Strasbourg judgment (15 January 2013) Eweida and others v UK

By Carl Gardner, 
Barrister, former UK government lawyer, London - United Kingdom

Nadia Eweida has succeeded in her claim that the UK breached her right to manifest her religion under article 9 of the European Convention on Human Rights. Readers may remember that she worked for British Airways, and refused to abide by its uniform policy, insisting on wearing a cross visible to customers. By a majority of five to two (the dissenters including the Court’s British former President, Sir Nicolas Bratza), the judges of the European Court of Human Rights found that the English court that dismissed her religious discrimination and human rights claim at national level, the Court of Appeal, gave too much weight to BA’s corporate aims and not enough to Ms Eweida’s desire to manifest her religion by wearing her cross. In consequence, the UK breached its “positive obligation” to protect her right to manifest her religion.

Subsidiarity in Luxembourg and Strasbourg Europe

By Jeroen M.J. Chorus

retired vice-president of the Amsterdam Court of Appeal in the Netherlands

One of the important aims of the French revolution was the unification of private law within France. In the ‘enlightened society’ the citizen only had to deal with the state itself, no longer with intermediate status groups to which he had belonged, such as feudal, ecclesiastical, trade and profession, or family status groups, nor with territorial parts of the state where each region or city might have its own law. As Voltaire observed, a traveller changed his law as often as he changed horses. Instead, private law ought to be common to the whole country.

Why Judges in Europe Need To Work Together

By David Ordóñez-Solís
Senior Judge in the Oviedo Administrative Court, Spain

With a response from Rudolf R. Winter

Coordinating senior vice-president of the Administrative High Court for Trade and Industry in The Hague, Netherlands

When in 2008 Richard Posner, a well-known American federal judge and professor at Chicago University, launched his book How Judges Think, he suggested other provocative and alternative titles for his book like Do Judges Think? or Which Judges Think? I want to raise the question Do Judges Really Need Networking; can an exchange of information and best practices between judges in Europe really improve their work? 

(Dutch) Rechtsstatelijk management van de rechterlijke organisatie

by Marc de Werd 

(Amsterdam Court of Appeal)

Rechtsstatelijk management van de rechterlijke organisatie mag anno 2013 best ‘een uitdaging’ heten. Het Straatsburgse mensenrechtenhof maakt het de rechterlijke organisaties in de 47 lidstaten namelijk niet makkelijk. Wie terugblikt op een jaar EHRM-jurisprudentie valt op dat de grens tussen bedrijfsvoering en rechtspreken in Europa precair wordt.

 JOHAN RUDOLPH THORBECKE (1798-1872)