The review process of texts submitted for publication in scientific journals is one of the main ways of evaluating the scientific output of their authors. Any disruptions in this process can have serious and far-reaching consequences, not only in terms of the credibility and integrity of the author themselves, but – most importantly – in terms of the confidence in their achievements. Attempts to distort the review process have so far occurred most often in medical and exact sciences. The case of „The Critique of Law” discussed herein shows that attempts at scientific fraud affect also legal sciences. The purpose of the article is to inform the scientific community worldwide about subsequent attempts of unethical scholarly activities, to describe instances of malpractice, and to point out some of the possible ways to
prevent the fraud in question.

The review process of texts submitted for publication in scientific journals is one of the main ways of evaluating the scientific output of their authors. Any disruptions in this process can have serious and far-reaching consequences, not only in terms of the credibility and integrity of the author themselves, but – most importantly – in terms of the confidence in their achievements. Attempts to distort the review process have so far occurred most often in medical and exact sciences. The case of “The Critique of Law” discussed herein shows that attempts at scientific fraud affect also legal sciences. The purpose of the article is to inform the scientific community worldwide about subsequent attempts of unethical scholarly activities, to describe instances of malpractice, and to point out some of the possible ways to prevent the fraud in question.

Queen Elizabeth II died on 8 September 2022, at the age of 96 and after the longest reign in British history. Her death brings up the question of what the future holds for the monarchy. The paper explores the monarch’s role – both at home and abroad – as head of state. It also analyses how the new king will have to adapt to socio-political and demographic changes the United Kingdom has been going through. Britain is now recovering from Brexit and the Covid-19 pandemic and dealing with the ongoing economic crisis and growing calls for Scottish independence and the change of status of Northern Ireland. The Queen successfully navigated the monarch’s constitutional political neutrality, but the new circumstances raise key questions about what kind of King former Prince Charles will be and whether public support for the monarchy will outlive support for Elizabeth II.

Constitutional crisis confronts legal practice with philosophical problems that normally may seem abstract or even purely academic. Among those, there is a question of material (content-dependent) criteria of legal validity, namely whether legal norms may actually have any content and remain binding elements of the law. It becomes palpable due to the legislative initiatives to decriminalize some violations of law committed by governmental officials. Such regulation deserves discussion in the light of theoretical conceptions of the claim to correctness (justice, righteousness) as a necessary feature of each act of enacting or applying the law. Arguably, even weaker conception of such claim, relying on the correctness relative to the public morality reflected in the fundamental values and principles of the positive law, is sufficient to challenge the potential presumption of validity of such decriminalizing provisions entailed by their possible formally accurate enactment.

This paper discusses judicial duty of improving the law on epistemic grounds and claims in that regarding this obligation, it is possible to give a place to free speech from an epistemic point of view. As a requirement of having epistemic agency, judges like other human beings have epistemological responsibility. Different from the others’ responsibility, judges’ responsibility is connected to their duty of improving the law, which is required by their job as well as the idea of the rule of law and judicial professional principles. Judges should improve the law’s capacity to guide the conduct of its citizens, who are obligated to obey the law. Improving the law also improves the delivery of justice. The ways of legal interpretation and justification are important to improve it. While applying the law, judges can find the law unclear or they may encounter some norm conflicts. In these cases, they
should resolve them to keep the law ‘legally in good shape’, which should meet epistemological requirements. When fulfilling this obligation, judicial free speech on epistemic grounds should not be limited.

The goal of this article is to discuss the problem of communicativeness of the instructions given by judges to non-professional participants of court trials. The background of the considerations are the results of empirical research on communication in the courtroom, which, among other things, show that judges are significantly active in giving instructions. Drawing on research conducted within the “plain language” movement, the author points out those elements of instructions that increase their communicativeness and those that decrease it. As a result, some hints were formulated as an answer on question – how to increase the communicativeness of instructions given at the court trial?

The aim of this paper is to present the issue of judicial freedom of expression in the perspective of obligations that are inherent in the judicial role. The fulfilment of such a task is dictated firstly by the presentation of an epistemic and egalitarian view of judicial humility. Based on this distinction I hypothesise two directions of thinking about judicial freedom of expression. The epistemic variant, focusing on the role aspect, presents the judge as a special category of citizen due to the obligations connected with his or her profession. The egalitarian variant presents an image of the judge as a citizen. The whole study is completed by the justification of the choice of a research topic. Among the reasons, technological changes and the related development of social media deserve special attention. The implementation of the tasks mentioned above allows several conclusions to be drawn. One of them concerns the mentioned hypothesis, which is given a correction. The other conclusion, in turn, concerns the variables in view of which the scope of judicial freedom of expression can be examined. The first of these is the sphere in which the judge’s expression occurs, the second is the object of that expression, and the third variable is the cultural aspect.

This paper focuses on the issue of whether the boundaries of the private lives of judges are shaped according to cultural conditions and gender. My main assumption is that gender inequality in a culture is reflected in how the boundaries of the private life of judges are interpreted. In this regard, women judges may face more restrictions than their male colleagues in what they wear, what they do and what they say in their lives generally. And ultimately, an interpretation of private life that reinforces gender roles also limits the freedom of expression. I concretise my discussion regarding gender stereotypes that influence what judges do or say in their private lives in different cultures.

The article deals with the normative patterns of communication of judges in a theoretical perspective. Their identification is thus taken as a universal problem, occurring in all legal cultures and regardless of current disputes concerning them. It is assumed that normative patterns of communication among judges are built on the understanding of the role of the judge and the place of the judiciary within checks and balances. Based on the assumption that the role of judges and the status of the judiciary have evolved, three successive historical models of judicial communication were proposed, i.e. the first model – impersonal, the second – self restrained, and the third – accurate communication. The thesis was also put forward that the last of the models may prove to be inadequate in the face of contemporary challenges, resulting primarily from cultural changes driven by the development of new communication technologies.

Article aims to invigorate the study of judicial smiles in Polish legal science. Judicial smiles are treated as an element of psycho-social processes in the courtroom, in particular the judge’s non-verbal communication. Such an opening will be made by identifying and discussing a few real cases of judges’ smiles in Poland, and more precisely in the courtrooms of Krakow’s lower courts (civil and criminal divisions). The empirical material was obtained through passive observation of the hearings, supported by a standardized observational questionnaire. According to the results, (i) there are more smiles of judges in courtrooms than one might think, (ii) a judge’s smiles during questioning the witnesses (as a rule) is generally less controversial than that smiles expressed in relation to parties or participants, (iii) five types of judicial smiles were distinguished, (iv) two of them seem to violate important procedural rules, while the role of others is positive, (v) it is possible to reflect on the development of the judges’ ability to use a smile in a situational manner, of course in a narrow scope and under many conditions.

This article considers the meaning of trust for judicial communication. The central tenet of this analysis is that trust is best conceptualized as a judicial virtue and that it can be most fully explained with aretaic language. This claim is elaborated through, first, making distinctions between trust and reliance, as well as between trust and trustworthiness. Second, exploring the determinants of trustworthiness leads the author to argue for a virtue account of judicial trustworthiness. Third, the article discusses whether and how trust as a particular attitude or propensity may be perceived as a judicial virtue. The argument concludes by considering the relation between trust in judges and trust in justice institutions, such as courts of law.

The paper aims to discuss the reasonable observer test as a tool for assessing judges’ expression. The argument begins by analyzing the relevant provisions of international soft law, as inscribed in the instruments developed and adopted by the CoE and the UN. Subsequently, an operationalization of the test is proposed by identifying the factors to be taken into account in the application of the test. In the following step, the expectations placed on the reasonable observer test are addressed, whereby the juriscentric (“strong”) and post-analytical (“weak”) positions are outlined. The former relies on Artur Kozak’s law-philosophical conception, and the latter is underpinned by the topography of juristic power developed by Paweł Jabłoński and Przemysław Kaczmarek. The paper makes the case for the post-analytical approach, which places rather modest expectations on the reasonable observer test and considers it instrumental in structuring the discussion, rather than yielding
indisputably reliable conclusions.