Teaching Comparative

Rule of law through treaty

Rebecca Small pointed out an article in the Washington Post that I'd missed. Thank you, Rebecca.

(Aside: I rely on your help in finding things like this, so send me references to things that look useful or send your recommendations directly to the gov/pol EDG or post them at the online discussion group. We all can use each other's help.)

The rule of law may sneak into a political system in unusual ways. In this case, through an old Cold War institution. And the motivation for accepting the authority of the international court is probably the desire by the Russian power elite for closer relations with the economic powers of Western Europe, even if that means basic political reform.


Europe's Long Legal Tether on Russia -- Court of Human Rights a Powerful Check on Excesses, Abuses

"While President Vladimir Putin has been marginalizing Russia's parliament, opposition, media and human rights groups, this international court sitting 1,250 miles away in Strasbourg, France, has emerged as a powerful check on the excesses of the Russian bureaucracy and failures by the country's own investigative organs and courts to follow Russia's laws.

"The European Court enforces the Convention for the Protection of Human Rights and Fundamental Freedoms, drawn up by the Council of Europe, an international body founded in the wake of World War II to defend human rights, parliamentary democracy and the rule of law. Russia ratified the convention in 1998, agreeing to accept the court's decisions as binding...

"Following European Court decisions in recent years, Russia improved conditions in pretrial detention centers and trimmed the powers of federal or local authorities to reopen ostensibly completed cases that they have lost in domestic courts. Torture victims have been compensated, and in at least one case, police officers were jailed for abuse after the Strasbourg court took up the matter.

"'The court represents the end of impunity,' said Olga Shepeleva, a lawyer with Demos, a human rights research center in Moscow. 'There's a growing recognition that the court is a place where justice will be done. The authorities may not always be happy, but they pay attention to the results.'

"While Russia is quick to pay any compensation ordered by the court, the country has been criticized by the Council of Europe's parliamentary assembly for failing to carry out systemic and deep reforms as a result of court rulings..."

We should note, as the article later does, that "Reports by the Council of Europe's parliamentary assembly have criticized countries from Ukraine to Britain for dragging their feet on reforms."

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The Council of Europe describes itself as "the continent's oldest political organisation, founded in 1949."

It says it was set up to:


• defend human rights, parliamentary democracy and the rule of law 

• develop continent-wide agreements to standardise member countries' social and legal practices

• promote awareness of a European identity based on shared values and cutting across different cultures

Since the fall of the Iron Curtain, the group's web site says its main job has become:

• acting as a political anchor and human rights watchdog for Europe's post-communist democracies

• assisting the countries of central and eastern Europe in carrying out and consolidating political, legal and constitutional reform in parallel with economic reform

• providing know-how in areas such as human rights, local democracy, education, culture and the environment

The Council of Europe is composed of:


• the Committee of Ministers, composed of the 46 Foreign ministers or their Strasbourg-based deputies... which is the Organisation's decision-making body

• the Parliamentary Assembly, grouping 630 members... from the 46 national parliaments
  
• the Congress of Local and Regional Authorities

• the 1800-strong secretariat...

The Council of Europe, then, is an international treaty organization, not a supra-natonal, constitutional membership organization like the European Union. It's decision-making is done by representatives of the member governments. Unlike the European Union, its organizations do not include any direct representation of member countries citizens. It is, however, a force for promoting rule of law in Europe.

There's a useful page on the COE web site, titled "What's what?" that helps distinguish between COE organizations and EU bodies. The definitions there should help students in keeping these two international organizations distinct in their minds.

posted by Ken Wedding @ 10:52 AM