| Abstract [eng] |
Public cooperation and perceived legitimacy of courts, obedience to court rulings depend on perceived fairness of court actions. This paper aims to determine factors of civil party’s judgments of judicial behavior fairness and evaluate judicial compliance with procedural fairness requirements. 151 litigants were surveyed and 106 judges’ behavior in 181 court hearings of civil cases was analyzed. Results of the first part of the research show that the civil parties’ judgment of the judge (deliberating the case) behavior fairness predicts their judgment of fairness of all judges’ behavior (after the trial). Pre-trial judgment of judicial behavior fairness predicts judgment of fairness of all judges’ behavior (after the trial) via judgment of the judge (deliberating the case) behavior fairness. In addition, judgment of fairness of all judges’ behavior is related to the favorability of the ruling in the case, civil party’s anger, age, procedural status (plaintiff or defendant), satisfaction with the organization of the proceedings. The second part of the study revealed that the average judicial behavior compliance with procedural fairness requirements of neutrality, ethicality and voice exceeded 70 percent. Judicial behavior compliance with requirements of procedural fairness is related to their sex and with the regulation of the criteria situations, used to analyzed judge's behavior, in the Code of Civil Procedure of Republic of Lithuania. |
