КРИВИЧНИ ПОСТУПАК РЕПУБЛИКЕ СРБИЈЕ ‒ ИЗМЕЂУ РЕФОРМЕ И СЛОМА СИСТЕМА ВРЕДНОСТИ
CRIMINAL PROCEDURE IN SERBIA: BETWEEN THE REFORM AND THE VALUE SYSTEM BREAKDOWN

Summary/Abstract: This paper discusses the correlation between the current reform of Serbian criminal procedure and the transformation of the fundamental principles of European-contintnetla criminal procedure. In that context, the authors first provide a diagnosis of current state of affairs in domestic criminal procedure, which has been subjected to the process of legal acculturation embodied in spreading the Anglo-American criminal procedure into the European-Continental criminal procedure. In the second section, with reference to the “Serbianisation” of Dworkin’s Heracles, an imaginary perfect judge through whom Dworkin’s famous theory of law as integrity is presented, the authors provide insights into the state of domestic criminal justice system. The most important conclusions are presented in the third part of the paper. Firstly, the authors point out that the process of transplanting elements of the Anglo-American criminal procedure into the European-Continental proceedings gives birth to Serbian Heracles, which embodies the spirit of time when the old system of values is destroyed and a new one is created. In the authors’ opinion, the process of “revaluation of values” is a dominant tendency in the criminal procedure law of the Western legal circle (which the Anglo-American and mixed continental procedures fall into), and it is a consequence of wider social trends. Changes in the criteria for comparing values first occurred in the accusatory proceedings, primarily because the standpoints and the metanarrative permeated with notions of pluralism and relativism were born and first applied in the Anglo-American procedure. However, considering the current legal acculturation, the last dams of revaluation of values have been demolished in the continental procedures as well. As nothing is either right or wrong anymore, an environment has been created in which the question of truth cannot be posed any longer. In the authors’ opinion, the alternative is found in the process of simulating the pursuit of justice. The primary function of procedures imitating the judicial process is to serve and uphold the stability of the political system. Thus, postmodern procedures are an illusion created in order to deceive the public. An important role in that process is played by due process rules on fair proceedings which, as the authors believe, are the primary means of simulating the process of seeking justice in criminal proceedings.

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