Freedom of Expression and its Competitors

The recognition of an increasing number of basic human rights, such as in the European Convention on Human Rights, has had the paradoxical effect of requiring courts in the common-law world to consider whether the extensive protection given by the common law to expression that was not false or misleading must be modified to accommodate these newly recognized basic rights. The most important of these newly recognized rights is the right of privacy, although expression has other competitors as well, such as what might be called a right to be spared the emotional trauma caused by abusive language. This article examines the growing differences between the ways the courts in the United States and the United Kingdom have handled these conflicts. In the United Kingdom there is a growing body of law requiring speech that is challenged for invading some other recognized basic right to survive a judicial determination that the expression in question concerns some matter of legitimate public interest. For the moment the United States has not taken that route but, as the article points out, there are some hints in its more recent decisions on freedom of expression that the United States Supreme Court might modify its expansive view of the ambit of freedom of expression to permit some expression to be successfully challenged on the ground that it does not concern a matter of “public concern”—a development I would not welcome even if it narrowed the differences between the United States and Europe

The Future of Freedom of Expression Online

Should social media companies ban Holocaust denial from their platforms? What about conspiracy theorists that spew hate? Does good corporate citizenship mean platforms should remove offensive speech or tolerate it? The content moderation rules that companies develop to govern speech on their platforms will have significant implications for the future of freedom of expression. Given that the prospects for compelling platforms to respect users’ free speech rights are bleak within the U.S. system, what can be done to protect this important right? In June 2018, the United Nations’ top expert for freedom of expression called on companies to align their speech codes with standards embodied in international human rights law, particularly the International Covenant on Civil and Political Rights (ICCPR). After the controversy over de-platforming Alex Jones in August 2018, Twitter’s CEO agreed that his company should root its values in international human rights law and Facebook referenced this body of law in discussing its content moderation policies. This is the first article to explore what companies would need to do to align the substantive restrictions in their speech codes with Article 19 of the ICCPR, which is the key international standard for protecting freedom of expression. In order to examine this issue in a concrete way, this Article assesses whether Twitter’s hate speech rules would need to be modified. This Article also evaluates potential benefits of and concerns with aligning corporate speech codes with this international standard. This Article concludes it would be both feasible and desirable for companies to ground their speech codes in this standard; however, further multi-stakeholder discussions would be helpful to clarify certain issues that arise in translating international human rights law into a corporate context

Policy paper on freedom of expression in Tajikistan

Nigina Zaripov

European Court of Human Rights, Hans Burkhard Nix v. Germany

A recent decision by the European Court of Human Rights (ECtHR) confirms the limits of freedom of expression, in Germany, in relation to the publication of Nazi-symbols. A German blogger complained under Article 10 of the European Convention of Human Rights (ECHR) about his criminal conviction for the offence of using the symbols of unconstitutional organisations. But the ECtHR recently found no violation of his right to freedom of expression

Conviction of journalist for reporting about sex abuses in a Christian rehabilitation centre violated Article 10 ECHR

Analysis on judgment ECtHR on defamation and freedom of expression, conflicting right

European court of human rights: case of Axel Springer AG v. Germany

Grand Chamber judgment on freedom of expression, privacy and presumption of innocenc

European court of human rights: case of Aksu v. Turkey

Judgment ECtHR on freedom of expression, right op privacy, discrimination and stereotyping Rom