This thesis explores the constitutionality of compulsory electoral quotas for women imposed by law. The central question this thesis attempts to answer is what makes these quotas constitutional or unconstitutional in a given jurisdiction. A double methodology was employed to answer this question: theoretical and comparative. From a theoretical perspective, it is proposed that the constitutionality of electoral quotas for women depends on the approach that domestic legal orders adopt to four issues: political representation, equality, affirmative action and political rights. An additional crosscutting factor that influences the constitutionality of these quotas is gender, mainly through its effects on the understanding of political representation and equality. From the comparative law perspective, three jurisdictions were analysed: France, Spain and Mexico. After exploring these systems' approaches to political representation, equality, affirmative action and political rights, the process of adoption of electoral quotas for women is discussed, particularly the constitutional litigation about quota laws. Finally, the relationship between the theory and the practice of assessing the constitutionality of electoral quotas for women is analysed, concluding that although courts use a theoretical framework formed by political representation, equality, affirmative action and political rights, they adopt a somewhat simplistic approach to these issues, using only one of these theoretical factors as the primary determinant, often side-stepping the most controversial issues connected with these factors, and almost completly ignoring the particularities of the target group (women). Additionally, in each jurisdiction the decisions of the courts are also influenced by domestic political and legal factors.

La recherche proposée concerne « la dimension constitutionnelle de l’urgence en France et en Italie». Elle sera divisée en deux parties. La première concernera l’autonomie sémantique et la dimension théorico-juridique de la notion d’urgence. L’appréhension de la notion d’urgence, en effet, soulève la question de sa définition juridique, permettant de la distinguer d’autres notions juridiques proches, comme celles de la nécessité, de la rapidité ou du péril en la demeure. Définir l’urgence d’une façon rigoureuse est-elle une entreprise vouée à l’échec ? La deuxième concernera l’urgence dans les systèmes constitutionnels français et italien. On examinera les 47, al. 4, et 61, al. 3, de la Constitution française et les articles 13, 21, 72, 73 et 77 de celle italienne. Il nous a apparu intéressant, en outre, d’analyser la loi sur l’état d’urgence dans les deux ordres juridiques, pour se demander, finalement, s’il est possible d’envisager une "urgence démocratique". / The research concerns «the constitutional dimension of the emergency in France and Italy». The PhD Thesis will be divided into two parts.The first part is aimed at the theoretical definition of the emergency. We have paid priority attention to highlighting the difference between the emergency and the others “similar” legal notions (necessity, periculum in mora, celerity, etc. Is it possible defining the emergency in a rigorous way?In the second part we have examined the articles 47, al. 4, and 61, al. 3, of the French Constitution and the articles 13, 21, 72, 73 and 77 of the Italian Constitution. We have also analyzed the state of emergency law in France and in Italy. It is possible to envisage a «democratic emergency»

In this thesis it is argued that while the concept of freedom of religion or belief itself is opaque and difficult to define, the right to religious freedom must contain certain basic factors – most importantly the right to individual (religious) autonomy. The individual autonomy approach is seen here as providing the necessary rationale for the protection of freedom of religion or belief. This rationale is not cemented in stone in the practice of the Convention and this has caused the Court to lose its focus on individual freedom. It is a dangerous tendency. It allows the focus to be placed on the role of the State and leaves freedom of religion or belief to be heavily affected by politics and fluctuating social attitudes. In this regard, this thesis looks for the meaning and scope of individual and collective religious autonomy and how it is and ought to be represented in the practice of the European Court of Human Rights. It is the aim of the author to contribute to a clearer and more principled understanding of Article 9 of the ECHR. The right to individual autonomy is thought to be able to provide the necessary focus for the European Court of Human Rights in creating a more robust framework for the protection of freedom of religion or belief different from current Court practice which shows inconsistency in its reasoning and theoretical chaos. This lack of clarity has also contributed to freedom of religion or belief being a relatively weak right. It is explored here as to how the principle of autonomy (as developed in this thesis) relates to other principles provided by the Court, namely the principle of State neutrality, pluralism and the effective protection of rights, but also the margin of appreciation and the autonomy of religious communities. The individual autonomy centred theoretical framework in the first part of the thesis will be engaged to analyse the conflict in the triangle of state-individual-community explored in the second part.

La liberté d’expression est aujourd’hui considérée comme l’un des éléments essentiels d’une société démocratique. Sous l’impulsion de la jurisprudence européenne et interaméricaine des droits de l’homme, elle a acquis une dimension nouvelle et bénéficie d’une large protection. Cependant, et malgré son importance, cette liberté n’est pas absolue, elle doit être conciliée avec d’autres droits de valeur équivalente et des impératifs juridiques qui méritent aussi d’être protégés.Traditionnellement le moyen de régulation et de sanction des abus de la liberté d’expression a été le droit pénal. Cependant, le renforcement de la liberté a produit, de manière inversement proportionnelle, un phénomène de «retrait progressif» du droit pénal, lequel est considéré de moins en moins comme un mode «strictement nécessaire» etproportionnel de sanction par rapport au but poursuivi. Cette thèse analyse la pertinence du recours au droit pénal dans le domaine judiciaire, où la liberté d’expression se trouve souvent confrontée au droit à la présomption d’innocence, droit à la réputation, et aux impératifs de protection de l’autorité et de l’impartialité du pouvoir judiciaire. La question est abordée à partir d’une approche de politique criminelle, laquelle nous permet de déborder le champ du droit pénal, pour fairedes propositions de régulation et de sanction nouvelles, d’une nature autre que pénale. / Freedom of speech is now considered one of the essential elements of a democratic society. Driven by the European and Inter-American Court of Human Rights, it has acquired a new dimension and has an extensive protection. However, despite its importance, this freedom is not absolute, it must be balanced with other rights of equal value and legal imperatives which also deserve protection. Traditionally the way of regulating and sanctioning abuses of freedom of speech was criminal law. However, the strengthening of the freedom has produced, inversely, a phenomenon of " gradual withdrawal " of criminal law, which is considered less and less as "strictly necessary" and is often viewed as a disproportionate mode of sanction in regards to the goal pursued. This thesis analyzes the relevance of the use of criminal law in the judiciary field, where freedom of expression is often confronted with the right to presumption of innocence, right to reputation, and the need to protect the authority and impartiality of the judiciary. The issue is studied from a criminal policy approach, which allows us to go beyond the field of criminal law to make proposals for new regulation and punishment by other means than criminal.

This thesis asks how manifestation of religious belief by religious individuals can best be protected in English law. It is particularly concerned with the protection available to religious individuals in the public sphere. This thesis assesses the current state of protection under religious freedom and religious discrimination models, before considering the potential for increasing protection by reconceptualising the right to manifest religious belief as an aspect of freedom of expression. This thesis asks whether the practical and conceptual limitations of a religious freedom model, and Article 9 of the European Convention on Human Rights (ECHR) in particular, can be overcome by reliance on alternative modes of protection, namely religious discrimination protections in domestic, Convention, and EU law, or through litigating religious manifestation claims as freedom of expression cases under Article 10 of the ECHR. The difficulty of communicating the harm in being denied the ability to manifest religious beliefs publicly is a key limitation of both religious freedom and religious discrimination models. Similarly, this thesis highlights the difficulty in assessing what weight should be attributed to such religious harm within a proportionality exercise balancing the rights of religious individuals with the rights and interests of other parties. The analysis in this thesis draws primarily upon the sources of law which shape domestic English law in this area, namely the ECHR and European Union law. However, this thesis also considers foreign precedent and case law from the United States in particular. This thesis contends that no one model can address the range of cases where manifestation of religious beliefs arise, and that litigants should be able to draw from religious freedom, religious discrimination, and freedom of expression protections depending on the nature of their case.

Internally Displaced Persons ('IDPs') outnumber refugees by two to one and often have the same fears, needs and wants as refugees recognised as such under international law. However, refugee status entails international protection, while IDPs are left to the protection of their own state, which may, but by no means necessarily, be the very entity that has forced them to flee in the first place. In recent years, there have been significant developments in the realm of IDP protection. This includes the conclusion of two regional treaties on the protection of IDPs, the development of relevant soft law instruments, and the reformed 'Cluster Approach' of humanitarian response. Although the increased focus on IDP protection is a welcome development, the UNHCR has expressed the fear that 'activities for the internally displaced may be (mis)interpreted as obviating the need for international protection and asylum.' This thesis represents the first legal analysis of the relationship between the protection of IDPs and International Refugee Law. It will discuss five key challenges in this respect. First, the challenge of drawing the attention of the international community to the plight of IDPs; second, the challenge of developing an appropriate framework for the protection of IDPs; third, the challenge of ensuring that internal protection is not interpreted as a substitute for asylum; fourth; the challenge of determining the relationship between complementary protection and internal displacement; and fifth, the challenge of ensuring that IDP protection in an inter-agency context does not trigger the application of Article 1D of the Refugee Convention, rendering the Convention inapplicable to the recipients of that protection. This thesis will conclude by setting out the future challenges in the relationship between IDP protection and International Refugee Law, by identifying questions left open for further research, and by illustrating the overall impact and importance of this thesis' findings.

La tension entre la singularité de chaque individu et la dimension sociale de l’être humain est souvent réduite par le droit à une contradiction. Fondé sur la nécessité de protéger la dignité individuelle et les droits qui lui sont attachés contre les atteintes portées par la collectivité et ses institutions, le droit européen des droits de l’homme fait ainsi figure de rempart à la suprématie du groupe sur l’individu. Cependant, le développement de nouveaux systèmes régionaux de protection des droits de l’homme en Amériques et en Afrique fondés sur des traités moins empreints de l’antagonisme entre l’individuel et le collectif, ainsi que la multiplication de groupes sociaux prétendant détenir et faire valoir leurs intérêts, mettent en évidence la dimension sociale de l’individu et font entrer les intérêts collectifs dans la sphère juridique. Cette étude vise à rechercher si cette dimension est, à ce point, constitutive de l’humanité de l’individu que les intérêts que ce dernier détient conjointement et indissociablement avec tout ou partie ses semblables sont des droits de l’homme, qui devraient être consacrés et défendus comme tels. / The tension between the uniqueness of each individual and the social dimension of the human being is often reduced by law to a contradiction. European human rights law is seen as a bulwark against the supremacy of the group over the individual, as it is based on the need to protect individual dignity and the rights attached to it against attacks by the wider community and its institutions. However, the development of new regional systems of human rights protection in the Americas and Africa based on conventions that are less imbued with the antagonism between the individual and the collective, as well as the proliferation of groups claiming to have interests and to defend them, highlight the social dimension of the individual and bring collective interests to the legal sphere. This study aims to investigate whether this dimension is so inherent to the humanity of the individual, that the interests that the latter owns jointly and inseparably with all or part of his fellows are human rights, which should be enshrined and defended as such.

Les minorités sont les fruits de l’histoire, des conquêtes, des défaites, des modifications de frontières. Mais si aucune histoire nationale ne ressemble à une autre, les minorités, dans leur diversité, se trouvent dans des situations s’apparentent les unes aux autres. Dans ce contexte global, cette étude a pour objectif d’appréhender dans quelle mesure les droits nationaux et internationaux des minorités répondent effectivement aux besoins des personnes appartenant à ces dernières. Pour ce faire, deux thématiques revenant régulièrement dans les doléances des membres des minorités ont été sélectionnées. Il s’agit, en premier lieu, de la prise en compte des spécificités relatives à l’habitat (dans sa diversité) et, en second lieu, de la possibilité de communiquer dans sa propre langue. Après une présentation du droit international portant sur ces questions, est ici étudiée la façon dont ce droit ou plutôt ces droits sont transposés et mis en œuvre dans les systèmes nationaux (en effet, il existe de fortes variantes entre la protection offerte par les organes universels et celles offertes par les organes régionaux européens et américains). Pour rendre compte de la diversité des situations nationales, six pays sont ici étudiés. Il s’agit de l’Espagne, de la France et de la Lituanie pour l’Europe et du Canada, du Costa Rica et du Paraguay pour l’Amérique. Nous constatons que, feignant de méconnaître l’intérêt que présente une protection convenable des minorités pour la stabilité de leur société nationale et même pour la démocratie en général, les gouvernants ne sont pas toujours prêts à mettre en œuvre les dispositions visant à protéger les personnes appartenant à des minorités et opposent l’intérêt général ou des arguments tirés du caractère unitaire de leur peuple, de leur territoire ou de leur nation. A ceci s’ajoutent des difficultés pratiques lors de la mise en œuvre des normes adoptées, difficultés occasionnées par des raisons financières, par exemple le coût des mesures positives visant à l’égalité effective dans les domaines de l’enseignement, des médias, de la vie privée et familiale ou encore obligation de partage des bénéfices générés par l’extraction minière avec les peuples autochtones. D’autres raisons peuvent être liées à l’intolérance sous-jacente dans la population majoritaire, par exemple les attaques de campements Roms ou l’interdiction de parler une langue minoritaire dans certains contextes ou lieux. Malgré cela, le droit international des minorités est en évolution continue, puisant dans la diversité des contextes régionaux et se fondant tant sur les droits de l’homme et le droit à ne pas être discriminé, que sur une transposition à toutes les minorités d’éléments des droits reconnus aux peuples autochtones en tant que premiers habitants d’un territoire donné. De plus, dans une volonté de promouvoir une démocratie véritable à caractère participatif, les organes de droits de l’homme poussent les autorités nationales à associer toujours plus les membres des minorités aux prises de décision les concernant, et à prendre ainsi en compte les besoins de ces derniers. Ainsi, l’étude comparée de la protection des minorités en Europe et en Amérique permet de se rendre compte des difficultés pratiques empêchant de protéger effectivement les minorités et d’appréhender dans quelle mesure le droit international peut aider les États à surmonter ces difficultés. / Minorities are the product of history, conquests, defeats and border changes. No two national histories are alike, however, minorities, in their diversity, find themselves in situations that appear similar the one another. In this overall context, the objective of this research is to better understand to what extent national and international minority rights effectively meet the needs of individuals belonging to those minorities. To do so, two issues that reoccure in the grievances of members of minorities have been selected for study. These are firstly the consideration shown towards housing specificities (in their diversity) and secondly, the possibility of communicating in one’s own language. Following the presentation of international law related to these issues, is studied the way this law, or better said these laws, are transposed and implemented in the national systems (in fact, there are major variants between the protection offered by universal organs and the one offered by European and American regional organs). In order to take into consideration the diversity of national situations, six countries were selected for this study. These were Spain, France and Lithuania in the European context, and Canada, Costa Rica and Paraguay in the American context. Our findings show that those who govern pretend to be unaware of the benefits related to adequate protection of minorities for the stability of national societies, as well as for democracy at large. As such, they are not always ready to implement the provisions that aim to protect persons belonging to minorities and claim the interest of the public good or arguments based on the unity of their people, territory or nation as reasons for doing so. In addition, it should be mentioned that some practical difficulties exist in the implementation of adopted norms. These include difficulties caused by financial reasons, for example, the cost of positive measures aiming at effective equality in the field of education, media, private and family life or the obligation to share with indigenous people the benefits generated by mining. Other reasons may be linked to underlying intolerance present in the majority population, for example, attacks on Roma settlements or prohibition on speaking a minority language in some spheres or places. However, the international rights of minorities are constantly evolving, drawing on the diversity of regional contexts and based on human rights and the right not to be discriminated against, as well as on the application, to all minorities, of elements of the rights recognized to indigenous peoples as the first inhabitants of a given territory. Moreover, in an effort to promote genuine democracy of a participatory nature, human rights bodies push national authorities to involve ever more members of minorities in decisions that affect them, thereby taking their needs into consideration. The comparative study of the protection of minorities in Europe and in America enables reporting the practical difficulties preventing minorities from being effectively protected and assists in understanding to what extent international law can help countries overcome these difficulties.

Today, some twelve million immigrants are unlawfully present in the United States. What response to this situation does Christian theology suggest for these immigrants and those who receive them? To this question about the status of immigrants before the law, the theological literature lacks an understanding of how federal U.S. immigration law developed, and it lacks a robust theological account of the governance of immigration. To fill this gap, the thesis presents three stages in the formation of the laws that designate some immigrants as aliens unlawfully present or illegal aliens, drawing out the moral argumentation in each phase and responding with moral theology. In the first stage, non-citizens were called aliens in U.S. law. In response to the argument that aliens exist as a consequence of natural law, Christian teaching indicates that immigrants are not alien either in creation or for the church. In the second stage, the authority of the federal government to exclude and expel aliens was established, leaving those who do not comply to be designated illegal aliens. To the claim that the federal government has unlimited sovereignty over immigration, interpretations of the Christian Scriptures respond that divine sovereignty limits and directs civil authority over immigration. In the third stage, legal reforms that were intended to end discrimination between countries allowed millions from countries neighboring the U.S. to become illegal aliens. These reforms turn out to be unjust on philosophical grounds and unneighborly on theological grounds. While federal law classes many as aliens unlawfully present in the United States, Christian political theology indicates that immigrants are not alien, the government of immigration is limited by divine judgment, and nationals of neighboring countries deserve special regard.