European System of HR Protection
JUSTIN
Judicial Studies Institute
Masaryk University
Katarína Šipulová
Brno, 19 September 2022

CoE
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Council of Europe
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•Established 1949
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•Intergovernmental (compared to EU)
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•ECtHR and a network of various bodies
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•ECHR plus more than 200 treaties
•European Social Charter
•European Convention on Human Rights
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•47->46 members

ECtHR
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Bringing a case to ECtHR
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•Who
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•When
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•Where
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•Which rights?

Bringing a case to ECtHR
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Bringing a case to ECtHR
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Bringing a case to ECtHR
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ECtHR most important issues
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•Armed conflicts
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•Damages
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Proportionality test
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•Relative rights – any limitation to the right must be
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•Prescribed by the Law
•Necessary in democratic society
•Pursuing legitimate aim
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•Proportionality means that the interference must be no more than is absolutely necessary to
achieve one of the aims in the Convention
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Proportionality test
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Proportionality test
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Proportionality test
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ECtHR
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ECtHR
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ECtHR
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Selection of ECtHR judges
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•46 judges
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•Decide in formations:
•Single judge
•Three-member chamber
•Seven-member chamber
•Grand chamber
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•Each state nominates 3 candidates
•PACE interviews and selects one judge per country
•Many controversies
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•New Czech judge: Kateřina Šimáčková
•New Court President: Síofra O’Leary
Rozhovor - Kateřina Šimáčková: Soudce musí být člověk, který pracuje od rána do večera - jak na
případech, tak sám na sobě | Právní prostor The jurist Síofra O'Leary, the first woman to preside
over the European Court of Human Rights | International | The USA Print - The USA Print

ECtHR key dates:
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•5 May 1949 - Creation of the Council of Europe
•4 November 1950 - Adoption of the Convention
•3 September 1953 - Convention enters into force
•21 January 1959 - First members of the Court elected
•23-28 February 1959 - Court’s first session
•18 September 1959 - Court adopts its Rules of Court
•14 November 1960 - Lawless v Ireland
•1 November 1998 - Protocol 11 in force -> The New Court
•1 June 2010 - Protocol 14 enters into force
•1 August 2018 - Protocol 16
•16 March 2022 - Russia ceases to be a member state of the CoE

ECtHR key dates:
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Current issues
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•3 crises negatively impacting the ECtHR’s legitimacy
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•Backlog (victim of its own success)
•Non-implementation
•Populist challenge to ECtHR
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•4th? Russia’s exit?
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•Judicialization
•Independence
•Backslash / pushback against the ECtHR
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(Populist) challenge to ECtHR
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•Non-majoritarian difficulty squared
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•A. Bickel: counter-majoritarian difficulty of constitutional review
•Waldron: institutions must respect the fact of deep conflict among citizens on substantive issues
•only unconstrained majority rule among elected parliamentarians treats all citizens as political
equals. Human rights constraints based on judicial review of legislation, on the other hand,
violate citizens’ equal dignity
• “it is where responsible representatives of the people engage in what they would probably
describe as the self-government of the society.”
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•Any constraint of the legislator = x self-government
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(Populist) challenge to ECtHR
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•5 Objections towards constraints on legislator:
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•1. power of judges cannot be more than power of citizens
•2. skewed outcomes
•3. role of state (Bellamy: too much focus on negative social and political rights)
•4. Mistaken conception of the person (democracy does not endanger individual, tyranny of majority
is limited by a sense of justice)
•5. damage to public political culture
•Bellamy: political institutions should allow perpetual contestation about interests, rights,
policies
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(Populist) challenge to ECtHR
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•ECtHR’s response
•Margin of appreciation
•Principle of subsidiarity
•Weak review
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•A. Follesdal:
•Liberal contractualism: social institutions must satisfy principles of legitimacy
•Democratic rule with constraints on legislatures may provide important assurance why citizens
should trust institutions
•The least dangerous branch (risk of domination is small)
•ECtHR does not replace political, democratic domestic contestation
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•BUT: the real challenges
•Quality of judicial deliberation
•Risk of unaccountable judges
•Social legitimacy
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Backlash against international HR courts
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•Resistance to ICs
•Who?
•Why?
•How?
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• pushback
• backlash
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•UK confusion
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DH vs Czech Republic
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DH vs Czech Republic
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