Paper's abstract

Bertrand Mathieu, When Determining the General Interest, Which Part belongs to the Judge and which to the Lawmaker?
Whereas the democratic principle entrusts the determination of the general interest to the Parliament, as representative of the People, this function is nowadays widely held, not to say usurped, by judges. If the control of constitutionality plays but a limited part in this situation, the development of the conventionality control, in particular in the system of the European Convention on Human Rights, plays an essential part here. A good illustration can be found, for example, in the mechanism of legislative validations and the controls carried out in this frame. This phenomenon expresses a significant evolution in the respective social functions of the judge and the lawmaker.

Key Words : Parliament, general interest, Human rights
t. 50, 2007 : p. 41-48

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