Presentation at the Workshop of the Berkeley Equality & Anti-Discrimination law Virtual Study Group.

On November 26th, Dorothea Staes (PhD candidate at the Perelman Center and at the Saint-Louis University) will present a working paper entitled « ‘External’ documents in decisions of the European Court of Human Rights – Legitimate and harmonizing tools for argumentation ? » at the workshop of the Berkeley Equality & Anti-Discrimination law Virtual Study Group. Her presentation starts from the observation of an increasingly diverse (or pluralist) normative context within and beyond human rights. Subsequently, she focuses on tools or opportunities that this context has to offer within human rights decision-making procedures. Making use of recent case law examples, her presentation will more particularly discuss the introduction of ‘external’ documents in decisions of the European Court of Human Rights to interpret and apply the European Convention on Human Rights and its Protocols. Which tools do these ‘external’ documents offer to judges and (third) parties ? What does the introduction of such documents imply for the position of the latter ? Attention will equally be paid to legitimacy questions surrounding referencing practice, particularly in light of procedural justice requirements. A final topic that will be addressed is whether or not the importation of ’external’ documents in the ECtHR’s judgments contributes to the reduction of ’diversity’ associated with the pluralist context.