The Role of Civil Society in Human Rights and Constitutional Adjudication: Some Concerns about “Judicial Lobbying”

Civil society organizations are increasingly playing a significant role in the different phases of human rights litigation, contributing to changing the nature of the functions performed by ordinary, constitutional and supranational courts in contemporary democracies. The primary purpose of this article is to analyse the different ways of involvements of NGOs and other organized forms of civil society in the administration of justice, with the aim of highlighting how their activity is proving to be quite similar to lobbyism. Secondly, it discusses the perception of human rights courts as an arena of public debate and the consequent need for more clarity and transparency in the use of third-party interventions, public oral hearings and popular actions.