The Right to Legal Counsel in the European Court of Human Rights : A Study of International Human Rights Law and Jack Donnelly’s Theory of Relative Universality of Human Rights

Sammanfattning

The universality and cultural relativity of human rights are central topics in human rights studies. This thesis addresses a gap in the previous research regarding their connectedness to the European Court of Human Rights (ECtHR), and further ties the topic to fair trial rights and more precisely to the right to legal counsel. The universality and cultural relativity are examined within Jack Donnelly’s theoretical framework of the relative universality of human rights, focusing on the interpretative level of human rights. Where the doctrinal legal method identifies cultural relativity in the ECtHR case law, the comparison with a comparative legal method to a universal human rights body, the UN Human Rights Committee, sheds light on patterns of universality on the interpretative level of international human rights law. The key finding is that the ECtHR represents Donnelly’s relative universality in the chosen cases regarding the right to legal counsel.