The Criminal Process And Human Rights

Revised papers from a conference organised by the United Kingdom National Commission on Comparative Law at Manchester 1978.

The title of this work illustrates the two difficulties which the chosen theme poses, difficulties which arise from the confrontation between collective and individual interests. On the one hand, the criminal process is based on the protection of society; on the other hand, human rights implies respect for all individuals implicated in that process, be they victim, witness or accused. A third difficulty arises in relation to the new influence of European law. While the right to judge has long appeared to be the most obvious indication of national sovereignty, it is now subject to supranational control and a State can be censured by the European Court of Human Rights. Part One of this volume analyses the period of reform in various Eastern and Western European countries; Part Two explores the debate among jurists, historians, sociologists and philosophers on the subject of the criminal trial in a democratic society. Finally, Part Three reflects on the issue within the context of the European Community and the European Council and explores the question of a future model for the European criminal trial. Professor Mireille Delmas-Marty teaches at l'Université de Paris I - Panthéon Sorbonne and is a member of l'Institut Universitaire de France. She is the editor of The European Convention for the Protection of Human Rights, International Protection versus National Restrictions (Martinus Nijhoff Publishers, 1992.)

A survey of Czech business law, tax and accounting regulations. The political, legal and economic systems of the Republic are outlined.

"A comprehensive guide to the impact of human rights law upon Australian criminal process." --

This is an open access title available under the terms of a CC BY-NC-ND 4.0 International licence. It is free to read at Oxford Scholarship Online and offered as a free PDF download from OUP and selected open access locations. There has been little sustained consideration of the ways in which human rights act to safeguard the individual from substantive unfairness or injustice in the imposition of punishment. Human rights might be expected to play a pivotal role at the sentencing stage, regulating the process and substance of sentencing, mapping out the state's role, and affording it legitimacy in the imposition of punishment. The traditional view that sentencing theory is best understood as a branch of moral philosophy has obscured the importance of consideration of the special nature of state punishment as mediated by and through law and the significance of human rights principles, notably legality, proportionality, equality, and judicial responsibility for the determination of the sentence. Sarah Summers focusses on sentencing practices which are widespread across Europe and indeed further afield and their compatibility with constitutional or human rights principles. Sentencing and Human Rights develops a systematic account of the importance of human rights principles at sentencing stage. Consideration of these principles provides the basis for an examination of the way in which they might be expected to limit important sentencing practices, such as the imposition of aggravated sentences for previous convictions, the treatment of confessions and mandatory minimum sentences. It is not just that punishment follows a multitude of aims but rather that the balance of these aims may, and in the context of lengthy prison sentences almost certainly will, change during the sentence. This examination of the human rights limits on the sentence suggests that it might be necessary to reconsider the way in which state punishment is conceptualised in sentencing theory.

"...Papers presented at the Cambridge Centre for Public Law's winter conference on 9-10 January 1999."--P. [vii].