Political Resistance and ECtHR Decision-Making

International courts are increasingly facing public criticism and even backlash. Governments have publicly refused to implement international court judgments, they have implemented reforms aimed at curtailing courts, and they have withdrawn from international court jurisdictions. Do international courts change their rulings in anticipation of potentially harmful scrutiny? We examine this question in the context of the European Court of Human Rights (ECtHR). The ECtHR has faced severe criticism in the media, public protests, attempts at reform, as well as threats of withdrawals from important member states. We identify two theoretical routes through which the ECtHR could be responsive to this contentious environment. First, Euroskeptic governments could appoint judges that are more deferential to states. Second, judges might have more diffuse concerns that their legitimacy would be endangered if they engaged in activist rulings in countries where Euroskepticism is high. We examine these ideas using a new dataset of all ECtHR judgments and their implementation until June of 2016. We estimate ideal point models based on dissenting opinions to analyze whether Euroskeptic governments appoint less activist judges. We then examine whether judges exercise more restraint than would otherwise be expected when ruling on countries where public opinion has become hostile or where governments have threatened repercussions to the ECtHR’s authority.