The Emotional Interaction of Judicial Objectivity
Keywords:
Emotion management, empathy, objectivity, impartiality, Swedish courts, legal professionals, tacit signals, emotional communication, Gestión de emociones, empatía, objetividad, imparcialidad, tribunales suecos, profesionales del derecho, señales tácitasAbstract
Like other Western legal systems, the Swedish legal system constructs objectivity as an unemotional state of being. We argue that the enactment of objectivity in situ relies on objectivity work including emotion management and empathy. Building on qualitative interviews and observations in Swedish district courts, we analyse courtroom interaction through a dramaturgical lens, highlighting tacit signals and interprofessional emotional communication aimed to secure objective procedures, while sustaining the ideal of unemotional objectivity. By analytically separating objectivity from impartiality, we show that judges’ objective performances balance empathic attunement and restrained expressions to uphold an impartial presentation. Prosecutors take pride in maintaining objectivity in spite of being partial, fostering the ability to switch between engagement and disengagement depending on the strength of the case. The requirement for legal professionals to be autonomous demands skillful inter-professional emotional attuning. Thereby, collaborative professional emotion management achieves the ideal of justice as being objective.Al igual que otros sistemas jurídicos occidentales, el sueco construye la objetividad como un estado del ser no emocional. Argumentamos que la aplicación de la objetividad in situ se apoya en un trabajo de objetividad que incluye la gestión de las emociones y la empatía. Basándonos en entrevistas cualitativas y en observaciones en juzgados de Suecia, analizamos la interacción que se da en el tribunal, destacando señales tácitas y comunicación emocional interprofesional destinada a asegurar procedimientos objetivos, a la vez que a sostener el ideal de objetividad no emotiva. Al separar analíticamente objetividad de imparcialidad, mostramos que las actuaciones objetivas de los jueces suponen un equilibrio entre la sintonía empática y la contención expresiva para defender una presentación imparcial. El requisito de que los profesionales del derecho sean autónomos demanda una sintonía emocional interprofesional. Por tanto, la gestión emocional colaborativa de los profesionales cumple con el ideal de justicia objetiva.
Available from: https://doi.org/10.35295/osls.iisl/0000-0000-0000-1031
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