Citizens do not measure Justice by the announced reforms. He measures it by response time, the clarity of decisions and, most importantly, the system’s ability to deliver on what it promises. It is on this concrete, everyday and verifiable level that Justice is legitimized or weakened. Not in terms of political discourse, even populist or pamphleteering, because time unmasks everything. Not in the rhetoric of successive reforms. Not under the illusion that each legislative change solves, by itself, problems that are much deeper.
For years, we have become accustomed to looking at Justice mainly through the prism of slowness. And with good reason. Justice that arrives late compromises effective judicial protection, erodes rights, worsens inequalities and erodes citizens’ trust in institutions. But today it would be a mistake to persist in an incomplete reading. Alongside the slowness, a risk of the opposite sign was installed: the pressure of statistics, productivity indicators and the need to decide quickly, often too quickly.
The demand for speed is legitimate. What is no longer legitimate is to transform speed into an absolute criterion, disconnected from the quality of the decision and respect for procedural guarantees. When Justice begins to live under the rule of numbers, there is a risk of confusing good administration of Justice with “zeroing” the procedural pendency. It is decided to close numbers. Make a decision to achieve goals. It is decided to improve indicators. And, in this movement, the essential thing can be lost: the time for consideration that a conscientious judicial decision necessarily requires.
Judging is not a mechanical act of management. Judging is listening, analyzing, interpreting, valuing and, above all, pondering. Judging means guaranteeing the parties the effective exercise of adversarial proceedings and full respect for defense guarantees. Judging is refusing the temptation of a hasty response when the case requires reflection. A good judicial decision is not the one that comes out first. It is one that, being delivered in a timely manner, results from a true effort to understand the dispute and from serious, intelligible and fair reasoning.
This is why reforming Justice is not legislating about Justice. Reforming Justice means ensuring that courts have people, organization, rational work routines, functional technological means and effective leadership. It is to ensure that magistrates, court officials, lawyers and all procedural actors work in a system that does not push them towards exhaustion, automation or defensive and hasty decisions. A court without adequate conditions cannot become more efficient by the mere imposition of numbers and statistics: the pressure on judges to decide in a hurry is simply disastrous and will irremediably affect the confidence of users of justice. Even with the ignoble applause of statistical fanatic bureaucrats. Easy fanaticism for those who, at the moment, are not being judged.
The same goes for digital modernization. Technology is essential, but it is only valuable if it improves the quality of the judicial response. It is not enough to computerize procedures, multiply platforms or announce investments. The relevant criterion is another: whether all this reduces useless acts, improves the circulation of information, simplifies the functioning of the courts and creates better conditions for making good decisions. Digitizing cannot mean accelerating blindly, but organizing intelligently.
Justice cannot be a prisoner of either slowness or haste. Both are harmful. The late decision fails because it arrives after time. A hasty decision fails because it arrives without the necessary time for enlightened and conscious consideration. And a Rule of Law is not measured by the speed with which it closes processes, but by the seriousness with which it guarantees that each decision respects the rights of the parties, observes contradictions and expresses real consideration. The country does not need another cycle of justice reform. What it needs is a Justice that works without sacrificing its own essence.
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