How to do a good job in trial management

First, the definition of trial management

Trial management means that the people's court arranges the trial work reasonably, strictly regulates the trial process, scientifically evaluates the trial quality and effect, effectively integrates judicial resources, and ensures fairness, honesty and efficiency through methods such as organization, leadership, guidance, evaluation, supervision and restriction. ①

Trial management is not only a management activity, but also a management means. Viewed separately, trial management is a management activity, aiming at ensuring fairness, honesty and efficiency. Bringing trial management into the whole court system trial management is a management method of the court party group, that is, by organizing, directing, coordinating and controlling the trial business, managing the court talent team, integrating judicial resources, realizing judicial justice, honesty and efficiency, and enhancing judicial credibility. At this level, the party group of the Academy is the decision-maker, commander and policy-maker of trial management, and the trial management office is the concrete executor, coordinator and supervisor. The management objects are trial work, judicial process, trial quality and judicial resources. The operator of the management object in the specific trial work is the case-handling personnel, which can also be said to be the executor in the execution activities of trial management. At the same time, the case handlers are also the managers of trial management, and they determine the progress and quality of the case. Therefore, trial management is carried out by monitoring the trial process, case quality evaluation, trial node prompts and other activities.

Second, the challenges faced by trial management under the current situation

(1) Economic and Social Factors The 18th National Congress of the Communist Party of China put forward the grand goal of building a well-off society in an all-round way by 2020. In the next few years, the underdeveloped areas in the west will quickly set off an upsurge of large-scale development, large-scale construction and large-scale development, enter the "fast lane" of economic and social backwardness and catch up, and social contradictions will also increase. Under such a realistic background, how should the people's courts play their functions and meet the people's new demands and expectations for justice? As a national judicial organ, it must give full play to its functions, strive to promote judicial justice, openness, efficiency and honesty, and earnestly shoulder the historical responsibility of escorting economic and social development by leaps and bounds.

Decline in judicial credibility

The lack of judicial credibility cannot bear the authority and effectiveness of legal relief, and it is difficult to produce the image of legal justice and social justice. Credibility is the inherent logical requirement of justice and the guarantee of vitality. Nowadays, the injustice of judicial cases leads people to question the judicial credibility. Some people don't believe in the law in letters and visits, and something happened. Their first thought is not to protect themselves with legal weapons, but to find leaders and superiors. According to the statistics of the State Bureau for Letters and Calls in recent years, among all kinds of letters and visits, "complaint letters and visits" account for the largest proportion, and law-related letters and visits account for more than 30% of the "complaint letters and visits". These data fully reflect the serious problem of lack of judicial credibility.

(3) New expectations and requirements for the administration of justice.

On the one hand, although most people's legal awareness is gradually increasing, there are also many litigants who know little about the law, which requires the investigators to know not only what it is but also why it is, not only the departmental law, but also the whole legal system to convince the parties. Otherwise, it will aggravate the people's distrust of the judiciary, and then put forward higher requirements for the comprehensive quality and judicial ability of judges than before. On the other hand, with the advent of the information age, the role of news media in public opinion propaganda and supervision of case trials has been significantly enhanced, and the people's demands for judicial openness and transparency have become more urgent and intense, paying more attention to the case process and trial results, and generating new expectations for trial work.

Based on the above analysis, it is of great significance to do a good job in court trial management in the new period and situation.

Three. Problems in trial management

Tongren city is located in an underdeveloped area in the west, and the trial management started late. The trial management office of the two-level courts in our city was formally established only 20 1 1 (up to now, some grass-roots courts still do not have independent trial management offices), and the trial management experience is insufficient and the foundation is weak. Some veteran comrades and some business departments do not understand the trial management work, and there are contradictions and exclusions, and they do not cooperate with the trial management work. Therefore, we are still in the initial stage of this work. However, judging from the practice of trial management in recent two years, the trial management in our city has achieved remarkable results since its launch. Through the implementation of trial management, the enthusiasm and initiative of police officers have been mobilized, and the cohesion has been enhanced, so that police officers can focus their work on law enforcement and case handling. Through quality and efficiency assessment, case quality assessment and trial limit process tracking, the competitive situation of trial business has been formed. The investigators' grasp of the trial limit node has been enhanced, the level of handling cases has been greatly improved, the quality of cases has been guaranteed, the judicial credibility has been strengthened, and some cases that have been delayed for a long time have been effectively and thoroughly solved. Nevertheless, there are still some problems in trial management. This paper analyzes the problems existing in the implementation of trial management:

(A) putting the cart before the horse, relying on management tools for management.

To a great extent, the mediation rate and the withdrawal rate can reflect the indicators of people's courts to resolve contradictions among the people, achieve case reconciliation and achieve good social effects. Through index monitoring, it is found that the mediation rate and withdrawal rate of some grass-roots courts are as high as 80%, which fully proves that the people's courts are solid and effective in resolving social contradictions. At the same time, the implementation rate of cases settled through mediation in some courts exceeded 20%. In the specific operation process, some case handlers get extra points in the assessment in order to achieve a high mediation rate, and on the other hand, mediation is not as troublesome and risky as writing a judgment. Based on the above two reasons, the case handlers will try their best to facilitate the parties to reach a mediation agreement. For example, in order to close the case as soon as possible, one party, especially the plaintiff, sometimes has to sacrifice some interests against his true will and reach a mediation agreement; The "back-to-back" mediation method often adopted by judges also exposes some disadvantages. This method will lose the neutrality of judges. Judges often transmit asymmetric information to both parties in the process of mediation. Because many parties have no professional legal knowledge and have no clear understanding of the legal consequences of not accepting mediation, they accepted mediation in a muddled way, and later found that they could actually get more compensation and could not go back on their word. This will easily lead to new contradictions and damage the judicial credibility. The above situation shows that a considerable number of cases closed by mediation have not achieved real reconciliation, but have been closed because of one-sided pursuit of high mediation rate and high withdrawal rate. Take the mediation rate and the withdrawal rate as the goal rather than the management means. Similarly, other indicators also have different degrees of data-only theory and index-only theory of index alienation.

(2) Some investigators have contradictions.

Individual case handlers lack understanding of trial management and are critical of trial management. Some judges think that some people in the trial management office are not proficient in their own business and their level is not high, so they are not qualified to "dictate" the cases in the business court, so there are objections. Individual case handlers who were found to have file quality problems avoided talking about the problems, repeatedly quibbled, denied the problems found and refused to rectify them.

Judicial ability needs to be improved.

First, the judge's procedural awareness is not strong, and his ability to handle cases needs to be improved. Some divorce cases directly skip the mediation pre-procedure; Some cases declared missing were declared without investigation and verification of the registered residence of the person declared missing; Some documents contain all copies of the evidence, but no originals.

Second, the ability of audit management personnel needs to be improved. The staff of the trial management office are mostly old judges who have experience in handling cases but have not engaged in specific trial business for a long time and new young staff who have no trial experience. This combination of the old and the young will lead to the elderly who are experienced but have not updated their legal knowledge in time, or who have been engaged in the trial business of a certain department for a long time but are not familiar with other jobs, or who are not familiar with some new management methods because of their age, such as the operation of the online case handling system. Young employees are knowledgeable and can use some new office systems for statistical analysis, but they lack corresponding work experience. This also makes people in some business departments look down on people in the audit management office, so they don't take the audit management office seriously.

(D) Some staff of the Audit Management Office have insufficient ideological understanding and a weak sense of responsibility.

Some comrades think that the audit management office is a leisure department for the elderly, and whether the case is handled well has nothing to do with themselves, but is a business court matter, so you don't have to bear the risks yourself. The job of judging is just to cope with it, and we don't want to exercise the power of trial management too much, thinking that it will offend people, and it is better to do more than one thing. For example, the quality evaluation reports of some cases are the same, because the problems found in the evaluation of each case file are basically the same, for example, the receipt of service is incomplete, there are typos in the judgment documents, and the parties have not indicated their fingerprints. Therefore, some examiners either read a few files casually, or simply don't read them, and write a few common questions in the case quality evaluation report to deal with them. Even once, the files being evaluated were obviously fingerprints, but they still wrote in the case quality evaluation report that there were no fingerprints.

Fourth, the reason analysis

(A) the index setting is not reasonable enough

Trial management will inevitably involve data and indicators, which is a necessary means. Because there is no obvious boundary between the means and the purpose, it is very easy to regard the means as the purpose in the actual pursuit of indicators. The reason for the high mediation rate, high withdrawal rate and high execution rate of mediation cases is the excessive pursuit of this index. In order to improve the withdrawal rate, the case handlers may adopt various methods to achieve their goals by combining soft and hard measures. The mediation rate is high, but the purpose of mediation is not achieved. The reason for excessively pursuing the values of the withdrawal rate and the mediation rate is that the index setting is unscientific, and there is no upper limit for this index, which will lead the case handlers to pursue high indicators, thus leading to the alienation of indicators, which runs counter to the original intention of setting this index. Therefore, in order to solve the problem of putting the cart before the horse in data theory, reasonable upper and lower bounds should be set for each index according to the specific situation of each court or a regional court system.

(2) Lack of supervision due to lack of rewards and punishments.

For the problems found by the audit office, the relevant departments and personnel just don't rectify, and most of the problems found by the assessment are similar. The fundamental reason for not commenting and not changing is that it is not linked to rewards and punishments and has not established relevant incentive and restraint mechanisms. As a result, the investigators still go their own way, the mistakes still exist, the case quality evaluation is ineffective, and the trial management goal cannot be achieved.

(C) weak cultural soft power

The most important reason for the problem of file quality is that the ability to handle cases needs to be improved. The low ability to handle cases is not only manifested in the overall level, but also in the personal ability. Some investigators have work experience, but their theoretical foundation is not strong; Some investigators have rich theories, but lack practical experience. The talent team of the court is polarized, which is either an old judge in his 40 s with experience in handling cases or a college graduate with education but no experience under the age of 30. This phenomenon is very serious. The uneven ability of the talent team leads to the uneven quality of talents and the overall lack of judicial ability. The lack of cultural soft power is one of the reasons why the court's external judicial ability is insufficient.

(d) Need to strengthen the leadership's care and support for trial management.

In some courts, the trial management office is managed by the vice president instead of the top leader, and the level of the trial management office is the same as that of other courts. Even some presidents of commercial courts serve as members of the judicial committee at the same time, which is higher than the director of the judicial management office. In addition, individual business courts have long regarded themselves as experts in trial business, and they simply look down on the people in the trial management office. As a result, the trial management is ineffective. When evaluating the quality of a case, individual evaluators are afraid of offending people, afraid to look for mistakes seriously, with incorrect attitudes, careless evaluation, perfunctory work, finding some fur and flaws, and even finding out some problems that do not exist at all. There are some shortcomings in their own ideological understanding, and they are afraid of offending their colleagues because of their serious work, but they can't get the support and trust of their leaders, so they try to protect themselves and prevaricate.

Verb (abbreviation of verb) Countermeasures and suggestions

(A) set up a reasonable index system to achieve scientific management

Any management must follow certain laws, and trial management is no exception. The trial work has its particularity, and the trial management must be carried out on the premise of not violating the trial law. The application of quantitative analysis as a management method of trial management has opened a precedent for scientific management in the history of court management. The transformation of the efficiency of trial business from a single qualitative analysis to the use of data is a great progress in court management. Quantitative analysis makes all the work results displayed through data, which is more objective and fair. However, we should also see that relying too much on quantitative analysis will also bring some disadvantages. Quantitative analysis is only a means, and excessive use of quantitative analysis will only lead to putting the cart before the horse. Quantitative analysis is mainly applicable to the calculation of some natural science fields and the increase or decrease of economic benefits. Because the data itself is an objective and neutral thing, which is calculated by people. How to calculate and how to use it in trial management is also manipulated by people, and it is easy to cheat. However, the trial work of the court is a mass work and a practical work involving fairness and justice. The realization of fairness and justice is that the data itself cannot be fully measured and fully perceived. Justice and efficiency, social effect, legal effect and political effect cannot be measured by simple addition, subtraction, multiplication and division. Of course, indicators and data can evaluate the quality of trial work to a certain extent, but they are not the only means. Therefore, in the trial management activities, we should adopt the method of combining quantitative analysis and qualitative analysis, and manage each index more flexibly according to the actual situation in different places, and set the upper and lower limits at the same time, and try our best to make the upper and lower limits of the index wider according to different situations. On the basis of indicators, the focus of trial management is the effect of justice for the people. For example, some grass-roots courts have narrow jurisdiction, small population and small number of cases, but the institutions of the courts are indispensable. Then, the average number of cases closed by the court and the average number of cases closed should be reduced appropriately, otherwise it is naturally unfair. The courts should be authorized to adjust the corresponding indicators and indicator intervals according to their own different situations. For example, the cases of the First People's Court and the Second People's Court in grass-roots courts are generally more important and complicated than those sent to the courts, and the mediation rate of cases is generally lower than those sent to the courts. Therefore, it is necessary to set the upper and lower limits of the indicators between the various departments of the court according to different situations, and set the withdrawal rate index of the organs and civil courts to be lower than that of the people's courts, so as to be scientific and reasonable.

(b) Introduce a monitoring mechanism to establish a balance of rights.

Power without supervision and restriction will lead to corruption and dictatorship. Shen Deyong, vice president of the Supreme People's Court, put forward: "Trial management is to standardize, guide, promote and serve trials." It can be said that taking trial management as one of the three major management of the court itself is to introduce the supervision function into the court management activities. In the trial management activities, we should also introduce a supervision system to avoid excessive concentration of rights and lack of supervision, which will lead to rent-seeking and even corruption.

The first is to introduce a reconsideration procedure. For cases that are found to have problems through evaluation, the case handlers are given 3-5 days to raise objections. If there is any objection, the auditee will file an objection application and explain the reasons, and then an evaluation team will be formed by the evaluators to discuss whether the evaluation question is objective and true in combination with the objection application and give an answer. If the audited entity refuses to accept the opinions of the evaluation team, it may apply to the judicial committee, which will make the final decision. If there is no objection or the objection period expires, it will be notified, and the relevant personnel must make rectification. The notification result will be used as the basis for the year-end assessment.

The second is the separation of evaluation and rectification. Evaluation and rectification are operated by two different groups of personnel, which forms the internal power supervision and restriction of trial management, avoids excessive concentration of power, facilitates the discovery of problems that cannot be found in evaluation, and avoids sharp contradictions and excessive concentration on a specific evaluator.

(3) Establish a reward and punishment system to change passive acceptance into active behavior.

A reward and punishment system shall be implemented for the problems that the evaluator is not enthusiastic and slack, and the problems that the evaluator does not rectify and evade. When there is no problem in the case assessed by the assessed personnel, the effect and quality of handling the case will be rewarded. On the contrary, those who do not actively rectify the problems found in the evaluation should be punished. "There must be a brave man under the four rewards." Management should regulate people's behavior through interest distribution. By introducing a reasonable reward and punishment mechanism, according to people's nature of seeking advantages and avoiding disadvantages, the managed person will naturally become passive and active, forming a good situation of chasing after each other. If there is no corresponding reward and punishment system and measures, the trial management will be pale and powerless.

(four) focus on serving the trial and implement humanized management.

We must adhere to the concept of serving the trial, and in the process of implementing trial management, we must manage it in place and not offside, and we must not interfere with the judge's judicial power in the name of management; We should respect the law of trial and give full consideration to the characteristics of trial work. We should not only standardize the judicial behavior of judges through management, but also respect the rights of judges in management and fully mobilize their enthusiasm and initiative. The content of trial management is relatively extensive, including both traditional trial management content and modern management means such as information construction, including both macro-control and micro-guidance; In the work of system design, system implementation and scientific and technological means to realize management, various resources needed for management have been effectively mobilized and integrated. Figuratively speaking, the staff of the Audit Bureau are statisticians, analysts, forecasters, commentators, supervisors and waiters. The power of trial management comes from the authorization of the party group and the trial Committee. As the functional department of macro-management of court trial work, the trial management office should closely focus on the work center determined by the party group, take strengthening management and improving the quality and efficiency of trials as the main line, constantly innovate management, make suggestions for the party group to establish a scientific and efficient operation mechanism that conforms to the law of trial work, and provide decision-making reference; In the pattern of court trial management, the audit office is the staff and assistant of the audit Committee and the president, and it is the connecting link between the preceding and the following. It is a comprehensive trial business department of the court specializing in trial management; Therefore, it is necessary to give full play to the coordination and communication role of the audit management office, so that the trial work of various departments can form a joint force. The Audit Bureau should provide an objective, scientific and reasonable basis for the personnel department to carry out trial performance appraisal and human resource allocation, cooperate with the judicial and government departments to do a good job in information construction and material resource allocation, and promote the overall improvement of the court management level.

(five) to formulate unified and standardized operating rules for the trial process of cases.

In order to solve the problems of ineffective rectification and dissatisfaction of the people being evaluated in the process of case quality evaluation, in order to reduce the contradictions caused by different standards, make management supervision more rule-based, evidence-based, clear trial management objectives, accurate implementation, simple and clear operation, and realize scientific trial management, unified and standardized operation rules of case trial process can be formulated. Including specific operating methods and operating standards. For example: document binding, according to different situations, what is the binding order. How to typeset, font, line spacing, and how to deal with special situations. Many procedures, forms and other operational processes are established in a specific unified written form.

(six) to strengthen learning, enhance ability, and promote the construction of judicial credibility.

Faced with the decline of judicial credibility and the people's new expectations of judicial justice, we must fundamentally improve judicial credibility and meet the people's growing new expectations. We must fundamentally improve judicial ability, standardize judicial behavior, and promote judicial openness. Pay attention to the cultivation of judicial practice and judicial ability of young and middle-aged police officers, and strengthen the study and further study of the theoretical level of middle-aged police officers. The case-handling personnel will communicate with the personnel who carry out trial management on a regular basis to avoid the situation that the case-handling personnel do not understand trial management or the personnel who carry out trial management do not understand trial business. Attach great importance to learning and establish overall awareness and overall concept. Trial management should not only understand politics, but also understand business; We should strengthen the study of Scientific Outlook on Development and Socialism with Chinese characteristics's theory of rule of law, thoroughly understand the spirit of the Central Political and Legal Work Conference and the instructions of the people's courts at higher levels, and profoundly grasp the current work mission and direction of the people's courts. We should also strengthen the study of trial business, especially some newly promulgated laws, regulations and judicial interpretations, and constantly update our knowledge. Enrich outstanding personnel with rich trial experience, familiarity with trial work, strong management ability, fairness and integrity to trial management posts. Only through standardized management and high-quality service can we create excellent judicial "products" to repay the people's concern and expectation and further improve the judicial credibility of the people's courts.