In the Middle East and North Africa region, laws organising the judiciary and bilateral agreements on judicial cooperation expressly permit the use of foreign judges on domestic courts. Judicial ‘secondments’ of this type allow host courts to deal with increasing caseloads expeditiously, while providing shadow-training for domestic judges in the long term. This chapter outlines the practice of sharing judges in the region and describes how foreign judges serve on domestic courts in Bahrain, Kuwait, Qatar and the United Arab Emirates, in law and practice. Using the lens of political economy, the analysis highlights two trends in the region. The first is the recruitment of foreign judges to fill skills and knowledge-based gaps among domestic judiciaries. The second is the high degree of executive control over the movement of judges, in both sending and receiving states, with implications for the separation of powers, judicial independence and executive accountability.

Seychelles is a small island state with a hybridity of citizens, language, and culture. Its heritage of double colonisation has resulted in a complex blend of the French civil tradition and English common law. Litigation and adjudication in Seychelles have demanded knowledge of both legal traditions and necessitated the recruitment of judicial officers from outside the jurisdiction to complement the limited pool of locally available judges. This chapter considers the substantive and procedural constitutional provisions for the appointment of both Seychellois and foreign judges to the judiciary of Seychelles, the ratio of foreign judges to Seychellois judges, and how Seychellois view foreign judges and whether their perspectives on the role of foreign judges is substantiated by evidence. Examples of some of the difficulties experienced by the appointment of foreign judges are given, together with a reflection on whether these issues are specific to foreign judges or apply to judges generally. Finally, the continuing role of foreign judges in the Seychellois judiciary is explored together with an assessment of their contribution to, and/or diminution of, the judicial and legal landscape.

The judges who served as members of the Colonial Legal Service, established in 1933, were part of a community that was built and sustained by the imaginations of officials in the Colonial Office and those who served in the colonies. The judges of the Colonial Legal Service were shaped by the uniformity of formalised recruitment and promotion policies that rewarded professional legal experience at the Bar rather than local knowledge. A colonial legal career was not necessarily limited to one colony or region and legal officers were frequently transferred. The high number of transfers partly explains judges’ attitudes towards the administration of justice, in particular the fact that they often remained wedded to English law. Colonial judges were defined by their backgrounds – personal, educational and professional – and by the roles they performed. This chapter discusses how these factors helped create a unique sense of identity within the Colonial Legal Service.