Using Law as an Instrument of Domination and Violating the Right of Assembly: The Story behind the Palestinian NGOs’ Quest for Independence

This article explores the position of the successive executive powers that have ruled over the occupied Palestinian territory toward the right of association, analyzing the regulations and practical measures they introduced. The governance of these authorities was undemocratic, resulting in abuses of legislative power with a view to constraining the right to assembly and to dominating ngo s, starting with incorporation and ending with dissolution. Despite an ongoing struggle for operational independence, ngo s have been under the control of the Palestinian ruling political parties in the West Bank and the Gaza Strip since 2007. Throughout this period, elected formal oversight bodies have been lacking. While Fatah monopolizes government of the West Bank, Hamas takes exclusive possession of the administration of the Gaza Strip; each party has fought against the ngo s aligned with its rival. The ruling regimes have also exploited shortfalls and gaps in some regulations in order to undermine and weaken the role of ngo s in issues of public concern.

The Right of Assembly in Central Europe

The article deals with the legal regulation of the right to freedom of peaceful assembly in Germany, Austria, the Czech Republic and the Slovak Republic with regard to the jurisdiction of the European Court of Human Rights (ECHR). The chosen topics focus on the definition of assembly, the relationship between freedom of expression and property rights together with the right of assembly. In each of above-mentioned countries, the assembly to which constitutional protection is granted, the definitiondiffers slightly; with the widest concept of assembly deriving from the judicature of the ECHR. The constitutional protection of the Assembly, in particular found in Germany and Austria, which is significantly narrower than the protection provided by the European Convention on Human Rights, may thus at some stage come into conflict with the requirements of the ECHR. The section devoted to freedom of speech deals, among other things, with cases exhibiting shocking photographs, which were part of the campaign against abortion, in front of schools in the Czech Republic and the Slovak Republic. In the future, the most serious problem is the conflict of the right of assembly along with the right of ownership, consisting in assemblies held on private property, which is used by the public, such as shopping malls, airports or railway stations. This has been the focus of the professional public and the courts for a long time, especially in Germany.

Physically Distant – Socially Intimate

In the 2020 COVID-19 pandemic situation, physical interaction and public performances became difficult, while use of digital media for public and private purposes was extended and intensified. This affected citizens’ right of assembly and led to new forms of collective sociality. This article analyses how social intimacy was re-arranged during lockdown through a thick description of mediated performances circulating on Italy’s Day of Liberation from Nazi fascism. It examines how a politicised commemoration of resistance echoed fears and desires relating to the virus and enabled the production of subjectivities in a transnational techno-social environment. Combining Lauren Berlant’s concept of intimate publics with theories of media, social movements, mediation and national identity, it offers an analytical framework detailing three layers of social intimacy: spatial/corporeal materiality, biography and mediation.

To Facilitate and Protect: State Obligations and the Right of Peaceful Assembly in International Human Rights Law

This article distinguishes the obligation of States to ‘facilitate’ and ‘protect’ the right of peaceful assembly under Article 21 of the International Covenant on Civil and Political Rights (iccpr) from State practices that rather seek to ‘manage’ or ‘control’ its exercise. Focusing on the protection of public assemblies in the Asia-Pacific region and drawing principally on the UN Human Rights Committee’s assembly jurisprudence and its Concluding Observations on State reports, it emphasises the critical importance of the language in which State obligations are framed and understood. Many domestic laws over-regulate the right of assembly by creating broad discretionary powers, impermissible grounds of restriction, bureaucratic procedures and onerous liabilities. Such laws reinforce a police ego-image premised on the pernicious logic of ‘management’ and encourage preventive policing tactics that fundamentally undermine the right of peaceful assembly.

La retórica violenta y la teoría de la neutralización en el ejercicio del derecho de reunión en España | Violent retoric and neutralization theory in the exercise of the right of assembly in Spain

El derecho de reunión representa una realidad socio-jurídica de máxima actualidad, pues su ejercicio se encuentra más presente que nunca en la vida de cualquier país democrático. La situación de crisis económica mundial ha elevado, de manera muy significativa, el ejercicio de esta libertad en nuestro país, de tal manera, que se hace más necesario que nunca garantizar el efectivo y eficaz ejercicio de este derecho. Por todo ello, la violencia, el uso de la fuerza, o cualquier otro término que utilicemos, que se oponga a la paz y tranquilidad social en el ejercicio del derecho de reunión, no tiene cabida en nuestra norma fundamental de convivencia. En este trabajo nos preguntamos: ¿Qué motivación existe en estos sujetos para ejercer el uso de la violencia, en detrimento de muchas de las normas jurídicas y sociales que imperan en nuestra sociedad, en lugar de utilizar otras alternativas posibles?, ¿qué razones pueden justificar este tipo de conductas violentas?, ¿el uso de la violencia es una elección libre o se trata de una conducta irracional producto de una despersonalización en el interior de la masa?Este estudio pretende aportar un mayor conocimiento sobre la libertad de reunión. Trataremos de ahondar en su realidad, conocer sus intereses en conflicto, los problemas que plantea su ejercicio, la aparición del fenómeno de los comportamientos delictivos violentos en las reuniones y manifestaciones, así como aproximarnos a los sujetos titulares individuales de esta libertad, mediante un método de análisis cualitativo, que permita explorar y explicar la realidad tal como la experimentan sus protagonistas.________________________________The right of assembly is an extremely current socio-legal reality, since its practice is becoming more and more part of everyday life in democratic countries. The world economic crisis has significantly increased the practice of this right in our country, making it more necessary than ever to warrant the effective and efficient practice of this right. This means that violence, force or any other similar term, that jeopardizes peace and social calm during the practice of this right, has no place in our fundamental regulation of coexistence. We ask in the present paper:For what reasons do these subjects exercise the use of violence, at the expense of many legal and social regulations that prevail in our society, instead of other alternatives? How can they justify this kind of violent behaviour? Is the use of violence a question of free choice or is it an irrational behaviour caused by depersonalization when the subject forms part of a group?In this study we would like to point out some of these questions. This study claims to increase the understanding of the right of assembly and demonstration, and in the appearance of the phenomenon of violent criminal behaviour during gatherings and demonstrations.Finally, we will approach the individual entitled subjects of this right, by means of a qualitative analysis, that will allow us to explore and explain the reality in the way its main subjects experience it.

Freedom of Assembly and Safety

The article refers to freedom and human rights as universal and global principles covering all aspects of human life. Human rights are those freedoms, means of protection and services respected precisely as rights, which all people should be able to demand from the society in which they live, in accordance with today's freedoms. On the other hand, as rights they solely occur among individuals and authorities. None of the authority can take them away. They can not be waived or renounced. In Poland, guarantees of respect for human rights - to which all people are entitled and citizen's rights - to which only Polish citizens are entitled are included in the Constitution of the Republic of Poland. According to it, the inherent and inalienable human dignity is a source of freedom and human and citizen's rights. One of the fundamental human right is the freedom of assembly. The possibility of using the freedom of assembly must be dictated by the need to ensure the protection of national security or public order, protection of health, public morals and rights and freedom of other people. Due to the subject matter discussed, the study focused on peaceful assemblies, which organization is guaranteed by law, on the other hand no illegal forms of protest were described - the blockades and occupation of buildings, transport routes, or prohibited strike forms. The main task of ensuring security during assemblies rests with the Police, whose fundamental duty is to facilitate the conduct of assemblies. It is important to find a balance between maintaining order and exercising the right of assembly.