Streikverbot für Beamte – sowohl verfassungs- als auch konventionsgemäß? Kritische Anmerkungen zum Urteil des BVerfG vom 12.6.2018

Abstract

This article critically approaches the recent decision of the German Federal Constitutional Court regarding the ban on strikes for civil servants. It shows that the judgment cannot be seen as a decision committed to international public law, as some scholars suggest. By once more adopting a material understanding of Art. 33 para. 5 Basic Law and thereby not only confirming the constitutionality, but in particular the constitutional status of the ban on strikes for civil servants, the court holds on to the absolute primacy of the Basic Law that is not to be undermined by the ECHR or the jurisprudence of the ECtHR as a means of interpretation. The reference to the need to contextualize the jurisprudence of the ECtHR as well as the emphasis on the national particularity of the Federal Republic of Germany clearly indicate that, by developing a state-centred principle of commitment to public international law, the court does not seek to align and harmonize the requirements of the ECHR and the Basic Law by developing a state-centred principle of commitment to public international law but rather to achieve a delimitation of competences between the spheres of the ECtHR and the Federal Constitutional Court.