Interpretation of Fundamental Rights in a Multilevel Legal System: An Analysis of the European Court of Human Rights and the Court of Justice of the ... Union: 46 (School of Human Rights Research) - Softcover

Senden, Hanneke

Softcover

ISBN 10: 1780680279 ISBN 13: 9781780680279

Publisher: Intersentia Ltd, 2011

Synopsis

Fundamental rights provisions are known for their relatively vague and general formulation. As a result, judges dealing with these provisions are confronted with many and often controversial interpretative choices. These interpretative choices already present judges operating in a national context with difficulties, but that is even more so for European judges operating in a multilevel context. The European Court of Human Rights (ECtHR) and the Court of Justice of the European Union (CJEU) are often criticized for delivering judgments that contain debatable choices and do not offer sufficient insight into the reasons which have led the courts to make these choices. Especially in a multilevel context where the cooperation of national authorities plays an important role as regards the effectiveness of the European courts, it is important that interpretation methods and principles are used in a transparent manner so that the reasons that justify a specific interpretative choice are clear. This volume analyses the use of a selected number of interpretation methods and principles in the fundamental rights case law of the ECtHR and the CJEU. The use of teleological, comparative, evolutive and autonomous interpretation by the ECtHR and the CJEU are elaborately discussed on the basis of both legal theoretical literature and case law. The legal theoretical analysis provides the basis for various relevant questions, hypotheses and (analytical) suggestions, that are further studied in the subsequent case law analysis. This leads to a thorough overview of the role of these interpretation methods and principles and the possibilities for improvement. This volume has been written as a PhD Thesis by Hanneke Senden (Institute for Public Law, University of Leiden; presently lawyer at Van Doorne, the Netherlands) in the framework of the research project 'Judicial reasoning in fundamental rights cases - national and European perspectives', supervised by professor J.H. Gerards and funded by the Netherlands Organisation of Scientific Research (NWO).

About this title

About the Author

Hanneke is an associate lawyer with Bird & Bird. She regularly advises and litigates on a variety of employment issues, such as employee representation, individual employment cases including termination, performance as well as non-competition issues. She qualified as a lawyer in 2011 and joined us in 2014. She graduated from Maastricht University with a Master's degree in European and comparative law. In 2011 she obtained her PhD in law on the use of interpretation methods by the European Court of Justice and the European Court of Human Rights.Hanneke is a member of the Dutch association for Employment Law (VvA).

From the Back Cover

Fundamental rights provisions are known for their relatively vague and general formulation. As a result, judges dealing with these provisions are confronted with many and often controversial interpretative choices. These interpretative choices already present judges operating in a national context with difficulties, but that is even more so for European judges operating in a multilevel context.

The European Court of Human Rights (ECtHR) and the Court of Justice of the European Union (CJEU) are often criticized for delivering judgments that contain debatable choices and do not offer sufficient insight into the reasons which have led the courts to make these choices. Especially in a multilevel context where the cooperation of national authorities plays an important role as regards the effectiveness of the European courts, it is important that interpretation methods and principles are used in a transparent manner so that the reasons that justify a specific interpretative choice are clear.
This volume analyses the use of a selected number of interpretation methods and principles in the fundamental rights case law of the ECtHR and the CJEU. The use of teleological, comparative, evolutive and autonomous interpretation by the ECtHR and the CJEU are elaborately discussed on the basis of both legal theoretical literature and case law. The legal theoretical analysis provides the basis for various relevant questions, hypotheses and (analytical) suggestions, that are further studied in the subsequent case law analysis. This leads to a thorough overview of the role of these interpretation methods and principles and the possibilities for improvement.

This volume has been written as a PhD Thesis by Hanneke Senden (Institute for Public Law, University of Leiden; presently lawyer at Van Doorne, the Netherlands) in the framework of the research project ‘Judicial reasoning in fundamental rights cases – national and European perspectives’, supervised by professor J.H. Gerards and funded by the Netherlands Organisation of Scientific Research (NWO).

About the book
‘The present work contributes a very interesting analysis of the jurisprudence of the ECHR and the ECJ and can be recommended to [readers] not only interested in the content of judgments but also in the technical side of the decision-making process.’
Stefan Kieber in Newsletter Menschenrechte (NLMR) 1/2012, 69, 70

Edition details

• Publisher: Intersentia Ltd
• Publication date: 2011
• Language: English
• ISBN 10: 1780680279
• ISBN 13: 9781780680279
• Binding: Paperback
• Edition number: 1
• Number of pages: 466