The Role of the ECJ in the Protection of Fundamental Rights

Abstract

This chapter examines the role of the European Court of Justice in protecting fundamental rights. It shows that the Court's approach in this area developed progressively over several decades and different phases, through a number of judgments which were as bold as they were far-sighted. It has undertaken a dynamic interpretation of Community law, developing to their full extent principles inherent in the legal order originally created by the Treaties. The Court has carried out its mission and fulfilled its role in a consistent manner.

La adhesión de la Unión Europea al Convenio Europeo de Derechos Humanos

“…"La dispersión y sectorialización de los derechos humanos en la Unión Europea" en AZNAR GÓMEZ, M.J. Pérez González, Vol I, 2012, pp. 1453-1474, p.1457TIZZANO, A. "The Role of the ECJ in the Protection of Fundamental Rights" en ARNULL, A. ECKHOUT, P. and TRIDIMAS, T.…”

Further Developments in the Right to be Forgotten: The European Court of Justice's Judgment in Case C-131/12, Google Spain, SL, Google Inc v Agencia Espanola de Proteccion de Datos

“…82 As Advocate General Tizzano has noted, writing extrajudicially, 'the Court came to de facto integrate the Convention, as well as the jurisprudence of its Strasbourg counterpart, in the Community legal order through its general principles'. 83 Thus, despite the fact that the EU's accession to the Convention is still pending, there is a clear and direct need to engage with the ECHR and with the Strasbourg Court's case law now: 84 not only is there an obligation to accede to the ECHR, 85 but the Convention is also already structurally embedded in both the Charter and the EU's fundamental rights tradition more broadly. 86 That being said, the CJEU has also made clear in its judgments in Kamberaj and Fransson that it is the Charter and not the ECHR that governs the minimum level of protection of fundamental rights in the EU.…”