TY - JOUR

T1 - Die Besetzung des Bundesverfassungsgerichts

T2 - Ein Spiegelbild gesellschaftlicher Präferenzen?

AU - Engst, Benjamin G.

AU - Gschwend, Thomas

AU - Sternberg, Sebastian

N1 - Funding Information: Wir danken Patricia Popelier, Nils Schaks, Daniel Stegmüller und den Teilnehmerinnen und Teilnehmern des Fakultätsseminars der Abteilung Rechtswissenschaft an der Universität Mannheim vom 1. März 2017, sowie den Teilnehmerinnen und Teilnehmern des Werkstattgesprächs des Law & Society Instituts an der Humboldt-Universität zu Berlin vom 23. Oktober 2018 für hilfreiche Kommentare. Wir sind ebenso dankbar für die Unterstützung durch das Team des German Internet Panels – insbesondere Annelies Bloom, Barbara Felderer, Franziska Gebhard, Jessica Herzing und Ulrich Krieger – ohne welches wir unser Experiment nicht hätten implementieren können. Des Weiteren danken wir Antje Wechsler für das Lektorat. Abschließend danken wir der Deutschen Forschungsgemeinschaft für die finanzielle Unterstützung der Projekte C4 und A8 am Sonderforschungsbereich 884 der Universität Mannheim, in deren Rahmen dieser Beitrag entstand.

PY - 2020/3

Y1 - 2020/3

N2 - Which candidates do the German public want to be judges of the Federal Constitutional Court? Constitutional courts require public support. This support is also the result of the legitimacy of the politically elected judges. We argue that political actors are able to define the (1) judicial and (2) political–ideological leaning of the court through (non-)institutionalized selection criteria. Candidates possess features from both dimensions. Using a discrete choice experiment, we identify the features that are preferred by the public. We show the role of a respondent’s partisan leaning in evaluating his/her candidate and compare the “ideal judge” with currently serving judges and candidates in relation to the election of Stephan Harbarth. The findings expand our understanding of the legitimacy of the courts.

AB - Which candidates do the German public want to be judges of the Federal Constitutional Court? Constitutional courts require public support. This support is also the result of the legitimacy of the politically elected judges. We argue that political actors are able to define the (1) judicial and (2) political–ideological leaning of the court through (non-)institutionalized selection criteria. Candidates possess features from both dimensions. Using a discrete choice experiment, we identify the features that are preferred by the public. We show the role of a respondent’s partisan leaning in evaluating his/her candidate and compare the “ideal judge” with currently serving judges and candidates in relation to the election of Stephan Harbarth. The findings expand our understanding of the legitimacy of the courts.

KW - Discrete choice experiment

KW - Federal Constitutional Court

KW - Judicial election

KW - Legitimacy

KW - Non-separable preferences

UR - http://www.scopus.com/inward/record.url?scp=85075995214&partnerID=8YFLogxK

U2 - 10.1007/s11615-019-00204-7

DO - 10.1007/s11615-019-00204-7

M3 - Artikel

VL - 61

SP - 39

EP - 60

JO - Politische Vierteljahresschrift

JF - Politische Vierteljahresschrift

SN - 0720-4809

IS - 1

ER -