Vetting as a Tool for Strengthening Judicial Integrity in the OSCE Region

Vetting procedures have gained momentum in Third Wave Democracies as a tool for rebuilding state capacity post-crisis or during regime shifts within the transitional justice framework. Vetting procedures are present in contemporary legal realities, but the discourse around them remains mainly in the transitional justice setting. This chapter’s central claims are that the aims and rationales of vetting procedures have changed considerably over time; unlike in the transitional justice framework, where the political and moral criteria for judicial assessment matter, contemporary vetting focuses on boosting judicial integrity to strengthen the rule of law. Secondly, there is a need for a novel lens on vetting to strengthen judicial integrity. Thirdly, a distinct framework should, on the one hand, observe the international standards of judicial independence and the rule of law and, on the other, account for the specificities of the local contexts in which vetting is applied. Finally, a short overview of the Serbian vetting saga shows that vetting as a strengthening tool may have detrimental outcomes, even when guided by presumably laudable intentions.