A. HONDEGHEM, X. ROUSSEAUX & F. SCHOENAERS (eds.), Modernisation of the Criminal Justice Chain and the Judicial System [Ius Gentium: Comparative Perspectives on Law and Justice, ed. M. SELLERS & J. MAXEINER], Heidelberg/New York: Springer, 2016. XVIII + 275 p. ISBN 9783319258027. € 99,99

 

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Springer published a collective work on "Criminal Justice and the Judicial System" (eds. A. Hondeghem, X. Rousseaux & F. Schoenaers), from an interdisciplinary and historical perspective in the series Ius Gentium. Comparative Perspectives on Law and Justice (eds. M. Sellers & J. Maxeiner).

Description:

This book focuses on one part of the judicial system: the criminal justice chain. This involves all the activities and actors dealing with policing, prosecution, judgment, and sanctioning of crimes. In the last decades, reforms have been implemented in several European countries. In Belgium, for example, there was the so-called Octopus reform in 1998. The police was restructured, leading to an integration of the police forces on a national and local level.  New steering instruments were introduced, such as regional security plans. With regard to the sanctioning of crimes, a new institution was installed, called the sentence implementation court. This book evaluates these reforms and discusses the current reform on the reorganization of the judicial landscape. In addition, it examines the relation between trust and distrust and the application to the judicial system. It discusses the human capital aspect of the system, by means of a study on the prosopography of the Belgian magistrates that analyses the Magistracy as socio-professional group, and focuses on situations of system building, transformations under constraint (occupations), and transfers (colonial experience). Lastly, the book presents a comparative study of Belgium and France regarding the new techniques and instruments that are needed to accelerate the judicial response time and to ensure that the judicial system delivers its services on time.​

 Contents:

From Octopus to the Reorganisation of the Judicial Landscape in Belgium (A. Hondeghem et al). (3-18)
Indicators or Incentives? Some Thoughts on the Use of the Penal Response Rate for Measuring the Activity of Public Prosecutors’ Offices in France (1999–2010)(C. Mouhanna et al.) (19-35)
Different Methods, Same Results as French Criminal Courts Try to Meet Contradictory Policy Demands (V. Gautron) (37-50)
The Position of the Public Prosecution Service in the New Swiss Criminal Justice Chain (D. Kettiger et al.) (51-64)
 Do Statistics Reinforce Administrative Centralisation? The Contradictory Influence of Quantified Indicators on French National Police (A.-C. Douillet et al.) (65-77)
From Justice Archipelago to Security and Justice Chain: Strategy-Organisation Configurations in the Dutch Criminal Justice System (S. Zouridis et al.) (79-93)
The Concepts of Trust and Distrust in the Belgian Criminal Justice Chain (J. Vanschoenwinkel et al.) (97-113)
Intra- and Interorganisational Trust in a Judicial Context: An Exploratory Case Study (M. Callens et al.) (115-130)
Managing the ‘Overall Integrated Security Policy’ at the Local Level: An Analysis of Inter-institutional Dialogue (A. Croquet et al.) (131-144)
Visible and Invisible Sentencing (N. Hutton) (145-158)
Making Sense or/of Decisions? Collective Action in Early Release Process (J. Bastard et al.) (159-172)
Prosopography, Crisis and Modernisation of Justice—“Belgian Magistrates”: An Introduction (X. Rousseaux) (175-180)
Prosopography in the Digital Age: Current Situation, Prospects and Perspectives in the Light of the Forthcoming “Belgian Magistrates” Application (A. François et al.) (181-193)
Conflicts, Tensions and Solidarity Within the Judicial District: A Socio-Professional Study of the Judiciary of the “Belgian” Departments Under the French Directory (1795–1799) (E. Berger) (195-210)
Magistrates of Congo (1885–1960): Prosopography and Biography as Combined Tools for the Study of the Colonial Judicial Body (L. Montel et al.) (211-232)
Belgian Magistrates and German Occupiers: A Diachronic Comparison (1914–1918/1940–1944) (M. Bost et al.) (233-260)
Prosopography, History and Legal Anthropology: Two Comments on the Belgian Case (J.-C. Farcy et al.) (261-275)

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