Restrictions of Rights

Undoubtedly one of the best ways to deepen our understanding of the nature and scope of constitutional rights is through an examination of the statutory (and other) restrictions on them, to the extent permitted by the relevant constitutions. Rights often collide with other rights (both with other categories of rights, and with the similar rights of other people), and with other important social goals which are often also constitutionally proclaimed. How these rights can properly be restricted is a matter both of the constitutional design of the permissible grounds for such restrictions, and also of the interpretation by constitutional courts of these grounds and of the additional requirements, which together constitute a pattern of scrutiny of the limitations of rights. Both the constitutional design and the courts' interpretation thereof will be discussed in this chapter. In addition, I will look at a matter that is partly beyond the main theme of this book, namely, the constitutional treatment of citizens' duties. As rights and duties are often proclaimed in one breath in constitutional texts, with the latter often limiting the former, it is appropriate that some attention is also paid to this topic in this chapter.