Judicial Reforms

Taiwan’s Citizen Judges Act: Part II

Lay adjudication can give citizens a meaningful role in the administration of justice and may boost their confidence in the courts. However, the use of lay adjudication also may raise questions about the extent to which systems can deliver a fair trial and the safeguards needed to assure accused persons that the system of adjudication is independent and impartial.

Taiwan’s Citizen Judges Act: Part I

In 2020, after years of advocacy by judicial reformers, Taiwan’s legislature passed the Citizen Judges Act, providing for professional judges to share their benches - and their power - with lay judges in a relatively small subset of criminal cases. The law takes effect January 2023. USALI Perspectives invited six experts in Taiwan’s judicial system to unpack the practical challenges and potential larger significance of this seemingly small step.

A Reputation Tarnished: Reflections on the Resignation of Overseas Judges from Hong Kong’s Court of Final Appeal

Hong Kong has been privileged to have a panel of eminent overseas judges to serve as non-permanent judges of its Court of Final Appeal (CFA). The willingness of overseas judges to serve on the CFA was seen as a vote of confidence in the constitutional model of “One Country, Two Systems,” in which a common law legal system and its values were to be preserved within a socialist sovereign. Now two UK judges have resigned, expressly citing the National Security Law as the reason.