14 PERSPECTIVES ON BUSINESS AND ECONOMICS | VOL 44 | 2026 Croatia can draw lessons from Slovenia’s anti-corruption commission and from Bulgaria, where mass protests in December 2025 translated widespread outrage over corruption into structural reform (Regional Anti-Corruption Initiative, 2025). The core challenge is making institutional integrity and its enforcement apparent for citizens to see, verify, and count on. The first lever for change is rigorous asset declaration and auditing of judges, prosecutors, and politically exposed individuals. Croatia requires formal declarations, but enforcement and systematic auditing are uneven, which fuels suspicions that illicit enrichment can be hidden behind family companies or shell arrangements (European Network of National Human Rights Institutions, 2021). By contrast, Slovenia’s Commission for the Prevention of Corruption (CPC, 2025) has statutory powers to obtain financial documents, inspect conflicts of interest, and penalize officials who fail to comply with rules. Croatia should move toward this model, mandating standardized public asset registers, establishing automatic cross-checks between declarations, tax records, and land registers and empowering an independent body to initiate investigations without political approval (Regional Anti-Corruption Initiative, 2025). Regular, random, and publicly reported audits would signal that wealth accumulation in public office is under constant scrutiny, not just addressed only after scandals arise. A second lever, full public transparency with comprehensive coverage of the e-Case system—a centralized digital platform that allows parties and the public to monitor the real-time status and procedural history of judicial files—can reduce opportunities for informal influence and strengthen perceptions of procedural fairness. Croatia has already adopted electronic case management tools but public visibility and standardization remain incomplete (Regional Anti-Corruption Initiative, 2025). A robust e-Case architecture should ensure that every filing, order, and judgment is time-stamped, encrypted, and accessible in real time, with anonymized data published (European Commission, 2012). Strict randomization of case assignments is necessary to prevent the impression of government interference, which remains a primary reason why the Croatian public rates judicial independence so poorly (Kubat & Miljević, 2021). In Slovenia, digital transparency and publication of decisions have been part of a broader effort to strengthen judicial independence and remuneration (CPC, 2025). Croatia could use e-Case as a technical upgrade and as a guarantee that case assignment and scheduling occur according to rules and not veze (Grdešić, 2008). A third lever would be strengthened civilian oversight via an independent board of legal scholars, ethics experts, and civil society representatives outside the judiciary (European Network…, 2021). Current disciplinary mechanisms in Croatia are seen as a closed circle where judges evaluate one another, reinforcing the image of a self-protective club (Innovations for Successful Societies, 2013). A civilian oversight council with clearly defined powers would introduce an external check without turning oversight into partisan prosecution. Such a council could receive complaints, request information from the courts, issue public reports, and recommend disciplinary charges. Slovenia’s CPC offers a working example as it examines integrity breaches and applies pressure through public findings and cooperation with law enforcement (CPC, 2025). A fourth recommendation is to offload routine administrative work to notaries and other auxiliary legal professionals, reducing low-value, high-discretion interactions (Regional Anti-Corruption Initiative, 2025). When judges handle tasks such as certifying documents, estate administration, or property filings, delays increase and citizens experience the system as hard to navigate. Reallocating standardized procedures to notaries who operate under transparent fee schedules and digital supervision would free judicial capacity for more complex corruption, organized crime, and fundamental rights cases where impartiality is crucial (European Network…, 2021). Any anti-corruption policy reform must account for USKOK, which international observers describe as one of the region’s most effective anti-corruption units, praising its broad mandate and high-profile cases against ministers and senior officials (Innovations for Successful Societies, 2013). Pre-accession reforms created specialized anti-corruption court chambers and a police unit to support USKOK’s investigations, advancing cases that previously seemed untouchable (European Commission, 2011). Recent analyses question, however, whether USKOK can maintain independence in politically sensitive cases and how it interacts with the European Public Prosecutor’s Office (Hall, 2022). USKOK’s success depends on insulation from political pressure, adequate funding, and a judiciary willing to convict powerful defendants (European Commission, 2025a). Stronger asset declarations, e-Case transparency, and civilian oversight would all help USKOK convert investigations into verdicts. If USKOK visibly pursues and secures convictions against well-connected figures, it could begin reversing perceptions that elites operate with impunity.
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