Remedial discretion and dilemmas in Asia

Abstract

Asian courts have mitigated the individual harms and institutional uncertainties associated with the judicial use of delayed remedies by incentivizing the government to comply with the court’s ruling or putting in place judicial safeguards against any legislative delinquency. Expedited remedies like remedial reinterpretation and judicial directives in certain contexts may also be necessary or desirable, even if the judicially imposed result may not be what the enacting legislature had originally intended. Insofar as the legislature can respond and amend these judicial reinterpretation or directives by ordinary legislation, the judiciary does not have the final word and has merely facilitated a constitutional dialogue on rights with the current legislature.