Conference Agenda

The integration of video hearings into judicial systems represents a fundamental shift in the administration of justice. While initially driven by necessity during the COVID-19 pandemic, the continued use of video hearings has raised critical questions about their implications for legal proceedings, stakeholder expectations, and international best practices.

This contribution offers an overview of the ongoing discourse on the digital transformation of justice and emphasises the necessity of balancing technological innovation with procedural integrity to ensure fair, inclusive, and resilient judicial systems. It does this by looking into two different issues identified in my dissertation.

First this contribution explores the advancement from physical court proceedings up to video hearings, focusing on the changing legal expectations of participants in video hearings compared to physical hearings, the implications of video hearings on communication and perception resulting from the mediated transmission, as well as the legal prerequisites and the governance structures required for digital justice. Those developments highlighting the transition of societal and institutional expectations from physical hearings to video hearings.

Secondly this contribution will examine the non-legal expectations surrounding court hearings, the historical origins of these expectations, and their role in the legitimisation of judicial decisions. It investigates the challenges posed to these entrenched expectations and whether adhering to those expectation can effectively maintain essential judicial functions such as procedural fairness, public trust, and participant engagement. Or if there is a need to rethink those expectations in order to strengthen procedural fairness and inclusivity.

In conclusion this contribution invites further debate on how courts can meaningfully adapt to digital formats. By reflecting on underlying assumptions and evolving expectations, it aims to support a more deliberate and informed development of video hearings in practice.

A field trial at the Higher Regional Court of Cologne

For years, the public sector in Germany has been lagging behind in terms of digitization. In the judicial branch of government, this has led to a process of catching up notably driven by the federal legislator’s mandate to introduce electronic communication with the courts by 2018 and electronic files by 2026.

As a result, in a comparatively short period of time the judiciary was compelled to not only develop and implement the technical requirements, but also to redesign – in part centuries-old – workflows and to provide the staff with the necessary skills for this transition.

This process has had a major impact on the entire judicial system and has also put a considerable strain on the staff. On top of the considerable and, in some cases, already overburdening amount of regular work, employees had to acquire the necessary skills to be able to continue to do their work in a sufficiently efficient manner.

Even though the introduction of the new digital tools was of course accompanied by extensive training opportunities, there are still challenges remaining. The regular trainings are often time-consuming and thus eating away at the valuable time needed to complete the regular work, which discourages some employees from taking part. Even after completing the trainings, employees may find themselves lost in the daily grind and face difficulties in having their practical questions answered. The results can be, to name a few, inefficient workflows, an increased likelihood for mistakes and frustration that at worst may affect the staff’s health.

It is against this backdrop that at the Higher Regional Court of Cologne we have conceived a project to promote Digital Literacy. Complementing the existing training, the idea is to provide employees with low-threshold training opportunities that can be easily integrated into the staff’s daily work. There is a range of short formats such as e.g. short lectures, practical workshops, “consultation hours” and live tutorials offered in-house and catering to the particular practical needs of the employees. The objective is to fill existing gaps and, ultimately, to identify a curriculum of basic skills that need to be addressed to provide staff with all that is necessary to be able to work in a digital world.

The concept has been put into practice at the Higher Regional Court of Cologne since December 2024 and is still a work in progress as the idea was to provide these opportunities as quickly as possible. Using the experiences of the trainings as a feedback loop, the contents will be continuously adapted and expanded, also to other courts of the district of the Higher Regional Court of Cologne.

The digital transformation of the judiciary represents a critical step toward increasing efficiency, transparency, and accessibility in modern legal systems. In Switzerland, the national initiative Justitia 4.0 aims to develop a single Swiss justice portal for electronic communication among all judicial authorities. It aims to replace traditional paper files with fully electronic ones, and to move from postal delivery to secure electronic data exchange and online access to case files.

However, the implementation of this ambitious project reveals significant tensions rooted in the federal organization of the country. The contribution examines whether Swiss federalism hinders the digitalization of the justice system, and identifies key challenges and lessons learned from Justitia 4.0.

A central issue lies in the institutional autonomy of the cantons, which independently organize their judicial systems. This decentralised governance model leads to organisational heterogeneity, which complicates efforts to implement uniform digital standards. In addition, the cantons retain legislative competence in many areas relevant to the administration of justice, such as different administrative codes of procedure, further fragmenting the regulatory environment in which digital solutions must operate.

Beyond structural complexity, Justitia 4.0 has also exposed organizational and cultural barriers. Many judicial authorities lack experience in project management and have limited resources to allocate to these tasks. Nor are they used to agile, interdisciplinary working methods. In addition, communication gaps between legal and IT professionals, rooted in different professional languages and institutional cultures, can hinder collaboration and slow down progress. While these problems are not caused by federalism, they tend to be amplified by the fragmentation and multiplication of implementation teams across the country. The disparity in resources between smaller and larger cantons adds another layer of complexity.

Nevertheless, Justitia 4.0 also illustrates that federalism is not necessarily a barrier to innovation. The project underlines the importance of strong inter-cantonal cooperation, the sharing of know-how and the development of common technological standards and best practices. The analysis concludes that while federalism introduces complexity and fragmentation, with the right instruments and incentives it can also foster innovation, adaptability and acceptance in the digital transformation of justice.