The Role Of Constitutional Justice in Russia in the Process of Interpretation of European Values and the Promotion of European Constitutionalism

Abstract

This paper conducts a critical analysis of selected cases of the Russian Constitutional Court and High Arbitration Court involving the interpretation of constitutional values underlying the Russian legal order, in this way investigating the role of constitutional justice in Russia in promoting a European type of constitutionalism. The judicial practices of the Constitutional Court are brought into the broader context of the process of transition, state- and nation-building in the Russian Federation. According to the new Russian 1993 Constitution and the 1994 Law on the Constitutional Court, the Constitutional Court of the Russian Federation is the main interpreter of constitutional developments and reforms and therefore a mirror of the constitutional transformation of the country. The Court, by linking its case law to that of the European Court for Human Rights and to the principles developed by the Council of Europe acts as a transmitter of European ideas and norms. Therefore, its jurisprudence can be seen as a channel for the introduction of European Constitutionalism in Russia. Moreover, this case law represents an attempt to reconcile the obligations under the European Convention for Human Rights with the peculiarities of the Russian legal situation. In this sense, the jurisprudence of the Constitutional Court is an interesting case study of implementation and interpretation of European values and norms on Russian ground. To what extent are the Soviet past or even pre-Soviet ideas and values present in the current social and normative practices? In this paper this question is investigated by analysing the interpretive practices of the Constitutional Court of the Russian Federation