The European Court of Justice: taking rights seriously?

Abstract

It is easily assumed that the use of the language of fundamental rights protection by the European Court of Justice translates directly into an extension of the actual protection of those rights within the European Community. It is the purpose of this paper to question that assumption.Whilst it would appear to be widely accepted that the initial motivation for the adoption of the terminology of fundamental rights by the European Court of Justice was a desire to defend the supremacy of Community law over national law, a close analysis of certain recent cases in the European Court shows that the court has begun to use rights talk in a different way.

A Decade of Europe? Some Reflections on an Aspiration

“…35 There are, of course, the inevitable problems of definition. At times it has been suggested that European citizens enjoy 'fundamental rights' to travel abroad for an abortion, to enjoy fair working conditions, even to fish.…”

Judicial Activism

“…However, in the first period of its activity, and in the mentioned cases, the ECJ was more concerned in creating a framework for the protection of fundamental rights than in effectively protecting them, since it allowed significant restrictions to their content (Coppel and O' Neil 1992).…”

Ironies in Human Rights Protection in the EU: Pre‐Accession Conditionality and Post‐Accession Conundrums

“…58 In 1992, Coppel and O'Neill argued in a well-known article that the ECJ's high rhetoric of human rights protection has merely been instrumental for the court's expansion of the scope and impact of European law, with fundamental rights not being taken seriously by the court. 59 At the time, this argument was vehemently rejected by leading EU lawyers. 60 However, such concerns resurfaced in the course of the Banana saga, where German courts voiced their open distrust with regard to the EC institutions and the protection of fundamental rights offered by the ECJ to individuals.…”