Regional mechanisms of protection

Introduction This chapter reviews a number of questions raised by the protection of human rights at a regional level. It does not offer a systematic treatment of how the Universal Declaration of Human Rights has been implemented in the regional context; nor does it examine in detail the working methods or case law of regional human rights courts or expert bodies established at regional level. This case law has been presented in chapters 3–7, which examined the content of States’ obligations to respect, protect and fulfil human rights without discrimination. In those chapters, the contribution of regional courts or non-judicial bodies has been analysed alongside that of bodies established at the international level, in order to describe the content of the emerging jus commune in the field of human rights. As to the overall context, it has been briefly recalled in chapter 1, section 2, which discussed the role of human rights in the Council of Europe, the Organization of American States, and the African Union. Instead, this chapter aims to review a set of core questions raised at regional level, that remained unaddressed in the previous chapters. It is divided into three sections, corresponding respectively to the Council of Europe, the Organization of American States, and the African Union (formerly Organization of African Unity). The materials presented seek to identify some of the challenges that regional courts have been facing. They address the role of these jurisdictions in the development of the jus commune of human rights, as well as the solutions these courts have developed to ensure the effective implementation of their judgments. In addition, the section on the Council of Europe provides a presentation of the role of the European Committee on Social Rights (ECSR), established under the European Social Charter. The ECSR is chosen as an illustration of one expert body established at regional level, operating roughly along the lines of the UN human rights treaty bodies: the discussion addresses the relationship between the function of the Committee in receiving reports from the States parties to the Charter and its function in receiving collective complaints, and the nature of the collective complaints mechanism itself.