Fewer courts, less justice? Evidence from the 2008 French reform of labor courts

The need to provide justice at reasonable cost represents a current challenge for many public authorities. Many reform projects propose to remove some courts in order to rationalize the judiciary. This paper explores the 2008 French reform of labor courts (removing 20 % of the courts) to empirically investigate the determinants of the removal decision, and its consequences on demand for litigation and case duration in the remaining courts. This represents—to our knowledge—the first attempt to evaluate the impacts of courts’ removal. Using panel data, our empirical strategy is based on probit estimations, counterfactuals, as well as 3SLS estimations. Our results show that the reform removed small and concentrated courts. It decreased demand for litigation in the targeted areas. Results also suggest that case duration might have increased in some specific courts since 2011.