Are the judges really protecting us?

At a time when European democracies are in an unprecedented crisis and far-right parties are coming to power, the courts are more than ever in a position to be the first safeguards and guarantors of our rights and freedoms. But are our judges really protecting us? Are they truly ready and equipped to assume such a role? Drawing on extensive legal and sociological research, Stéphanie Hennette-Vauchez & Antoine Vauchez’s new book - Des Juges Bien Trop Sages - investigates those French courts who judge of the State and its public policies: the Council of State and the Constitutional Council. By tracing their historical embeddedness in a Fifth Republic primarily concerned with guaranteeing executive power, the book shows how these two courts have let their guard down, accompanying rather than limiting two (anti-terrorist and sanitary) lengthy states of emergency while keeping rights and freedoms at bay. Ultimately, the French supreme courts have participated in the crisis of confidence and legitimacy afflicting our democracies.

About Antoine Vauchez

Antoine Vauchez is a CNRS Research Professor in political sociology and law and Head of the Centre européen de sociologie et de science politique-CESSP (Ehess – Université Paris 1-Sorbonne). His research engages with the field of historical and political sociology, law and politics, and socio-legal studies. He focuses in particular on the formation of EU center of power, the emergence of bodies of legal and economic knowledge of the European project, and the consolidation of a 'power of independence' around courts of justice, central banks and regulatory agencies. 

This lecture is co-organised with the Paul Scholten Centre for Jurisprudence (PSC).