Human Rights and Legal Entities: the Paradox of Implementation in International Law

Abstract

Abstract: this paper is devoted to the concept of corporate human rights. It is argued that not only individuals, but also legal entities, are carriers of human rights. The author explores the history of the European Convention on Human Rights, analyzes the provisions of the document and focus on the jurisprudence of the European Court of Human Rights. Nevertheless, the implementation by legal entities of their own human rights is limited so far to the European level. Other similar international human rights institutions – African and Inter-American, as well as the Committee on the Elimination of Racial Discrimination take a different position, granting legal entities only the right to lodge an application (locus standi) in defense of third parties rather than protect their own human rights. In this regard, the European system of human rights protection is unique in this area. At the same time, however, even at the European level, legal entities do not enjoy the entire list of conventional rights as individuals. The author does not exclude that in the future, the European Court of Human Rights under the doctrine of evolutionary interpretation will expand the scope of the rights of legal entities.