The FAU CHREN Human Rights Clinic invites to an Interactive panel discussion for students and doctoral researchers.

Beyond the Judgment - Courts, Trust and the Rule of Law

Courts shape the conditions of life in society by applying and interpreting the law. Through their rulings, constitutional and international human rights courts determine how rights are applied in practice and thereby affect the lives of people far beyond individual cases. In some constitutional systems, courts can invalidate decisions of elected bodies, and their rulings may therefore become politically contested, sometimes triggering a backlash against the courts themselves. Yet judicial independence has in many cases proved more resilient to such pressures than might have been expected, although this resilience should not be taken for granted.
This panel asks where a court’s resilience comes from. Legal cultures differ, and so does the way courts earn trust. British courts rely on oral advocacy and precedent, while parliamentary sovereignty limits their power. The German Federal Constitutional Court decides mostly in writing yet enjoys exceptionally high public trust. The European Court of Human Rights must reconcile 46 legal traditions and depends on governments’ willingness to comply. The Inter-American Court of Human Rights sits in member states to reach those most affected, and the bench of the African Court on Human and Peoples’ Rights is designed to reflect the continent’s legal traditions. There is no single model of a resilient court. Where citizens understand what is at stake, they have defended their courts and, through elections, reversed developments that weakened them. The rule of law concerns not lawyers alone, but everyone who depends on fair and predictable decisions.
The panel will discuss these aspects and also reflect on our guests’ paths into the law, between scholarship and practice. This speaks in particular to students and doctoral researchers weighing a future in academia or human rights practice.

Guests:

Professor Doris König
Vice President of the German Federal Constitutional Court a.D.

Sir Tim Eicke KC
Former British judge of the European Court of Human Rights

Mauricio A. Ricaurte-Moncaleano
Doctoral researcher at the Cluster of Excellence

The discussion will be moderated by Daniela Kolland (doctoral researcher at the Cluster of Excellence and coordinator of the Clinic) and Julia Knopp (student assistant at the Clinic).

From 15:00h, coffee and cake will be available outside the lecture hall for registered guests for an informal get-together.

If you are interested in attending, please register by sending an email to daniela.kolland@fau.de no later than 17 November 2026.