The1989 “velvet revolution” was understood from the outset as the human rights revolution. Consequently, in the following decade, complex legislation to protect human rights was adopted and major human rights institutions, such as Constitutional Court, established. Up to present, the achievements in this filed are undeniable: the Czech Republic ranks among states with solid human rights record. In spite of these positive developments, many aggrieved citizens and their advocates, NGOs activists and, partly, also the representatives of the human right institutions themselves, point out that the mechanisms of the human right protection do not function effectively. To remedy the situation, most critiques suggest reforming the existing institutions and/or creating new ones. Little attention is paid to the fact that the effective human rights protection depends on the functioning of the human rights machinery viewed as complex, interdependent structure, which involves both state and civil society actors. To give the simplest example: in most human rights cases, a legal remedy is not available for the victim, unless there is skilled lawyer to represent the case. From this vantage point, the project aims to analyse the institutional structures to protect human rights and formulate policy proposals for achieving higher accessibility, affordability and effectiveness of the human rights protection.

Current situation and key issues

At the beginning of the new millennium, a rich fabric of human rights institutions and actors exists in the Czech Republic. From the pragmatic/functional point of view, we can categorize (divide) these institutions into three main groups:
1. Judicial (system of courts, Constitutional Court)
2. Advisory (Government Human Rights Commissioner, Government Human Rights Council, and specialised advisory bodies such as Council for National Minorities)
3. Non-governmental (Czech Helsinki Committee and other specialised NGOs such as The Advisory Centrum for Citizenship, Civil and Political Rights).
4. Further, the Ombudsman (The Pubic Protector of Rights) must be mentioned. Although the Czech Ombudsman, like its British or Swedish prototype, is charged with the protection of individuals against misadministration primarily, he plays a vital role in the protection of human rights, because of his specific powers, i.e. requesting that public bodies change their policies or launching a constitutional complaint.
Finally, it is useful to remind in this context, that persons under Czech jurisdiction have access to international human rights protection bodies, such as is the European Court on Human Rights or the (UN) Human Rights Committee under article x of the ICCPR.
From the time perspective, the non-governmental actors are the oldest institutions on the scene, having their roots in the pre 1989 era. The (reformed) judicial institutions and Constitutional Court are the direct fruits of the human rights turn in after 1989. Finally, the advisory bodies and the ombudsman are relatively new, established in 1999 and 2000, respectively. It should be noted, that already their setting-up reflected the widely perceived insufficiency of the institutional structure to protect human rights. Their “founding fathers” intended to remedy certain shortcomings. In the case of ombudsman, the accessibility and affordability of legal protection for an individual were the main concern while the Human Rights Council was primarily intended to bridge the widening gap between the civil society and the state through the participation of the human rights activists from within the civil society in the Council and its sub-committees.

At present, the discussions at the governmental level on the strengthening or reforming of human rights institutions continue prompted mainly from two directions. Firstly, the need to harmonise the Czech protection standards with the EU requirements, most notably the Directive 2000/43/EC, which requires, inter alia, the functioning of a body to tackle race discrimination. Secondly, the issue has been considered in broader contexts of the administrative reform aiming at decentralisation and the civil service reform.

Despite these positive developments in recent years, a number of problems having the negative impact on the effectiveness of the human rights institutions persist. Among the most important rank the following:
- the low accessibility and affordability of the human rights protection machinery for an aggrieved individual (e.g. the strict requirement to be represented by lawyer in certain category of cases),
- the limited capacity, both financial and regarding the human resources, of the civil sector to provide effective support to clients (Consider that most of Czech cases brought before the European Court of Human Rights were declared inadmissible on procedural grounds because the lawyers were not able to present them adequately),
- insufficient communication among the actors.

Objective

The main objective of the project is to formulate strategies and concrete measures to strengthen the effectiveness of the functioning of the human rights machinery based on careful analysis and assessment of the existing barriers. The policy proposals should, in particular, focus on the space/area of mutual interactions (1) among the state actors and (2) between the state actors and relevant entities form civil sector in their co-operative as well as adverse (contentious) form.

Plan of fulfilment

The policy research will primarily focus on:
- reviewing and analysing the real functioning of the human rights mechanisms,
- analysing the major judicial human right cases, in particular those presented at the Constitutional Court and/or European Court on Human Rights, leading to the change of legislation or policies (e.g. citizenship cases), from the institutional perspective (e.g. involvement of civil sector actors, involvement of international NGOs, political support form other actors),
- analysing the cases of effective involvement of the civil society in the process of policy making thought the involvement in the institutional structure (e.g. the same-sex partnership legislation),
- analysing the proposed government action in this area (e. g. the proposed antidiscrimination body, intended l “free access to legal aid” act),
- analysing the policies of major human right NGOs, focusing on whether and to what extend they respond to the priorities of their donors and to what extend to the perceived priorities of the domestic scene,

Methodology

The proposed policy project will employ a multiform qualitative research. The actual research will include:
- a detailed analysis of printed and on-line resources (legislation, judicial decisions, governmental documents, reports of non-governmental actors such as Annual reports by NGOs)
- in depth examination of information provided by informants (public officials and activists or employees of NGOs who will be contacted in order to complete the information, not available from printed or on-line recourses and/or whose opinions are relevant for formulating policy proposals)
- exploring the available secondary sources (e. g. scholarly production focusing on the theoretical issues of human rights protection, institutions such as Constitutional Courts in the Czech Republic or in the region)

Results/outputs, their dissemination and application in practise

The final output of the project will be an analytical paper on the topic, containing a set of policy recommendations. The policy paper will disseminated through several channels. First, the paper will be placed on a relevant web page (to be determined, e. g. the web page of the Human Rights Council) and/or be published in Internet based journal, so as to make it easily accessible. Second, an article on the topic will be published in relevant Czech journal. Third, depending on the content of the policy recommendations, the paper (or selected findings) will be handed over in a printed version to relevant policy-makers, academics and to personalities and institutions within the civil sector, including the major sponsors of the human rights NGOs.
Although the project focuses on the Czech Republic exclusively, I assume, that it will be, at least partially, relevant for some other countries in the region which developed similar institutions of human right protection and exhibit similar similar feature (developed structure of human right institutions, relative stable civil sector scene).

Selected literature and documents

Henry J. Steiner & Alston, P. International Human Rights in Context. Oxford, 1996.
Human Rights Reports. Czech Helsinki Committee. (1994-2001)
Annual Human Rights Reports. Prepared by the Government Commissioner for Human Rights (1999-2001)
The first annual Report by the Ombudsman. 2002
Reports prepared by the special plenipotentiary to the Czech Government on cases before the European Court of Human Rights, submitted by the Minister of Justice