NCJ Number
79948
Date Published
1980
Length
241 pages
Annotation
The organizational and procedural characteristics of ordinary courts are examined through a comparative review of legal evolution in several 'bourgeois' countries and all European socialist countries.
Abstract
The book surveys the differentiation among courts (i.e., separation of powers). It reviews the causes, organizational frameworks, limits and trends for courts in both 'bourgeois' and socialist countries and draws generalizations from efforts to achieve more unified administration of justice. Judicial reform is traced to the French revolution in Europe and to the early 19th century in the United States. Analysis of socialist court reform begins with the 1917 revolution in Russia. The author applies comparative methods in analyzing evidence of legal evolution in Eastern European countries, France, England, Germany and, occasionally, the United States. He discusses the institution of arbitration and the principles of differentiation between judicial bodies according to their spheres of the activity (i.e., special administrative courts, courts of competence, constitutional courts and national courts). The prevailing tendencies in the development of economic, labor, military, administrative penal, and social jurisdiction are also analyzed. Each chapter is divided into two parts, the first describing 'bourgeois' systems and the second describing socialist systems. Footnotes and an index are provided. (Publisher's summary modified)