Rainer Arnold’s research while affiliated with University of Regensburg and other places

Minority protection is essentially connected to human dignity. Dignity means self-value as a subject, mainly expressed by the principle of individual freedom, nondiscrimination and equality. In many respects, the protection of minorities is required by human dignity.

The contribution reflects on the limitation of national sovereignty which has been effectuated by a transfer of national competences to the supranational institutions. The EU member states have opened their formerly closed legal orders through such transfers and accepted that EU law has direct normative effect. Primacy of EU law is generally accepted, but not regarded as being absolute. In tendency, the core elements of a Constitution are safeguarded by the constitutional courts which have elaborated the concept of constitutional identity.

In the field of Fundamental Rights a process of convergence is going on in Europe. There are three protection levels which are autonomous but functionally interconnected: the national constitutions, the European Convention of Human Rights (ECHR) and, for the member states of the European Union, the EU Fundamental Rights Charter. A total convergence comes into effect when the EU Charter applies in the member states, alternatively to the national Constitution. The impact of the ECHR on the signatory states’ orders leads to a relative convergence by conceptual transfer. In Germany, the national fundamental rights have to be interpreted in the light of the ECHR independently from its internal rank equivalent to ordinary federal law. In UK the Human Rights Act has established a mechanism which effects the adaptation of legislation to the jurisprudence of the Strasbourg Human Rights Court. In France, Article 55 of the Constitution gives the ECHR primacy over internal legislation. The accession of the EU to the ECHR is not yet been realized but the influences of the Strasbourg jurisprudence are significant. The EU Charter has to be interpreted, in important parts, in the light of the ECHR. It seems justified to state that fundamental rights in Europe undergo a significant convergence process.

The German system of cooperative federalism is characterised by a multiplicity of vertical and horizontal intergovernmental relations. Of particular significance are the relations of the Federal Council with the Federal Parliament in the legislative process. External intergovernmental relations take place, in particular, in EU matters. The autonomy of the members of the German Federation, the Länder, is considerably relativated by the intergovernmental cooperation. © 2013 Springer-Verlag Berlin Heidelberg. All rights are reserved.

It is difficult to define universality. It is a complex concept which incorporates geographic, cultural, historical and political dimensions (Solomon Islands, Chap. 6). As yet there is no generally accepted notion of universality of human rights.