Off Campus for SP0053762 Collaborative Research: Transparency and the Rule of Law: A Field Experiment in Ukraine

This project employs a large-scale field experiment to examine a novel, bottom-up approach to improving judicial transparency and building the rule of law: the videotaping of court hearings. Working in collaboration with an Ukrainian non-governmental organization, Open Courts, we will examine whether increased transparency in the form of independent monitoring of court hearings can improve key aspects of the rule of law, such as judges’ adherence to procedural rules and lawyers’ perceptions of the judiciary’s fairness and independence. Building on a pilot study conducted in the Ukrainian capital of Kyiv during September-December 2018, the field experiment will ultimately collect data on approximately 2000 hearings from five Ukrainian cities. The project will result in a novel data set consisting of survey and administrative data, rigorous evaluation of transparency measures’ effectiveness, and analysis of the Ukrainian judiciary from the firsthand perspective of defense lawyers.