High courts are important political players in the age of Judicialisation. Existing studies employ quantitative approaches that use legal categories or entirely ignore policy content, or they those that are interested in policy outcomes focus on singular decisions or specific policy areas but ignore the overall pattern. Thus, we know little about high court agendas from a public policy perspective and hence little about Judicialisation across policy fields. This paper compares the dynamic of issue attention for three high courts from 1979 to 2010: the German undesverfassungsgericht, French Conseil constitutionnel and Canadian Supreme Court. Using the Comparative Policy Agenda framework, we coded the policy content of each court’s decisions. We examine how the courts’ policy agendas changed over time. We argue that degree of institutional friction varies among countries, highest in Canada and lowest in France. We also find variation over time due to institutional reforms of the courts.
