Tom 12 (2012): Zeszyt 1 (June 2012)

The article deals with the rules for a grant of interim measures in the context of EU law and its application in national judicial proceedings. It covers the key case-law of the Court of Justice of the EU related to the regime, conditions and limits of the interim measures and adds a reflection of practice of Czech courts. Article pays particular attention to the conditions for suspension ofn the application of national law measures.

Human rights are much talked about and much written about, in academic legal literature as well as in political and other social sciences and the general political debate. Indeed, they are so oft en referred to and used as a basis for claims of various kinds that there may be a risk of certain “inflation” in that so much is said to be a human right that the notion loses its essential meaning. Th is article argues that the universality of basic human rights is one of the values of the concept of rights. Th e rights and the understanding and interpretation of rights may have to be purist. Th is may be the way universal human rights as a concept can survive at all. In the modern world there are different trends that to some extent conflict, like the trend of globalisation but also the re- emphasising in different parts of the world of traditional values, whether from a religious background or something else. It appears that the basic dogma of human rights - which has also been called the first universal ideology - that it is the individual and her rights and freedoms that should always be in the centre of any human rights discourse, is abandoned all the more oft en as the central principle. Instead the banner of human rights is used for various political and economic aims

The article deals with following issues: - plurality of mass media as a freedom of speech principle, - regulation of mass media and its two faces: regulation as a way of limitation of freedom of expression and regulation as a way of protection of freedom of expression, - danger of mass-media monopoly for “free trade of ideas”, - regulation of content versus regulation of access, the question of positive obligations of state power resulting from constitutional guarantees of freedom of speech, - legal means for securing of mass-media plurality and question of its constitutional conformity with protection of property (regulation of mass-media ownership as a protection of freedom of speech).

The article focuses on the principle of foreseeability of judicial decisions in civil court proceedings, as one of the components of the right to a fair trial in the Czech Republic. The principle of foreseeability of judicial decisions has to be understood as a general term including several requirements on judicial process in civil court proceedings the purpose of which is to avoid surprising decisions which can be seen as one of possible forms of violation of the right to a fair trial. Predictable decision is a decision that follows from a predictable procedure of the court in which the court proceeds strictly according to procedure code using all of the special institutions such as the duty to instruct the participants concerning their procedural rights and duties. The second requirement is to respect the legitimate expectations of the parties regarding the application of law on their case. Participants have the right to expect that their case will be decided accordingly to a legal opinion expressed in a case already decided before the courts. This aspect of the foreseeability of judicial decisions then puts high demands on the ability of courts to deal with situations in which they decide a case differently from the existing case law and thus the decision may be surprising for the participants. This article concentrates on the legal regulation of the principle of foreseeability of judicial decisions on the level of constitutional and civil procedural law. The article also deals with the legal regulation in this area in the Slovak Republic and Germany. The purpose of the article is to compare the legislation on national and international level as well as to compare Czech, German and Slovak legal regulation of the principle of foreseeability of judicial decisions.

The author, on the occasion of the tenth anniversary of most recent reforms of administrative judiciary in the Czech Republic and the Republic of Poland, compares the legislation of Czech and Polish administrative judiciary. The article is divided into three parts, the first two discuss the legislation in both countries. Constitutional foundations of the organization and the system of administrative judiciary are addressed there. Subsequently, the author deals separately with the legislation of lower levels of the system and the legislation of supreme administrative courts, focussing on judges and other professional staff and the structure of the courts. Both the parts are rounded by an interpretation of the instruments for unification of the judicature. The third part of the paper includes the final summary.

This article explores capacity to marry in depth, beyond the literal statements presented by legal acts in Estonia. Th e discussion will be focusing on answering the following questions: What is the nature of marriage capacity and how it has been developed in Estonia? What are the values that the Estonian Family Law Act (2010) protects when regulating marriage capacity? In addition a brief comparative analysis will seek to explain how different regulations of the EU member states on the same matter (marriage capacity) are. Th is can also help discussions on whether is it justified to talk about cultural differences of EU member states in the context of marriage capacity or not.

The aim of this article is to discuss the relation between a state’s unemployment and social policies with an eye on rights and duties declared in the European Social Charter and the Revised European Social Charter. First a summary is given to major international human right instruments’ approach to forced labor in connection with public work programs, followed by an introduction to Article 1(2) of the European Social Charter and its interpretation by the European Committee of Social Rights. This section will also give a short comparative analysis on the unemployment policies of selected EU Member States. The second half of the article is dedicated to the past and present of the Hungarian public work program and its critical analysis.

The article deals with the rules for a grant of interim measures in the context of EU law and its application in national judicial proceedings. It covers the key case-law of the Court of Justice of the EU related to the regime, conditions and limits of the interim measures and adds a reflection of practice of Czech courts. Article pays particular attention to the conditions for suspension ofn the application of national law measures.