Reassembling the French State via Human Rights: Between Human Rights Internationalism and Political Sovereignism

TY - CHAP

T1 - Reassembling the French State via Human Rights

T2 - Between Human Rights Internationalism and Political Sovereignism

AU - Madsen, Mikael Rask

PY - 2018/1/1

Y1 - 2018/1/1

N2 - This chapter analyses how the growing force of particularly the European Court of Human Rights (ECHR) has reassembled the French State. It argues that the development of the relationship between France and European human rights is hardly a linear development but rather one marked by a schism between internationalism and sovereignism that is both historical and contemporary. The chapter suggests that three stages can be observed with regard to the reception of international and European human rights in France. The first period is marked by export and national refusal of international human rights as a matter of domestic politics, lasting until roughly the mid-1970s. The second period is characterised by a burgeoning domestic political interest but still marked by an autonomous domestic interpretation of rights within the legal field, lasting until mid- to late 2000s. And the third period is marked by the mainstreaming of ECHR norms - at least on substantive matters - into the French legal field. In conclusion, the analysis points to the new Euro-scepticism in France and its possible implications for the Strasbourg institutions and their role in France.

AB - This chapter analyses how the growing force of particularly the European Court of Human Rights (ECHR) has reassembled the French State. It argues that the development of the relationship between France and European human rights is hardly a linear development but rather one marked by a schism between internationalism and sovereignism that is both historical and contemporary. The chapter suggests that three stages can be observed with regard to the reception of international and European human rights in France. The first period is marked by export and national refusal of international human rights as a matter of domestic politics, lasting until roughly the mid-1970s. The second period is characterised by a burgeoning domestic political interest but still marked by an autonomous domestic interpretation of rights within the legal field, lasting until mid- to late 2000s. And the third period is marked by the mainstreaming of ECHR norms - at least on substantive matters - into the French legal field. In conclusion, the analysis points to the new Euro-scepticism in France and its possible implications for the Strasbourg institutions and their role in France.

U2 - 10.1017/9781108590396.008

DO - 10.1017/9781108590396.008

M3 - Book chapter

SN - 9781108427760

T3 - Studies on International Courts and Tribunals

SP - 139

EP - 159

BT - International Courts and Domestic Politics

A2 - Wind, Marlene

PB - Cambridge University Press

ER -