In the past decade, European courts have struggled with the challenge of reconciling fundamental rights and security in the digital era. Nowhere has this challenge come to the fore more acutely than in the case of data retention. In its landmark judgment of April 2014 in Digital Rights Ireland, the Court of Justice of the...
Tag: <span>WEDNESDAY JUNE 27 2018 10:45 AM – 12:15 PM</span>
Gay Visibility and the Family
The question of family formation has emerged as the core of the struggle for gay rights, as evidenced by recent cases on same-sex marriage around the world. Long before the marriage debate, however, courts were already engaging with the relationship between homosexuality and family. This paper draws on theories of gay visibility to re-examine the...
Good governance through the prism of the European Court of Human Rights
The principle of good administration has many intellectual homes yet seldom is it analyzed outside the European Union context. Such lack of academic attention does not seem warranted because since the Beyeler case of 2000 the European Court of Human Rights (ECtHR) has named an increasing number of requirements that national administrations have to respect....
Governing By Chief Executives
Despite claims about the “hollowing-out“ of the state, governments worldwide are still focused on policymaking through various bureaucratic structures. But who controls this apparatus? In the US, the common response is that the president possesses most levers of control over the administrative state. In this paper, I argue that similar reality exists in parliamentary systems...
Gremlins in the Electronic Voting Machine: For a Right to Vote Analogously
Voting machines offer convenience. They economise infrastructure and potentially increase voter turnout. Yet, we are trading in information security, a bad deal for democracy indeed. I propose a right a vote analogously, using pen and paper. The machines may suffer technical failure, changing data. Implanting malware or hacking the network can compromise the vote tally....
Gun Control, Security, National Identity: The Story of Fighting EU Law by Introducing “Right to Bear Arms“ into Czech Constitutional Order
As a reaction to terrorist attacks in Paris, EU institutions adopted a directive that in some respect tightened the gun control rules. Using the prevailing eurosceptic mood of citizens and (unexistent) threat of Muslim immigration, opponents of the directive started to fight its implementation in Czechia. Their efforts started to be supported by the government...
Hart, Bentham, and Constitutionalism
Hart claims that Bentham‘s theory of law is a command theory; and that Bentham‘s theory cannot explain ‘legally limited supreme legislature‘ [LLSL]. His claim assumes that judicial review is the archetype of LLSL. I attempt a threefold task. First, I will present Bentham‘s explanation of judicial review, and argue that for Bentham, judicial review is...
How democratic is democracy? A question from the case of the popular consultations in Colombia.
The purpose of this paper is to analyse a new constitutional trend of democracy that is shaping the exploitation of natural resources in the Global South. As a result of recent Colombian Constitutional Court rulings and the appliance of constitutional participatory democracy mechanisms, local communities and authorities are able to hinder mining exploitation or oil...
How Different are Male and Female Judges in Australia? A Time Series Analysis
A common argument is that more women judges will make the judiciary more representative of the community it serves and thereby increase the democratic legitimacy of the courts. This argument assumes that there is something different about female judges when compared to male judges. This paper uses 15 years of demographic data to test that...
How do judges manage risks for life?
Authorities have to be on the alert regarding potential causes of human rights violation. Human rights instruments require from them to take action in order to secure the rights of those within their jurisdictions. The extent of these positive obligations is not unlimited and depends on many factors, among which a risk assessment can play...