Empirical research with judicial officers: The biography of a research project

This article examines the history of a large multi-year, national empirical research project into the Australian judiciary undertaken by the two co-authors. We consider the different phases of the project, discuss what worked and what did not, and offer some suggestions for future research involving judicial officers and their courts. The research project entailed negotiating collaboration with and access to judicial officers and court staff on a national, state and local basis. Reflecting on this experience confirms the importance of collaboration with the courts and judiciary and researcher independence from them. Collaboration provides extensive access, supporting a long term, multi-method research design, and providing findings that are original, robust and valuable to the judiciary. It is equally important to maintain researcher independence: to ensure that courts and government commit to researcher control of data, its analysis and application, recognising that the courts cannot censor findings, presentations or publications. Collaboration and independence require generating and maintaining long term relationships, so that research leads to robust original scholarship that benefits judicial officers, courts, and the publics they serve.