시니어판사 제도에 관한 연구 = A Research on Senior Judge Program

다국어 초록 (Multilingual Abstract)

The senior judge program of the United States has played an important role in preventing its judicial system from being overburdened as well as providing high-quality judicial service to the public. Originally aimed at Article III judges with life tenure, the senior judge program has been developed in order to minimize the drawbacks from life-tenure judgeships and to drive the federal judges to retire honorably. It turned out that the program has not only accomplished the purposes it had set out with, but has also enhanced the effectiveness and stability of the courts. Therefore, the senior judge program has been extended later to non-Article III judges, and state court judges throughout the U.S.. At the present time, senior judgeship has been adopted by many countries including Canada, UK, Singapore, Hong Kong SAR and Taiwan. On the other hand, Germany, the Netherlands, Spain and Japan have set up similar programs like part-time judgeships for enhancing the efficiency of the court.  In South Korea, in consequence of the fundamental transformation in judicial selection process, it is highly anticipated that the court will begin to fall short of judges from the near future. In order to mitigate the operational risk resulting from the shortage of judges, senior judge program should be introduced for securing the effectiveness and stability of the courts. Moreover, the senior judgeship could be utilized as a countermeasure against the decade-long criticism on the quality and fairness of the judicial function by enhancing judicial independence and its performance.