Judicial Decision-Making During Violence Conflict: A New Global Dataset

• In Event: Courts in Transition, Courts in Crisis

Abstract

Do judges rule in favor of state institutions during a violent emergency? Scholarship from the United States finds evidence for both judicial deference and judicial assertiveness in the context of international war, civil conflict and terrorism. What is missing is a comparative study with complete data on violence-related judicial decisions. This paper presents a new dataset that sifts through over 8,000 New York Times articles and English-language secondary literature to document all judicial decisions delivered by high courts (i.e., constitutional courts and high courts of appeal) during a violent emergency between 1945 and 2015. Tentative findings suggest that judicial deference is indeed common, but that courts have at times resisted the executive branch and/or state security institutions. Furthermore, judicial assertiveness is likely if the case in question threatens to curtail or eliminate the judiciary’s own power and authority.

Author

• Onur Bakiner, Seattle University