Recent jurisprudence of the European Court of Human Rights relevant to employment law

Abstract

In the field of regulatory instruments in the social field, the European Convention on Human Rights (ECHR) and the related jurisprudence of the Court of European Court of Human Rights (ECtHR) deserves renewed focus. In recent years considerable debate has developed over the relationship between social rights and human rights, and the jurisprudence of the ECtHR has clearly demonstrated the growing value of human rights in the workplace. The Court explored the growing facets of the ban on forced labour and discrimination; developed the idea of employee privacy and contributed to the protection of their freedom of religion, expression and association; recognised the ‘vulnerability’ of the employee in the employment relationship and has drawn from it the principle that a restriction on hiring practices or certain dismissal practices may have a ‘chilling effect’ on the exercise of the rights provided for by the Convention. In essence, thanks to a sensitivity towards the social and labour field, and due to the integrated approach adopted by the Court of Strasbourg, the scope of the ECHR has been broadly extended to include the protection of certain social rights of a collective nature.