

The ultimate goal of the research is to provide stakeholders factual data to substantiate those policies that aim to identify and correct the points in which we see poorer results, for an individual court or the entire judicial system.

The data driven assessment aims to provide a useful tool – The Performance of the Courts Index – which can be used by all those involved in the judiciary, policy makers, civil society and citizens, such as: Evaluarea bazată pe date vrea să ofere un instrument util – Indicele performanţei instanţelor – care să faciliteze o serie de acţiuni ale actorilor din sistemul judiciar, decidenţilor, societăţii civile şi justiţiabililor precum:

· Encouraging a debate and changing the optics on justice reform, focusing on the administration of the justice act elements and not only on its results. Stimularea unei dezbateri şi schimbarea opticii cu privire la reforma justiţiei prin concentrarea pe elementele de administrare a actului de justiţie şi nu doar pe elementele de rezultat ale acestuia

· Providing a set of national data in order to improve the understanding of the factors that can influence the performance of the courts from different angles and that can provide a data-based overview of the Oferirea unui set de date la nivel naţional pentru a îmbunătăţi înţelegerea asupra elementelor care influenţează performanţa instanţelor din diferite unghiuri care pot oferi o imagine bazată pe date asupra necesităţilor de intervenţie pentru îmbunătăţirea acesteia

· Informing policy-makers by highlighting the weaknesses and strengths of each court and the entire judicial system and, as a result, indentifying potential reforms or mechanisms that could improve the performance of the justice act.Informarea decidenţilor subliniind locuri specifice în care există puncte slabe sau puncte tari la nivelul instanţelor individuale sau la nivel de sistem şi, ca rezultat, identificarea unor potenţiale reforme sau mecanisme care ar putea îmbunătăţi performanţa actului de justiţie

· Facilitating the benchmarking of the performance of individual courts over time by stakeholders who are monitoring the improvements in this area in order to make informed decisions on public policy ????Facilitarea evaluării comparative (benchmarking) a performanţei instanţelor individuale de-a lungul timpului de către stakeholderii care monitorizează îmbunătăţirea sau înrăutăţirea situaţiei pentru a lua decizii informate de politică publică sau de utilizare a instanţei respective

· Prioritizing the needed interventions in public policies regarding the administration of justice, in terms of giving minimal standards for the administration of the justice act. Prioritizarea intervenţiilor necesare în politicile publice de gestionare a justiţiei din perspectiva asigurării unor standarde minimale de administrare a actului de justiţie

· Identifying best practices and assessment of the factors that can lead to their replication/extension to other courts or to the entire system. Identificarea bunelor practici de la nivelul instanţelor şi evaluarea elementelor care pot duce la replicarea şi/sau extinderea acestora la nivelul altor instanţe sau la nivel de sistem

assessment limits

The performance of the courts assessment has been the subject to countless analysis and there are still ample debates on the most suitable method for its evaluation. While the quality of the court’s decisions or the importance of the example of solving a particular case for society are important for the general assessment of the performance of the Romanian courts, we tried to limit ourselves to the elements of the administration of the justice act. Evaluarea performanţei instanţelor a făcut obiectul a nenumărate analize şi încă există dezbateri aprinse pe marginea celei mai potrivite metode pentru evaluarea acesteia. În vreme ce calitatea hotărârilor judecătoreşti sau importanţa exemplului dat pentru societate de rezolvarea unei anumite cauze sunt importante pentru evaluarea performanţei generale a instanţelor din România, am încercat să ne limităm la acele elemente de administrare a actului de justiţie.

Even within the indicators related to the administration of the justice act there are several factors that have an effect on its performance. Therefore, the performance calculated by the Index provides an overview of the courts by taking into account three indicators that are reported in relation to other elements that influence efficiency, workload and certainty, accordingly the number of judges per court, population served and the lenght of trials. Chiar şi în interiorul indicatorilor care ţin de administrarea actului de justiţie sunt mai mulţi factori care au un efect asupra performanţei acestuia. De aceea, performanța calculată de Indice oferă o imagine de perspectivă asupra instanțelor luând în calcul trei indicatori, care sunt raportați relativ la alte elemente care influențează operativitatea, încărcarea și siguranța, respectiv numărul de judecărori din instanță, populația deservită și durata proceselor.

coverage of indicators

The Performance Index is calculated only for the 2013 reports and covers data for each court, by competence levels: courts of appeal, tribunals, courts. The choice of the methodology is also generated by the fact that in 2013 the judicial system has mostly worked with the new Civil Code and Civil Procedure Code. For criminal matters, the old codes were still in effect in 2013. Evaluarea performanţei este calculată doar pentru raportările din anul 2013 şi cuprind date pentru fiecare instanţă, pe niveluri de competenţă: curţi de apel, tribunale, judecătorii. Alegerea metodologică este generată şi de faptul că sistemul de justiţie a lucrat, preponderent, în anul 2013 cu noile coduri civil şi de procedură civilă. În materie de cauze penale, pentru anul 2013 avem încă în vigoare doar vechile coduri penal şi de procedură penală.

From this perspective, the Index captures only comparisons between same level courts, for the cases that were registered and solved in 2013. It is expected for the accuracy to improve for the 2014 data, by automatically gathering and calculating the new entries in the system (made through programmatic access into the data provided by the portal http://portalquery.just.ro/query.asmx) Din această perspectivă, Indicele suprinde doar comparaţii între instanţele de la acelaşi nivel, pentru cauzele înregistrate şi soluţionate în 2013. Este de aşteptat ca, pentru datele din 2014, acurateţea datelor să crească, prin colectarea şi calcularea automatizată a noilor intrări în sistem (realizată prin accesul programatic la date furnizat prin intermediul portalului http://portalquery.just.ro/query.asmx).

It is also expected that, starting with the 2014 data, the Index will also manage to capture the comparative trends over time for each court, as well as how it performs in relation to various indicators. De asemenea, este de aşteptat ca, începând cu datele pentru 2014, Indicele să reuşească să surprindă şi evoluţiile comparative în timp ale fiecărei instanţe şi felul în care aceasta performează în raport cu diferiţii indicatori.

how the index is calculeted

Note: The invalidation index is currently calculated as being constant for each level of courts (according to 2013 SCM reports) which means that we will have significant differences for the „certainty” indicator only for the 2014 data. The average duration is calculated only for cases registered in 2013 (over 2 milion cases). From these, we selected only those casese that have recieved a solution at the first instance court.

final considerations

At this point, the Performance of the Courts Index provides an overview of each level of courts in Romania. Because it is the first year in which it is tested, it can be corrected and improved once we obtain comparative data over time. This is only a proposal that is intended to be a useful tool for three target groups: Pentru că este primul an în care este testat, acesta va putea fi corectat şi îmbunătăţit odată cu obţinerea unor date comparative în timp. Acesta este doar o propunere care se doreşte a fi un instrument util pentru trei categorii de grupuri ţintă:

- For decision makers, it can provide clues about the factors that should be taken into account for poblic policies regarding the administration of justice. The Index provides a fairly accurate image of some issues, such as: courts that are less efficient because they work at a lower capacity than the court scheme; courts that have under-sized court establishments in relation with the demografic evolution in the district they serve; the good performance of the specialized courts, by taking into account other indicators (such as the incidence of certain types of cases) may indicate the need for more of this kind of institutions etc.

- For magistrates and court managers it can be a useful tool in terms of optimizing the administration of justice processes. For example, a large number of lawsuits per capita may indicate the need for alternative measures to relieve the courts, such as legal education or better communication with the citizens in terms of relevant jurisprudence. Pentru magistraţi şi pentru managerii de instanţe, instrumentul poate fi util din perspectiva optimizării unor procese de administrare a actului de justiţie din instanţa lor. Spre exemplu, un număr mare de litigii pe cap de locuitor poate indica nevoia unor acţiuni alternative de degrevare, precum educaţia juridică sau o mai bună comunicare cu justiţiabilii din perspectiva jurisprudenţei relevante.

- For citizens the tool is especially useful in terms of making better decisions regarding theirs options as „consumers of justice”: a longer duration for solving a case or a lower invalidation rate may lead them into finding the opportunity to seek altenative ways to solve lawsuits, such as mediation. Pentru justiţiabili, instrumentul este util mai ales din perspectiva unei mai bune decizii privind opţiunile lor de „consumatori ai actului de justiţie”: o durată mare a proceselor sau un procent de casare mic pot indica acestora oportunitatea de a apela la modalităţi alternative de soluţionare a litigiilor, precum medierea.

We are aware of the fact that this tool is not a perfect one, but a first attempt to look at the evolution of the judicial system from an objective and data driven perspective. We believe that there is a real possibility for the Performance of the Courts Index to become better and more relevant, therefore we look forward to your comments and suggestions regarding the methodology. Ne asumăm faptul că acest instrument nu este unul perfect, ci doar o primă încercare de a privi, din perspectivă obiectivă şi bazată pe date, evoluţiile din sistemul judiciar. Credem că posibilitatea ca Indicele de performanţă al instanţelor să devină mai bun şi mai relevat este una mare, de aceea aşteptăm cu interes comentariile sau sugestiile voastre cu privire la metodologie.

data sources

The statistics were obtained from the following sources:

1. Superior Council of Magistrates – 2013 Report on the state of justice (Raport privind starea justiţiei 2013) and responses to requests made under the freedom of information law –L 544/2001

2. Ministry of Justice - portal.just.ro

3. National Institute of Statistics - www.recensamantromania.ro