Abstract
This chapter has two main sections: Section 9.2 deals with two critiques of human rights-based judicial review based on the democratic thesis that law-makers should be accountable to the people they represent: (1) a rule of law objection, that the bills of rights are insufficiently specific and clear as to what they require and permit, and (2) a practical objection: that human rights judicial review is largely ineffective in promoting human rights goals. Section 9.3, argues (1) that the weaker ‘Dialogue’ or ‘Commonwealth’ versions of court-based human rights judicial review do not successfully evade either the rule of law or the efficacy critiques, and (2) that a better alternative is to institutionalise bills of rights as political constitutions involving mechanisms such as human rights-based legislative review of existing and prospective legislation.
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- 1.
Since this chapter was written the Commonwealth of Australia has enacted the Human Rights (Parliamentary Scrutiny) Act 2011, along the lines proposed in this chapter. See Kinley and Ernst 2012.
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Campbell, T. (2013). The Rule of Law and Human Rights Judicial Review: Controversies and Alternatives. In: Flores, I., Himma, K. (eds) Law, Liberty, and the Rule of Law. Ius Gentium: Comparative Perspectives on Law and Justice, vol 18. Springer, Dordrecht. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-94-007-4743-2_9
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