Made2Measure

My last blog noted three promising international models of justice system performance measurement and management: (1) the EU Justice Scoreboard, (2) the Global Measures of Court Performance, and (3) the CourTools. All three, more or less, aim for harmonization and consistent use of a common set of justice sector performance measures. There are, of course, differences among them, but it is their commonality that is potentially transformative for justice systems around the globe.

What distinguishes these three models from international global governance initiatives like theWorld Justice Project’s WJP Rule of Law Index™ and the American Bar Association’s Judicial Reform Index, as well as myriad program evaluations of justice and rule of law projects, is that they promote an approach to performance measurement and management that: is essentially a bottom-up instead of a top-down strategy grounded in the local ambitions of justice institutions and justice systems exercising their legitimate…

Three models of justice system performance measurement and management that have gained significant currency internationally over the last few years are:
·the recently launched European Commission’sEU Justice Scoreboardbased on the extensive work of the Council of Europe Commission for the Evaluation of the Efficiency of Justice (CEPEJ);
·the Global Measures for Court Excellence developed by the International Consortium for Court Excellence as part of its International Framework for Court Excellence; and,
·the National Center for State Courts' CourTools. All three of these models aim for consistent use by all countries and states or, in the case of the EU Justice Scoreboard, all EU member states; all three elevate to the status of core measures of performance a limited number of indicators (e.g., case clearance rate and on-time case processing) developed from data collected by the justice institutions and systems themselves, data that has been referred to somewhat pejoratively as “a…

Q: Adopting government-wide or justice sector-wide performance measurement and managementto make public service or justice service more efficient and effective is politically attractive, even if elected officials are drawn mostly by the symbolic values of the key success factors with which performance measures are aligned (e.g., legitimacy, fairness, and public trust and confidence in institutions).Successful leaders and managers are drawn to performance measurement because it informs uncertain decisions. Beyond such models as the European Commission’s EU Justice Scoreboard,the Global Measures for Court Excellencedeveloped by the International Consortium for Court Excellence as part of its International Framework for Court Excellence, and the National Center for State Courts' CourTools, and their attendant exhortations to adopt performance measurement and management, are there any compelling success stories of effective use?
A: Yes. Almost five years ago, I wrote here about the Mo…