this post was submitted on 15 Apr 2025
17 points (100.0% liked)

askchapo

22957 readers
202 users here now

Ask Hexbear is the place to ask and answer ~~thought-provoking~~ questions.

Rules:

  1. Posts must ask a question.

  2. If the question asked is serious, answer seriously.

  3. Questions where you want to learn more about socialism are allowed, but questions in bad faith are not.

  4. Try !feedback@hexbear.net if you're having questions about regarding moderation, site policy, the site itself, development, volunteering or the mod team.

founded 4 years ago
MODERATORS
 

Most AES countries use a bench trial system for criminal law, but this seems like possibly taking power away from the workers in important matters. What was the thought process behind using bench trials for criminal court in AES nations?

(For reference, a bench trial is where one or more judges/magistrates decide the outcome of a trial as opposed to a jury of people)

you are viewing a single comment's thread
view the rest of the comments
[โ€“] TraschcanOfIdeology@hexbear.net 6 points 6 days ago (1 children)

In my opinion: The role of a court is to uphold the law, interpreting the legal code or relevant cases in statutory or common law jurisdictions, respectively.

If the workers have had full power in drafting the legal code, so that it is purely proletariat in spirit and content, and the judges or magistrates have been appointed by the workers or their representatives, I believe it is better to have people less susceptible to manipulation tactics by counsel, or to be less aware of implicit biases that may lead to unjust outcomes.

If the law is just, bench trials would lead to fairer results than jury trials, in my very uninformed opinion.

[โ€“] spectre@hexbear.net 4 points 6 days ago

Not sure if I agree or disagree but it's a reasonable take. One would hope that judges would have a deeper training in things like biases and the law itself, of course. Tossing a bunch of random into the middle of the process can gum it up in that way. I thought that the post above in this thread where in China the jury are "finders of fact" was an interesting compromise.