Domestic Authorities’ Obligations to Co-Develop the Rights of the European Convention on Human Rights

Abstract

Starting from the recognition that European human rights law develops bottom-up through the practice of democratic national authorities, this contribution analyses domestic authorities’ substantive and procedural obligations to ‘secure’ the rights of the European Convention on Human Rights (ECHR), and in particular the extent to which the dynamic elements of these obligations have been consolidated through European Court of Human Rights’ (ECtHR) jurisprudence. To this end, it initially disaggregates the obligations addressing parliaments and domestic courts respectively to respect, protect and fulfill Convention rights in light of present-day conditions. It secondly examines how domestic courts and parliaments should effectively interact to secure ECHR rights in an up-to-date manner. Third, it analyses how the ECtHR ‘communicates’ these obligations to domestic authorities by relying on the principle of subsidiarity/margin of appreciation. Overall, the contribution enhances our understanding of how domestic authorities should secure the rights of the Convention in circumstances of change (‘co-develop’ the law of the Convention), and how the ECtHR can promote domestic authorities’ engagement with the Convention towards this end.