02 October 2023
The Constitution Does Not Sleep
The South Korean government is embarking on a process to amend the current Assembly Act with the aim of enforcing stricter regulations on assemblies and demonstrations. Among other things, demonstrations at night are to be generally prohibited. I argue that the legislator’s plans disregard the jurisprudence of the Constitutional Court and fail to comply with standards of international law. Continue reading >>
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10 March 2023
The Imaged
A Basic-Law Monument and Some Buckets of Ink-Black Paint Continue reading >>
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09 November 2022
Meloni’s Illiberal Anti-Rave Law
Only ten days after it was sworn in and a week after it received the confidence vote from the Parliament, the new Italian government led by Giorgia Meloni presented its first decree-law containing numerous provisions on a variety of issues: health, justice, and security. The decree-law was the first legislative act presented by the new radical right-wing government. Members of the opposition argued that the decree, in particular the anti-rave norm, is a danger to the freedom of assembly of the Italian citizens and that is a law that Putin could have written. Continue reading >>
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14 September 2022
Giving Offence is no Offence
The death of Queen Elizabeth II last week, and thus the accession to the throne of King Charles III is an opportunity for reflection. However, what some have found here in the UK is that expressing republican sentiment in public has been met with a policing intervention – arrest or warning. This post considers the legality of expressing such views, and thus of the police response too, as well as some wider issues about the policing of protest, dissent and free speech. Continue reading >>
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21 January 2022
To Oppose
Freedom of assembly, general orders and boulders thrown by administrative law and hitting constitutional law Continue reading >>29 December 2021
Illiberal Britain
The right to peaceful protest in England and Wales is under graver threat than first feared. On 24 November 2021, new amendments were introduced to the already highly controversial Police, Crime, Sentencing and Courts Bill (PCSC) in the House of Lords. These are jaw-dropping measures that will expand police stop and search powers, increase restrictions on peaceful protests, create new criminal offences and banning orders, and expand delegated powers. What follows is a brief attempt to make sense of these illiberal proposals. If enacted, they will have severe implications for how the law strikes the balance between rights of protestors and the wider community. But even if not, their very proposal, and the means of legislating for them, are further evidence of a government with distaste, if not hostility, for constitutional norms of debate, scrutiny, and accountability inside and outside of Parliament. Continue reading >>
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17 May 2021
The Right of Catalonian Leaders to Protest
On 22 April, the Spanish Constitutional Court issued its first judgement on the constitutionality of the conviction of the Catalonian leaders for the events of October 2017. It upheld the Supreme Court’s interpretation of the crime of sedition which blurs the line between legitimate protest and sedition. The judgment will therefore have repercussions beyond this particular case and may affect the right of protest and dissent. Continue reading >>
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