The Reception of International Law in the European Court of Human Rights

Abstract

This book provides an overview of the reception of international law in the case law of the European Commission on Human Rights (ECommHR) and the European Court of Human Rights (ECtHR). It evaluates whether the Strasbourg bodies were able to create a coherent and comprehensive approach to the interpretation and evaluation of international law. The Strasbourg bodies' interactions with the international legal order and other special regimes reveal important lessons for the good functioning of the ECHR and international law alike. This book thus probes whether the Court has been able to contribute to international law and to the resolution of the fragmentation problem. It assesses fragmentation in specific areas of international human rights law and general international law at the level of the European public order. In this context, an important matter to consider is the extent to which the Court behaves autonomously and/or falls back on international law, either special or general. Further, the book discusses the question whether the Court or the Commission have sufficiently recognized that international law is a system and whether they have integrated the ECHR into this framework. The book covers six special regimes, namely international civil and political rights, international child rights, international refugee rights, international humanitarian law, the prohibition against torture, and State immunity. It also evaluates two areas of general international law, namely the law of treaties and the case law and Statute of the International Court of Justice.