The Evolution of EU Human Rights Law

Abstract

Gráinne de Búrca’s chapter analyses the evolution of EU human rights law in three distinct periods. The first is the period prior to the creation of the European Communities, when the human rights provisions of the draft European Political Community Treaty and its background materials were drawn up in the early 1950s. The second covers the period from the disappearance of human rights matters from European Community discourse with the adoption of the EEC and Euratom Treaties in 1957, until their re-emergence through the 1970s and 1980s in judicial and political discourse. The third covers the ‘high constitutional’ period from the adoption of the Maastricht Treaty in 1992 until after the adoption of the Lisbon Treaty in 2010, and reflects on what has taken place in terms of the development of EU human rights law between the time of the Lisbon Treaty and today. The chapter highlights three principal differences between the framework envisaged in the 1950s and that which is in place today, focusing on today’s much more limited monitoring, review, and intervention role for the EU with regard to human rights protection within the Member States, the more distant relationship between the EU and the ECHR and their respective courts, and the uneven role for human rights in the EU’s internal as opposed to its external relations. The chapter concludes by reflecting on whether the EU’s current constitutional framework for human rights protection is fit for purpose as we enter the third decade of the millennium.