Suzanne Le Mire, University of Adelaide (Australia) (Moderator); Gabrielle Appleby, University of New South Wales (Australia); Adam Dodek, University of Ottawa (Canada); Richard Devlin, Schulich School of Law Dalhousie University (Canada); Sarah Cravens, The University of Akron School of Law (US); Andrew Lynch, UNSW Law (Australia); Alysia Blackham, Melbourne Law School (Australia); and Graham Gee, University of Birmingham (UK)

Integrity in Judicial Ethics and Regulation 

Conveners: Gabrielle Appleby (UNSW) and Suzanne Le Mire (Adelaide)

Sponsored by: The Judiciary Project (Gilbert + Tobin Centre of Public Law, UNSW)

Integrity in Judicial Ethics and Regulation will bring together leading experts on judicial ethics to debate the conceptual bases for judicial regulation and explore contemporary issues and developments, with a focus on judicial appointment, support and discipline. The program will commence with Richard Devlin and Adam Dodek presenting their conceptual framework for designing and assessing judicial regimes, which offers an alternative to the traditional paradigm in which independence and integrity are presented as inherently conflicted objectives. The program will then move to discussion of contemporary issues in judicial regulation in a number of jurisdictions. Graham Gee will assess the regulation of judicial appointments by reference to the work of the UK judicial appointments commission ten years after its introduction. Sarah Cravens will explore public confidence as a major driver of regulatory efforts in the electoral context that continues to see challenges in terms of pressure for money and speech to flow as freely on the judicial side as they do in campaigns for representative political office. The final two papers will consider how judges in office can be supported in their roles. Andrew Lynch will consider the institutional challenges arising from cases of judicial incapacity, including the difficulty of providing appropriate support for and regulation of judges confronted with physical and mental illness. Gabrielle Appleby and Suzanne Le Mire will examine the possibilities of judicial guidance through education and counseling services by reference to the judicial ethics advisory boards operating in the United States. Appleby and Alysia Blackham conclude the panel with a paper that investigates the extent to which misconduct and disciplining regimes should extend to judges post-retirement, and the role that soft law instruments should play in regulating retired judges.

Richard Devlin and Adam Dodek: A New Framework for Conceiving and Assessing Judicial Integrity

Graham Gee: Formalizing Judicial Appointments: Lessons from the Judicial Appointments Commission

Sarah Cravens: The Enduring Importance of Public Confidence in the Regulation of Judicial Ethics: The Current Electoral Context in the U.S.

Andrew Lynch: The Challenges of Judicial Incapacity

Gabrielle Appleby and Suzanne Le Mire: The Possibilities of Judicial Guidance and Counseling

Gabrielle Appleby and Alysia Blackham: Retiring in the Shadow of the Court: Ethical and Legal Restrictions on Retired Judges

View other papers and programs within this theme.