Length of Trials in the Italian Judicial System: An Efficiency Analysis by Macro-Area

Abstract In recent years, the Italian judicial system has been at the center of both the political debate and policy actions aiming at modifying the territorial structure and the organization of the courts as well as the procedural processes. The measures adopted concerned the reorganization of the magistrate’s career and the reform of judicial districts. Despite the several reforms, the Italian judicial system does not reach yet the European standards, principally for the so called magistrate-duration procedures binomial, according to which the number of magistrates is above the European average level and the time of legal trials is too long compared with most European countries. Hence, performance and efficiency are worthy of attention in this field. Here, the territorial displacement of efficiency for the Italian judicial districts is studied using a DEA approach followed by a spatial analysis consisting in a PCA for macro-area where the problem of long trials is taken into account. We assess on the geographical characterization of both productivity and expenses of the judicial sector and provide indications to improve efficiency according to the dimensions of the courts.