Analysing Dissenting Votes Through Electronic Justice From Online Posts to Streets: A Real Case

Abstract

This paper brings us a vision of what dissenting votes mean in an eSociety, particularly linked to eJustice, and a real case in Spanish jurisdictional process. As soon as judicial decision has an increasing repercussion, our hyper-connected society and social networks on the Internet take a relevant influential role, giving a never before seen feedback to the Judiciary. Easy access to case law, jurisdictional texts and judicial decisions in electronic form are elements with great impact, surpassing traditional publicity. An interesting case of study related to electronic media, and particularly through social networks, has been the dissenting vote of the rape case called “The Wolfpack”, known as “La manada” in Spain, that has crossed the borders of electronic protests to the streets, with demonstrations and reactions against it, particularly from feminist movements. Our hypothesis is that dissenting vote as an eSociety conceptualization has an electronic-digital component whose easy diffusion through the Internet makes it different from the traditional concept. It changes from being an ordinary procedural mechanism within a restricted scope of decision, to opening a debate at citizenship level. It involves nuances on transparency in the digital society, and of course in the idea of Open Justice as part of Open Government initiatives. As a field experience and methodological system, we will use electronic justice ICT tools, such as web-based HJ of the Constitutional Court of Spain and others to explore these considerations analytically.