민사 증거법 개혁의 필요성 및 방향 = Needs and Direction of Evidence Law Reformation in Korea

다국어 초록 (Multilingual Abstract)

There is widespread criticism that Korean civil litigation is prone to lies and the truth is not properly revealed. One of the main reasons for this is the inadequate means of collecting evidence under Korean Civil Procedure Act. This paper first analyzes the necessity and importance of truth-finding in civil litigation, particularly from a law and economics perspective. Failure to uncover the truth during litigation leads to repeated judgments based on incorrect facts, undermining trust in the judiciary, hindering settlements between the parties, and increasing transaction costs for society as a whole.
When seeking to improve Korean civil evidence law, it is crucial to consider how to expand the current document production order system, while carefully considering the differences between the party-driven American litigation process and the current one. The points examined in this paper include ① that the obligation to submit documents should be clearly stated as a general civic obligation of citizens, ② that the subject of submission should be expanded to all physical evidence, but especially electronically stored information, where modern evidence is concentrated, ③ that the obligation to specify the document or material should be relaxed in both party applications and court submission orders, ④ that additional devices such as litigation holds, privilege rules, protective orders, and attorneys’ eyes only designations should also be provided, and ⑤ that, most importantly, courts should be granted strong and diverse sanctioning authority.