Browsing by Author "Hakala, Enna"

The thesis examines the initiatives and opinions of the Supreme Administrative Court (the SAC) and the Supreme Court (the SC) between 2000 and 2021. The SAC and the SC can propose initiatives to the Government according to section 99 of the Constitution. Since the courts’ duties extend beyond judicial power, this can be seen as an exception to the separation of powers doctrine. Between 2000 and 2021, the SC has proposed six initiatives and the SAC nine. Also, the highest courts give opinions to the Government on legislative issues and participate this way in law drafting. The thesis concentrates on all initiatives, four opinions of SAC and tries to form an overview of the opinions of the SC. There are no studies regarding the initiatives and opinions of the SC, and this is also the first time when the initiatives and opinions of both courts are examined together. The framework is socio-legal, and the method used is qualitative document analysis. The main part of the research material is collected from the SC and the SAC archives. Three questions are answered: 1. Why have the highest courts exercised their rights moderately in initiatives? 2. What are the causes and objectives in the initiatives and opinions, and what kind of argumentation did the courts bring up? 3. Do initiatives and opinions reveal something about the role of the courts in relation to Parliament and the Government? The main finding is that initiatives and opinions are a way to secure independence. The main cause in initiatives for the SAC was an increase in appeals, which led to insufficient human resources. For the SC, the main cause was the need to manage core tasks. Overall, managing core tasks can be found in causes, objectives and arguments, and we can say the initiatives are practical - the courts try to fulfil their role. The SAC uses initiatives to get sufficient resources to secure its operations. The SAC has given 361 opinions, over four times more than the Supreme Court. Opinions are not only answers to government proposals, and the courts defend their position and independence in those, especially the SAC. Giving opinions is a regular practice in Europe and several countries have mechanisms to provide input during the drafting of legislation. However, the Finnish statutory right for initiatives and opinions is unusual since only Croatia, Finland and Slovenia have it. Both courts see the right for initiatives as important but also an exception to the separation of powers. The thesis finds that initiatives are the last resort, which reduces the need to use them. Lastly, a model for re-thinking the independence of the courts is presented, which does not see the initiatives andopinions as exceptions.