The role of alternative dispute resolution (ADR) in the management of cases and disputes in Nigeria and across the globe cannot be overemphasized. The judicial arm of the government is the arm responsible for interpretation of laws in Nigeria and the judiciary’s role in preserving the rights of citizens across Nigeria also cannot be overemphasized. It ensures that the society is stable in the face of insta-bility and ensures that lawlessness is not maintained. The judiciary ensures that laws made by the legislature are obeyed by ensuring that those who violate the provisions of any established laws are punished. In doing all these, it has been established that the system of administering justice in our courts in Nigeria is extremely slow. Considering the foregoing, alternative dispute resolution as a means of settling disputes has been of tremendous help in easing the hardship of getting cases resolved through the court system. This paper examines ways through which alternative dispute resolution has assisted the Nigerian judicial system and the need to use alternative dispute resolution the more in order to ensure that number of cases handled by courts are drastically reduced. Recommendations are made at the end of the research.

The article is devoted to the study of the correct application of the evaluative concepts contained in the norms of the Convention for the Protection of Human Rights and Fundamental Freedoms. Attention is drawn to certain difficulties in the application of the evaluative norms in the Convention: despite their objective necessity and usefulness, they create a room for the law enforcement entity’s own discretion up to subjectivism in resolving specific cases; they serve as an objective obstacle to the unification of the case law of the ECtHR and this creates preconditions for unequal implementation of ECtHR judgments in the national legal order; they cause the risk of errors in the application of the provisions of the Convention by the competent authorities of the Contracting States. It is established that the application of legal norms containing evaluative concepts is challenging not only owing to the specific properties of the evaluative concepts themselves, but also due to the peculiarities of adjudication by the ECtHR when applying the evaluative norms. The relevant case law of the ECtHR as well as examples of national legislation are analysed in support of these theoretical conclusions. Since the lack of uniform application of the evaluative norms of the Convention causes divergent use of the ECtHR’s judgments in the domestic judicial system, it is advised to follow a number of rules for reasoning of decisions by the domestic court. These rules will serve as a certain guarantee against ambiguous implementation of ECtHR judgments at the national level.

The article concerns judicial integrity in its basic meaning, i.e. as the consistency of actions with beliefs. Firstly, a reconstruction of the role of a judge’s beliefs was undertaken on the basis of the philosophy law, which allowed for proving that at least on the grounds of the so-called third path theory, they are treated as essential. However, acknowledging their role raises questions about the danger of instrumentalising law by the judge and of instrumentalising the judge by the law. Ronald Dworkin’s philosophy which extensively refers to the concept of integrity was interpreted as a solution to the issue. Then, it was noted that this approach is too narrow, as it limits the possibility of including the judge’s beliefs in adjudication only when they meet the requirements of so-called appropriateness tests, and are therefore already included in the content of the legal order in some way. Furthermore, integrity in this sense does not cover the judge’s behaviours besides decision-making, the status of which increasingly requires a theoretical explanation and normative classification. In consequence, it was stated that the concept of integrity is connected with paradoxes. In spite of that, an attempt was made to design a more systematic approach to judicial integrity in adjudication and behaviour, which would lead to proving that it is something that should be cared about, and consequently, its behaviour should be made the object of normative and institutional solutions. At the same time, the concept of integrity seems to have more heuristic power than normative one.

The main purpose of the presented research project is to prepare an initiating answer to the present state of judicial integrity recognised as the top of legal professions and the legal system as such. The method comes mainly from the Oxford analytical jurisprudence, nevertheless, the historical and interdisciplinary approaches, as well as a legal practice, were taken seriously into consideration. The main theses and their scientific standpoints are: (i) at present, we are facing the disintegration of integrity; (ii) one of the sources of it lies in the very grounds of major jurisprudential terms, understood as parts of the Hartian internal point of view and that there are fundamental analytical paradoxes of integrity, generating practical dysfunctionalities; (iii) it is possible to solve main problems through a completely new approach: an ontological turn in the philosophy of law causing the idea of law as a concept and a new concept of integrity, namely ‘negative integrity’. It could be easily and effectively treated as practical support for firstly improving judicial integrity and secondly legal practice in general.

Fixed establishment (FE) is one of the institutions of the EU value added tax system; its structure is essential to correctly determine the right tax jurisdiction of an EU Member State for the purpose of VAT settlement in situations of cross-border provision of services. However, the legal structure of a FE adopted by the EU legislator (and, consequently, adapted to national legislation of the Member States) causes uncertainty when it comes to its interpretation. In the absence of unambiguously defined conditions in EU law to consider a specific presence and activity of an enterprise to be a FE, interpretation rules contained in judicial decisions
issued by the Court of Justice of the EU play an important role. Among attempts
made by the CJEU to clarify the ‘blur areas’ resulting from the dynamics of modern
business processes, one of the most interesting ones is the possibility of considering
a subsidiary to be a fixed establishment for a parent company. The purpose of this
paper is to analyse legal and economic factors, the fulfilment of which may constitute a condition for considering a subsidiary to be a fixed establishment for
a parent company, with particular emphasis on the ruling of the Court of Justice
of 7 May 2020 in the Dong Yang case (C-547/18).

This article seeks to identify the characteristic features of judicial cosmopolitanism and its product – the emancipation of judges from the constraints of national law. Cosmopolitanism manifests itself in creating normative systems outside and above traditional international law. While the latter draws its binding power from the will of states, cosmopolitan rules are usually created by private actors. Their binding power results predominantly from practical necessity. Such is the status of lex sportiva, of the standards imposed by rating agencies, or of international accreditation bodies. Judicial cosmopolitanism is different, for it rests upon the existing structures and competencies. By resorting to alien legal sources judges free themselves from national constraints, thus enhancing their power and independence. In assessing the impact of cosmopolitanism, one has to differentiate between looking up to foreign laws and precedents as binding sources, and treating them as merely intellectual inspiration. The second, albeit it seems innocuous, entails serious perils to the quality of adjudication. It creates a danger of cherry-picking by selecting foreign inspirations, not necessarily best suited to the case at hand. There is a danger of judicial overstepping of powers by making laws instead of merely applying it. By allowing judges to venture the uncontrolled expansion of their powers we endanger the very essence of the rule of law. On a positive note, drawing on foreign legal sources enables judges to verify the rationality of their decisions, as they were already tested in other jurisdictions.

The paper shows an American model of the participation of the society in the administration of justice. It is crucial for the Polish discussion about the involvement of public factor in that manner. The analysis is divided between the constitutional right to trial by jury and the institution of justices of the peace, which is unique for the Anglo-Saxon legal system. Research conducted here is the result of a detailed analysis of the case law of the Supreme Court of the United States and selected state courts that shaped the views of the American academia on this issue. Hopefully, this brief study will help to reform the Polish judicial process.

One of the most effective systems of protection of human rights is the system defined in the European Convention of Human Rights. Until 2010, the European Court of Human Rights had rarely handled tax cases because, in principle, it excluded this category of cases from its jurisdiction in the field of the protection of taxpayer rights. Such cases had always been qualified – in accordance to the requirements of Article 6 of the European Convention on Human Rights – as criminal or civil (property-related) cases. A major change in the ECHR’s approach to cases featuring tax-related aspects occurred in 2011. Given the protection of the right to property as set out in Protocol No. 1, the ECHR ranted taxpayers protection related to the return of value added tax in situations in which the taxpayer fulfilled their record-keeping obligations. The adopted trend in the issued decisions is seen to be dominant, but to be considered grounded, a greater number of ECHR judicial decisions than at present is needed. There is no doubt that the new tendency in the judicial decisions issued by the ECHR may have a major impact on the decisions issued by administrative courts in Poland.

This article aims to show the similarity between the arguments developed regarding the Treaty freedoms and the approach to the legal principles proposed by R. Alexy. Treaty freedoms from the Treaty on the functioning of the European Union, developed in the course of the Court’s many years of judicial activity, have a number of similarities to the concept of the principles of law proposed by prof. Robert Alex. This is evidenced by – the position of the principles of law in the legal system, the possibility of grading them, or a separate method of resolving the conflict of two opposing principles of law. The article analyses selected treaty freedoms in relation to tax matters and compares them with theoretical schemas proposed by prof. Robert Alexy.

The article discusses the phenomenon of "tax carousels" in the tax on goods and services, which is a specific abusive practice and is used for VAT refund scam purposes. A discussion on the jurisprudential doctrine of the abuse of law and good faith as offered by the Court of Justice of the European Union is followed by an analysis of the judicial decisions (case-law) issued in this area, which proves that taxable persons involved in value-added tax fraud practice have no right to a tax deduction. Meanwhile, those taxable persons who have fallen victim to tax fraud practices may quote the good faith doctrine and exercise the right to a tax deduction. The judicial decisions of the Court of Justice of the European Union have had a significant impact on the judicial decisions issued by administrative courts in Poland. The Supreme Administrative Court (SAC) tries to define the notion of a "tax carousel" in its decisions, as the notion is quite broad.