PROMOTING JUDICIAL INDEPENDENCE IN THE INTERNATIONAL COURTS: LESSONS FROM THE CARIBBEAN

摘要

The rapid expansion in the size and role of the international courts raises important questions about the nature and extent of judicial independence in these relatively little-known judicial institutions. To address these questions we need first to ask whether the analytical framework used in the study of judicial independence at national level can be transplanted wholesale to the international courts or whether a different approach is needed. Historically, these supranational judicial bodies have often been regarded as sui generis institutions only very distantly related to their domestic cousins. Given the differences in origin, jurisdiction and role between the national and international courts, there is some justification for this view. Yet these differences and their implications for our understanding of judicial independence can be overstated. In many respects the differences between national and international courts is no greater than those within the two jurisdictions. Both encompass a very diverse range of judicial forms and functions which demand the construction of a concept of judicial independence which is general enough to apply across the judicial spectrum yet specific enough to capture the very different requirements of each particular court and tier of the judiciary. The problem of how to define and measure judicial independence and where to strike the balance between independence and accountability is equally contested at both national and international level and many of the same approaches are needed to address these challenges.