Mantouvalou, Virginia; Voyatzis, Panayotis --- "The Council of Europe and the Protection of Human Rights: A System in Need of Reform" [2010] ELECD 202; in Joseph, Sarah; McBeth, Adam (eds), "Research Handbook on International Human Rights Law" (Edward Elgar Publishing, 2010)

Book Title: Research Handbook on International Human Rights Law

Editor(s): Joseph, Sarah; McBeth, Adam

Publisher: Edward Elgar Publishing

ISBN (hard cover): 9781847203687

Section: Chapter 13

Section Title: The Council of Europe and the Protection of Human Rights: A System in Need of Reform

Author(s): Mantouvalou, Virginia; Voyatzis, Panayotis

Number of pages: 27

Extract:

13. The Council of Europe and the protection of
human rights: a system in need of reform
Virginia Mantouvalou and Panayotis Voyatzis*



1 Introduction
Having been founded by ten countries in 1949, the Council of Europe is the
oldest regional human rights organisation in Europe.1 Its aim at its inception
was to achieve greater unity between Member States in the aftermath of the
Second World War, to protect and promote their common heritage and to
facilitate their socio-economic progress.2 Today both the composition and the
purposes of the organisation have changed. Membership increased greatly
following the fall of communism in Central and Eastern Europe, with the
organisation now comprising 47 Member States.3
In recognition of the expansion of membership and the changing needs of
Europe, a `source of immense hope'4 in the words of European Heads of State,
there have been three Summits to reconsider the Council's evolving aims in
recent years. Several declarations and action plans have been adopted, stating
the new political purposes and ways to pursue them. In 1993 the Council of


* The views expressed in this text are solely those of the co-author and do not
represent those of the European Court of Human Rights or any other institution. An
early draft was presented in the context of the Human Rights Lecture Series of the
University of Leicester, Centre for European Law and Integration.
1 The States that established the Council of Europe are Belgium, Denmark,
France, Ireland, Italy, ...