Is the European Court of Human Rights' Case Law on Anti-Roma Violence 'Beyond Reasonable Doubt'?

Discourses of Roma Anti-Discrimination in Reports on Human Rights Violations

“…This means that the Court is not applying its-already limited-competence to its full extent. 26 July 2007a, § 93-95;Möschel, 2012;O'Connell, 2009;Smith & O'Connell, 2011). These cases often concern racial violence by the police or evictions, while cases of discrimination regarding classic civic-political rights, such as the right to a fair trial or investigation 8 or the right to stand for election, get more easily judged as discriminatory and thus violating article 14 (ECHR, 6 July 2005, 12 July 2005, 13 December 2005, 31 May 2007, 26 July 2007a, 26 July 2007b, 6 December 2007, 22 December 2009, 25 March 2010, Möschel, 2012, O'Connell, 2009).…”

“…An important turning point can be situated in the D.H. case, whereby the Grand Chamber accepted in 2007 that the statistical evidence provided by the applicants was sufficient to give rise to a presumption of indirect discrimination and judged it as an article 14 violation as it did not regard the Czech government's justification as objective and reasonable (Dembour, 2009;ECHR, 13 November 2007, § 185-204;Ignatoiu-Sora, 2011;O'Connell, 2009;Smith & O'Connell, 2011). Moreover, the Court provided a broad definition of what racial discrimination entails, including in it discrimination on account of one's actual or perceived ethnicity and condemned this as a particularly invidious kind of discrimination which requires special vigilance and a vigorous reaction (ECHR, 13 November 2007, § 176;Möschel, 2012). Furthermore, the Court has noticed in several cases that the Gypsy way of life needs to be facilitated and that the Roma constitute a disadvantaged and vulnerable minority group in need of protection (ECHR, 18 January 2001a, § 107, 18 January 2001b, § 96, 18 January 2001c, § 110, 18 January 2001d, § 98, 27 May 2004, § 84, 13 November 2007, § 182, 8 December 2009, § 61, 16 March 2010, § 147, 8 November 2011, § 146, 179, 24 April 2012Peroni & Timmer, 2013;Smith & O'Connell, 2011).…”

“…It should be noted that our focus on the ECHR can give a somewhat distorted image, as there are other judicial or quasi-judicial institutions with different competences that do take on a stronger anti-discrimination discourse. In particular, the European Committee of Social Rights has proven to be more progressive, for example in terms of the right to housing (Möschel, 2012). In a way this difference in approach is evident, as the ECHR relies on the European Convention of Human Rights, which has a traditional civic-political rights focus (and the prohibition of discrimination only applies to the rights set forth in the Convention), while the European Social Charter that guides the European Committee of Social Rights is built around socio-economic rights.…”

Adaptation et réflexivité

“…L'exclusion des Roms a été quantifiée et traduite en termes de coût économique (World Bank, 2010). Entre 2010 et 2013, l'article 7.2 du règlement 1080/2006/CE sur le Fonds européen de développement régional a été modifié en ce qui concerne l'éligibilité des interventions du logement en faveur des communautés (Kullmann et al, 2014) bougé vers le niveau territorial, où une contextualisation précise de la mise en oeuvre permet de cerner les dynamiques les plus enchevêtrées (Legros, Vitale, 2011 (Moschel, 2012). De la même manière, le FERV donne une priorité forte à « la lutte contre l'antitsiganisme, défini comme un type de discrimination spécifique constituant un obstacle majeur à l'intégration sociale et au plein respect des droits humains » (FERV, 2014, p. 6).…”

Eroding the protection against discrimination: The procedural and de-contextualized approach to S.A.S. v France

“…v. France 1 concerning the law prohibiting for anyone to conceal their face in public places (the so-called full-face veil ban). The article identifies weaknesses in the Court’s jurisprudence concerning discrimination and suggests that despite the Court having announced its commitment to tackle particularly discrimination based on gender and ethnicity, there are multiple factors that impede the Court from addressing discrimination to its full extent (see also Arnardóttir, 2007, p. 38; Arnardóttir, 2014; Möschel, 2012, p. 492).…”