The Politics of International Judicial Appointments: Evidence from the European Court of Human Rights

Abstract:     
Theories of government-international court relations assume that judges share an interest in expanding the reach of their court. Yet, casual observation suggests that international judges vary in their activist orientations and that governments are selective in selecting candidates. This paper explores a new dataset of dissents in the European Court of Human Rights (ECHR) to estimate the ideal points of judges. The results show that activism-restraint is indeed the main dimension of contestation among judges. Variation in judicial activism cannot be accounted for by different legal cultures of judges or by levels of domestic human rights observance in the judges' countries of origins. Instead, aspiring European Union (EU) members use activist judicial appointments to signal human rights commitments. Moreover, governments more favorably disposed towards European integration appoint more activist judges. These results imply that politics matters in the appointment of international judges and that EU expansion was an important driving force behind the ECHR's increased activism. More generally, the article suggests that agent selection is an important and understudied tool for influencing IOs.

Keywords: International courts, judges, European Court, human rights

Working Paper Series