The Protection of Individuals from Environmental Hazards in the European Court of Human Rights Case Law: Seeking a Balance Between the Right to Life and the Right to Respect for Private Life

The case law of the European Court of Human Rights concerning environmental cases in the past has always privileged the right to respect for private life. This tendency did not reflect the positions of other bodies which verify the respect of human rights conventions because they tend, more logically, to link environmental degradation to the right to life. The protection offered by this right is undoubtedly more relevant in relations between human beings and the environment. In fact, environmental degradation and natural hazards clearly have more negative consequences on one’s psychological or physical condition than on one’s private life or home. The latest cases examined by the Court show the first signs of a positive development towards a better protection of individuals against environmental hazards. In the first place, the Court seems willing to expand the scope of article 2 of the Convention to include the breach of an individual’s physical integrity. In parallel with this positive development, the scope of article 8’s application has also been broadened to cover circumstances in which the applicant did not sustain any perceivable deterioration of his or her physical condition, but only suffered a decrease in his or her level of well-being. Besides expanding the scope of articles 2 and 8 of the Convention, in recent cases regarding the environment, the Court tends to standardise the interpretative criteria and arguments used to analyse both the right to life and the right to respect for private life. In particular, one can register a tendency to extend both the strict parameters of the State’s positive obligation to protect individuals and the independent verification of the proportionality of State measures normally applied in cases concerning the right to life to cases concerning the right to respect for private life. These are positive steps towards improved protection of individuals against environmental hazards.

• An Outline on the Right to Water in the EU System Francesco Anastasi, in European Studies /2020 pp.363
  DOI: 10.2478/eustu-2022-0061

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