New Challenges against the Judiciary in Romania

After a year 2018 dominated by conflicts between the President and the Government and marked by the adoption and entry into force of major changes of the judiciary legislation, the first part of 2019 brought new challenges to the rule of law in Romania, especially as regards the judiciary. All these changes aim at increasing the power of the executive over the prosecutorial part of the judiciary and at removing virtually all checks-and-balances in decision-making on the top prosecutorial offices.

Parité-Gesetz in Brandenburg – Kein Sieg für die Demokratie

Der brandenburgische Landtag hat nach einer kontroversen Diskussion mit den Stimmen der rot-roten Regierungskoalition und der Grünen am 31. Januar 2019 das erste Parité-Gesetz in Deutschland angenommen. Das Gesetz, das im Jahr 2020 (also erst nach der nächsten Parlamentswahl in Brandenburg) in Kraft treten soll, sieht im Wesentlichen paritätische Landeslisten vor. Die Entscheidung darüber, ob ein Mann oder eine Frau den ersten Listenplatz belegt, wird dabei den Parteien selbst überlassen. Die Kernregelung befindet sich in dem neugefassten Abs. 3 von § 25 des brandenburgischen Landeswahlgesetzes. Dieser wird neu gefasst und lautet nunmehr: «Frauen und Männer sollen gleichermaßen bei der Aufstellung ... continue reading

A Part of the Constitution Is Unconstitutional, the Slovak Constitutional Court has Ruled

The 30th of January 2019 will undoubtedly be remembered as a milestone day in the development of Slovak constitutional law, signaling the start of a new, second, stage of development. The first stage started on 1 September 1992 (the day of adoption of the Constitution of the Slovak Republic) and lasted until 30 January 2019. The second stage started with the Slovak Constitutional Court decision, of 30 January 2019, that an amendment to the Constitution is invalid for violating the material core of the Constitution.

The First Live-Broadcast Hearings of Candidates for Constitutional Judges in Slovakia: Five Lessons

In 2019, Slovakia selects nine out of thirteen constitutional court judges and the hearings of the candidates for the nominees for the vacant seats were publicly broadcast. The atmosphere of the hearings and the overall context of the 2019 appointment process, however, yield at least five, and not that optimistic, lessons.