Networks, Dialogue or One-Way Traffic? An Empirical Analysis of Cross-Citations Between Ten of Europe’s Highest Courts

Abstract

Today judges are said to 'see each other not only as servants and representatives of a particular polity, but also as fellow professionals in an endeavour that transcends national borders' (A.M. Slaughter). This statement was made in the context of transnational litigation but it may also reflect a more general trend. Interaction may take place in various forms. There is some direct transnational cooperation between judges, but it can also be seen as a form of influence when a particular court is frequently cited by its foreign counterparts. In this article, which is part of a wider research project, we present our findings on cross-citations between ten of Europe's highest courts. We considered 636,172 decisions and found 1,430 cross-citations between 2000 and 2007. The first section of the article summarises the data considered and the search methodology used. The next two sections present different ways of visualising these data: on the one hand three types of bar charts, and on the other hand two network presentations of the cross-citations between the ten courts. Subsequently, we examine the relationship between incoming and outgoing citations, in particular whether some of our countries may be regarded as 'the core' and the others as 'the periphery'.