Howlin on the Politics of the Nineteenth Century Irish Jury Trial

Niamb Howlin, Sutherland School of Law, University College Dublin, is publishing The Politics of Jury Trial in Nineteenth-Century Ireland in the 2015 volume of Comparative Legal History. Here is the abstract.

This article considers aspects of lay participation in the Irish justice system, focusing on some political dimensions of the trial jury in the nineteenth century. It then identifies some broad themes common to systems of lay participation generally, and particularly nineteenth-century European systems. These include perceptions of legitimacy, State involvement and interference with jury trials, and issues around representativeness. The traditional lack of scholarship in the area of comparative criminal justice history has meant that many of the commonalities between different jury systems have been hitherto unexplored. It is hoped that this paper will contribute to a wider discussion of the various commonalities and differences in the development of lay participation in justice systems.

Download the article from SSRN at the link.