Gender and judging: evidence from the European Court of human rights

Abstract

How does increasing the number of women on the bench affect the outcome of judicial proceedings? This article evaluates this question in the European Court of Human Rights using a new dataset that incorporates both the gender of judges and applicants to the Court. This allows us to examine whether female judges differentially evaluate human rights claimed filed by women. There are four main findings. First, women disproportionally file property rights claims, an issue that has received very little attention in the literature on gender and courts. Second, the analysis confirms findings from the U.S. context that female judges are more favorably disposed towards discrimination cases filed by women. Third, other than on discrimination issues, female judges are not more likely than male judges to support rights claims filed by women. Fourth, female judges are overall more likely to find violations, regardless of the gender of applicants. This is especially true on cases involving physical integrity rights violations, such as torture. This is consistent with earlier findings that women are on average less willing to compromise on physical integrity rights for security reasons.

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