Description
Werkstattgespräch: Migration is sometimes pitched as the ‘last bastion of sovereignty’ – an area in which States should enjoy ‘unfettered discretion’. The ‘discovery’ of the human rights of migrants, i.e., the increasing recognition that human rights protection extends to migrants especially by the European Court of Human Rights, however, challenges such a presumed power to exclude and places limits on the ways in which governments can design their migration policies.This talk proposes that one response of Contracting States to this development is ‘reverse strategic litigation: they try – and succeed – to counter human rights from within in migration-related human rights jurisprudence in order to legitimise their migration control policies under human rights law. Acting as ‘doctrinal entrepreneurs’, they activate and harness exclusionary elements within the law in order to shape doctrine to accommodate their interests in excluding migrants. This is a very powerful approach: If States succeed in shaping the very meaning of human rights law, they can defuse and limit the potential of human rights law to place restrictions on their migration policies.
| Period | 28 May 2024 |
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| Held at | Law & Society Institute, Humboldt University Berlin, Germany |
| Degree of Recognition | National |