Speech by Tatu Leppänen, President of the Supreme Court of Finland, at the Network of the Presidents of the Supreme Judicial Courts of the EU Conference, 12 June 2026 Limassol, Cyprus
Rule of Law: Challenges in the 21st Century
I have been asked to elaborate on the theme of this first session, Rule of Law: Challenges in the 21st Century, from the point of view of a national supreme court judge. As the president of the Supreme Court of Finland I will look at the theme from the Finnish perspective. I will add something also concerning the other Nordic countries. My colleagues from other states will certainly contribute to the discussion for a broader and fuller picture of the subject.
This presentation is divided into three parts. Firstly, a few words about the concept of the rule of law itself. Secondly, I will discuss present challenges to the rule of law. And finally, I will touch the question of what can be done to address those challenges.
1. Firstly, I think it is important that we keep clear in mind what is meant by rule of law (Rechtsstaat, l’État de droit). At least in Finland, rule of law is often used as an unclear slogan in public political debate.
As we know, rule of law is (also) a legal concept and a legal principle. Article 2 of the Treaty on European Union stipulates that the Union is founded on the values of respect for human dignity, freedom, democracy, equality, the rule of law and respect for human rights, including the rights of persons belonging to minorities. These values are common to the Member States. The legal concept of the rule of law in European Union law, as well as in the European Convention on Human Rights, will certainly be elaborated in the following presentations.
Correspondingly, for example, the Constitution of Finland is based on three fundamental principles – democracy, rule of law and human rights. They all presuppose and support each other. In a democratic rule of law state, such as Finland, democratic majority principle prevails but, at the same time, the human rights of individuals and minorities are secured, and they are both protected by the rule of law. According to Sec. 2 of the Constitution, the exercise of public powers shall be based on law, and in all public activity, the law shall be strictly observed.
A worldwide authority on rule of law is the Venice Commission’s Rule of Law Checklist. In the Checklist the concept of rule of law has not only been defined in abstract terms, but it has been deconstructed into more precise and useful benchmarks. It is worth noticing that the Checklist was updated in December last year and some new benchmarks were included.
In the updated Checklist the benchmarks concern legality, legal certainty, prevention of abuse of power, checks and balances, equality and non-discrimination, access to justice, constitutional review, restoration of rule of law and legal education. Under access to justice there are sub-benchmarks of independence and impartiality of the judiciary and fair trial.
Hence, we see that the concept of rule of law is quite wide and covers much more than just the independent judiciary which, of course, is an essential part of it.
2. I will now move to the proper subject of this session, i.e. challenges to the rule of law. As we see from the aforementioned, there are also other fundamentally important principles, such as democracy and human rights, and many of these challenges are also challenges to democracy and human rights. Similarly, there are also other important aspects of the rule of law, but I will concentrate on challenges to the independence of judiciary. Many of these are also challenges to other sides of the rule of law.
Unfortunately, I must start by saying that the worst challenges have been posed on the rule of international law. Five years ago, I would have not said this, but an existential threat to the rule of law is war. There is a full-scale war going on in Europe, in breach of international and humanitarian law. Obviously, if an imperial non-rule of law state occupies another state there will be no rule of law in that state either. Unfortunately, one has to ask to what extent there still is rule of international law in the world. But I will leave this question in the air and concentrate on the rule of law within a state.
There certainly are challenges to the national rule of law in the world. According to the World Justice Project Rule of Law Index 2025 the rule of law has declined in most countries, for eight years in a row. Naturally, the European Union member states succeeded well in the scores. In overall score, Finland was number 3 in the world, and the Nordic countries formed the top four, with Iceland not participating in the survey!
So, you can wonder why I am asked to speak about challenges to the rule of law. Well, we are not immune either. I would say that there are both political, social, economic as well as technological challenges. In many respects they are intertwined with each other.
The political challenges to the rule of law are the most imminent and visible ones. The political landscape is very polarized in many countries. Political far-ends try to win legislative and executive powers and use them in full. From their perspective the separation of powers and the independent judiciary and other institutions are obstacles. As we have seen in many countries, this political ideology has led to undermining the independence of the judiciary in many ways and even attacking individual judges, in national courts as well as in international courts.
This type of development has not, at least yet, occurred in Finland. However, I have to say that the rhetorics of some politicians have changed to some extent also in Finland. Some politicians have commented critically not only on the judgements they don’t like, but also personally on the judges in those cases.
I think there are also social challenges to the rule of law. It is easier to maintain the public trust in the judiciary and other institutions when the population is quite homogenous, and the people are educated and follow the traditional media, as the case has traditionally been in Finland. It is much more difficult if the social cohesion in a society decreases and there starts to emerge different kinds of subgroups with their own ideology and separate social media and even different concept of reality, where the mainstream is “fake news”.
Also, economic and technological challenges have to be mentioned because they affect access to justice. Economic difficulties affect the state and the courts and at the same time the potential parties in litigation. For example, in Finland there is a discussion whether ordinary people can still afford civil litigation. This affects the trust people have in judiciary and on rule of law. On the technological side I will only briefly mention AI with its potential but also risks to the rule of law, e.g. the risk of superfluous complaint filing or evidence fabrication.
To sum this up, there are multiple and increasing challenges to the rule of law.
3. My third and most essential point is that we should not just talk about the challenges but try to do something about them! In the present situation we cannot just passively follow the negative developments.
I think there are multiple layers in our possible response. I call them here legislation approach, struggle approach and cultural approach.
It should be added that I mean preventive responses against a rule of law backsliding. Restoration of rule of law is even more difficult question, after the milk has already been spilt, so to speak. That issue will be elaborated in the next presentation.
One important preventive possibility is to strengthen the legislation and especially the rules in the constitution on the rule of law issues. This approach has recently been adopted in the Nordic countries Norway, Sweden and Finland. In all of these countries there have been or is pending projects to amend the provisions of the constitution in order to safeguard the independence of the judiciary also in a possibly more turbulent future. It is better to take insurance when the weather is still relatively calm! The new, more precise provisions in the constitution concern e.g. the number of justices in the Supreme Courts and their retirement age.
Secondly, when there is severe undermining of judicial independence by someone, e.g. the executive, the judges must take a clear stand against it and take the appropriate measures. It is important that the individual judge attacked is not left alone but that she or he is supported by colleagues, e.g. the chief judge or the judges’ union. I would also like to see more support from other legal professionals, such as lawyers’ associations. The reaction can vary from a media statement to a legal recourse which may vary in different jurisdictions. The case law of the Court of Justice and of the Court of Human Rights have, of course, been of vital importance in this respect.
Thirdly, in my opinion, an important approach is to try to uphold and enhance the general social and political culture of the rule of law in a society. The key is to underpin the legitimacy of our work in the eyes of most people, common people if you like. We must keep their trust. And here we come back to democracy. Judiciary is not separated from the rest of society; it is the mirror of society. Judiciary has resilience against the challenges but, as we have seen in many countries, in the long run the judiciary cannot be better than the society in which it operates. Hence, it is of vital importance to safeguard not only the rule of law but also democracy and human rights. For example, free research, science-based education and free media are essential in this respect.
So, what can we do as judges? I think we should take our mandate as a judge very seriously. We must work well and behave well. We must shelter our integrity and dignity. We must explain tirelessly what independent courts do and why the rule of law is so important for everyone. I think this is nowadays actually quite simple, because people see what happens in countries where there is no rule of law but rule of power and violence, and where the judiciary is just a part of the repressive machinery of the state. Unfortunately, there is no lack of bad examples in the world.