Fundamental rights

Fundamental rights are basic protections and freedoms regarded as essential to human dignity and political life. They constrain public power and establish claims individuals can make against the state.

Human rights: Rights and freedoms belonging to people by virtue of their humanity. Fundamental rights are often domestic legal guarantees of broader human-rights principles.
Constitutional review: Judicial examination of whether laws or government actions comply with a constitution. It can invalidate measures that violate constitutional rights.
Universal Declaration of Human Rights: A 1948 United Nations declaration setting out a broad catalogue of human rights. It supplies a foundational global statement of rights, though it is not itself a treaty.
Natural rights: Rights understood as inherent in human nature rather than granted by political authorities. This theory grounds fundamental rights in moral claims that precede enacted law.
Rule of law: The principle that public power is exercised under accessible, stable, and equally applied law. Rights protections help make government answerable to legal standards.
Civil liberties: Protections against government interference in personal freedoms and private life. Many fundamental rights operate as civil liberties that restrain state action.
Judicial review: Court review of the legality of decisions made by public authorities. It offers a route to challenge public decisions that infringe protected rights.
European Convention on Human Rights: A 1950 treaty protecting human rights and fundamental freedoms in Council of Europe states. Its enforceable guarantees and court make it a prominent regional rights system.
Legal positivism: The jurisprudential view that law’s validity depends on social sources, not its moral merit. It challenges the idea that inherent moral rights automatically count as legal rights.
Separation of powers: The division of governmental authority among branches with distinct functions and checks. Rights enforcement often depends on courts checking executive and legislative power.

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