Handbook

Europe enjoys the world's most advanced regional human rights system. Its 'jewel in the crown' is the European Convention on Human Rights (ECHR) of 1950, the world's first and still unique human rights treaty, adopted by the Council of Europe as a reaction to the mass murders and atrocities of the Second World War. 47 States have ratified the Convention; some 50,000 applications have been submitted in 2008; some 100,000 cases are pending before the European Court of Human Rights (ECtHR). In recent years, the European Union has also become a major actor in the field of human rights. Europe thus possesses two systems of human rights protection that are complementary and constitute the core of this course.

Main Topics

• A general introduction and a discussion of the changing views about the tasks of the ECtHR;
• Human rights in the European Union (EU);
• 'Absolute'? guarantees (right to life, prohibition of torture);
• Private and family life;
• The freedoms of expression, of the press and of association;
• Multiculturalism, democracy's enemies, terrorism;
• Right to property;
• Prospects and reform of the system.