This book examines how judicial reform can be effectively assessed through a procedural justice approach. It provides a practical framework for assessment of judicial reform, examining a successful reform in Chile through large scale surveys and longitudinal research.

Judicial reform is a key element to democratization and modernization processes in the developing world. Practitioners have struggled with ways to analyze the effects of judicial reform, and to define success. Procedural justice theorists propose that people will obey the law if they consider it fair; this affects willingness to collaborate with the police and the courts, and the general approach that the public has towards social regulations. Judicial reforms such as criminal procedure reforms, which explicitly guarantee the development of a fairer judicial process, represent a scenario that puts these theoretical assumptions to the test.  With policy recommendations and applications for international judicial reform, this book tests the real conditions of a procedural justice approach with empirical assessment and analysis.

With implications for Latin America and countries undergoing judicial or political reforms worldwide, this book will be an important resource for researchers, policy makers and all those interested in the analysis of judicial reforms, democratization processes and the psychology of justice.

Preface

Chapter 1: Introduction
Chapter 2: An Overview of Judicial Reform in Latin America
Chapter 3: The Analysis of Trust and Criminal Justice: Between Legitimacy and Order
Chapter 4: The Analysis of Attitudinal Information in Crime Surveys
Chapter 5: The Assessment of a Judicial Reform Through Public Opinion: Theoretical and Methodological Issues
Chapter 6: An Overview of the Effects of Chilean Criminal Procedure Reform
Chapter 7: Trust in the Criminal Justice System and Judicial Reform: A Pseudo-Panel Analysis
Chapter 8: The Effects of Judicial Reform on Confidence and Trust in the Courts
Chapter 9: The Effects of Judicial Reform on Confidence in Policing
Chapter 10: Confidence in Policing and Crime Report in Chile
Conclusions.