Abstract
Drawing on Durkheim, Simmel, and Luhmann, this article grounds the polysemic character of privacy and its contingent legal determination in the functional differentiation of social communication systems. It demonstrates a previously overlooked common denominator among privacy conflicts and an emergent principle for their legal resolution. Case-law examples from the US Supreme Court and the European Court of Human Rights show how functional relevance turns ‘private’ events into ‘public’ ones, or ‘reasonable limitations’ of privacy into ‘unwarranted violations’, and vice versa.
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