The present article engages with human rights law’s purported ‘theoretical crisis’, according to which rights—and specifically those in the European Convention on Human Rights (ECHR)—are bereft of a convincing theoretical foundation. In doing so, the article interrogates the use of crisis-oriented language, challenging the very idea of a ‘theoretical crisis’ of rights. Identifying the tension between judicial activism and judicial deference as the source of the crisis narrative, this piece engages with the theoretical foundations of ECHR rights, rejecting binary opposition between opposing moral and political accounts of these rights. It presents an alternative account by framing human rights as capable of combining convincing moral foundations with institutional and political realities. This means melding principle and dynamism, and using moral values to interrogate a human rights law that remains indivisible from its institutional backdrop. Under this account, both the Court’s tools of deference, especially its European consensus doctrine, and the objection of rights inflationism must be subjected to scrutiny. This article straddles theory and practice to allow for a fresh perspective concerning the justification of rights, what is at stake, who bears the burden of restraint, and how current responses to backlash should be re-evaluated.

中文翻译：

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尊重、尊严和“理论危机”：在审慎和保护之间证明欧洲人权法院的权利

本文涉及人权法所谓的“理论危机”，根据这种危机，权利——特别是《欧洲人权公约》（ECHR）中的权利——缺乏令人信服的理论基础。在此过程中，本文质疑了以危机为导向的语言的使用，挑战了权利“理论危机”的概念。本文将司法行动主义和司法尊重之间的紧张关系确定为危机叙事的根源，探讨了欧洲人权法院权利的理论基础，拒绝对这些权利的道德和政治解释之间的二元对立。它通过将人权界定为能够将令人信服的道德基础与制度和政治现实结合起来，提出了另一种解释。这意味着融合原则和活力，并利用道德价值观来质疑与其制度背景密不可分的人权法。在这种情况下，法院的尊重工具，特别是其欧洲共识原则，以及对权利通货膨胀主义的反对都必须受到审查。本文跨越理论和实践，为权利的正当性、利害关系、谁承担限制责任以及如何重新评估当前对强烈反对的反应提供了新的视角。