English (United Kingdom)

https://curated-unify.zendy.io/wp-json/zendy-region/v1/featured_content/oa?rat=en

https://curated-unify.zendy.io/wp-json/zendy-region/v1/highlighted_journal/

Global: Zendy Plus annual

Presents the access of premium content as premium feature

Premium Content

Presents the keyphrase highlighting as premium feature

Keyphrase Highlighting

Presents the summarisation as premium feature

Summarisation

Insights

Presents the pdf analysis as premium feature

PDF Analysis

Presents the zaia usage as premium feature

ZAIA

Global: Zendy Tools annual

Global: Zendy Free Plan

Global: Zendy Tools monthly

Global: Zendy Plus monthly

The option to approve by referendum constitutional amendments proposed by popular initiatives is one of the characteristic of the Swiss regime, which fosters the use of direct democracy mechanisms. However, the narrowness of the constitutional limits to this kind of initiatives may open the door to serious contradictions between the domestic legal order and those international commitments undertaken by the country, being this particularly relevant in respect of human rights protection. Thus, the approval in 2009 of a new constitutional clause banning the construction of minarets in the Helvetic Federation entails a set of legal questions, starting from the possible violation of the religious freedom or the right not to be discriminated against, both protected by the highest international norms on human rights. Within the current conditions, finding an stable solution to these legal inconsistencies seems difficult, being the Swiss political culture reluctant to enlarge the limits of the popular sovereignty and to receive mandates from foreign judges. In this way, we face on the one hand problems or difficulties in the legal field and, on the other hand, questions of a political nature. Among the former, it must be firstly analysed whether the ban for construction of new minarets at the Constitution entails per se a violation freedom of religion or the right not to be discriminated against, in the way these rights are understood in the main international human rights instrument, such as the European Convention of Human Rights. In relation to the same point, it is also possible to study the access to the European Court of Human Rights as legal guarantee of the aforementioned treaty, appealing against the constitutional clause or against the possible decisions taken in its implementation. Secondly, it is necessary to reflect about the conflicts that may arise at the Swiss legal order between constitutional dispositions and international norms, as well as look for possible solutions to these inconsistencies. As for the political aspects, their analysis becomes relevant to rightly contextualize the aforementioned legal difficulties. Firstly, it is necessary to reflect about the real meaning of the 2009 referendum in a country where no more than four minarets can be found. The traditional political culture of Switzerland helps in this respect to understand the difficulties to put together direct democracy and international legal controls, or the absence of parliament or judicial domestic controls for popular initiatives. The peculiar Swiss model is thus a problematic one in a context of European harmonisation on the basis of a common framework of human rights protection. The analysis brings us to underline the need to enlarge the admission filters of the popular initiatives, adopting a new interpretation of the concept of peremptory norms of international law, with the aim of including in it those elements of human rights that constitute today a European common acquis.

Democracia directa y religión: problemas derivados de la decisión suiza de prohibir los minaretes