Jury in Civil Procedure in the Context of Judicial Reform in Ukraine

The scientific article is devoted to the definition of directions of improvement of the jury trial in civil proceedings of Ukraine. It unveils the historical origins of formation of the jury trial as one of the important democratic institutions, which provides the possibility of direct participation of people in the administration of justice and is a civilized means of protecting civil society from judicial arbitrariness and corruption in the judiciary. Two models of jury trial are described: the Anglo-Saxon and the continental. The existing scientific controversy on the expediency of the functioning of the jury in civil proceedings and the effectiveness of some, including complex, civil cases with the participation of the jury are described. It is argued that the reasons for the inefficiency of the jury trial in Ukraine are the non-transparent system of forming the jury lists, the lack of state funding for the jury trial, public misunderstanding of the benefits of the jury trial, and thus the non-acceptance of the jury by the vast majority of citizens and their evasion of the duties of jurors. It is concluded that it is inexpedient to preserve the jury trial in civil proceedings in its current form, as this will only harm the tasks of civil proceedings. The authors propose the ways to improve the model of the jury trial in civil proceedings in Ukraine, in particular, by building a transparent system for forming a list of jurors as a result of outreach work among the population and decent pay for jurors.

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