Abstract
The political activity of aliens is the subject of a special article in the European Convention on Human Rights. According to its Article 16 "[n]othing in Articles 10, 11 and 14 shall be regarded as preventing the High Contracting Parties from imposing restrictions on the political activity of aliens." The wide wording of this article has been criticized since its creation. In a few cases the ...
Abstract
The political activity of aliens is the subject of a special article in the European Convention on Human Rights. According to its Article 16 "[n]othing in Articles 10, 11 and 14 shall be regarded as preventing the High Contracting Parties from imposing restrictions on the political activity of aliens." The wide wording of this article has been criticized since its creation. In a few cases the European Court of Human Rights followed the critics partly and reduced the wide scope of Article 16. In 1995, the Court modified the definition of aliens in Piermont v. France. In Women on Waves v. Portugal and Cox v. Turkey, it ignored Article 16 completely. In 2015, the Court decided in Perinçek v. Switzerland that political activity was only relevant under Article 16, when it directly affected the political process. Against the background of recent case law and lasting criticism, the article undertakes to scrutinize the present-day scope of application of article 16.
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