Claire Loven, Fundamental Rights Violations by Private Actors and the Procedure Before the European Court of Human Rights: A Study of Verticalised Cases. Cambridge (United Kingdom): Intersentia, 2022. 250 pages, isbn: 9781839702839
Abstract
The book of Claire Loven is the first complex monograph focusing on so called 'verticalised' cases (the term invented by the author) in proceedings before the European Court of Human Rights (ECtHR). The author is not a pioneer in exploring the issue of human rights breaches by private actors, but the general characteristics of 'verticalised' cases and the analysis of the ECtHR's approach to them have never before been described in such detail.
To clarify the issue, I would like to borrow the author's explanation of verticalised cases: 'A complaint stemming from a horizontal conflict at the domestic level can be successfully brought before the ECtHR, where it is transformed into a vertical - and thus "verticalised" - case.' The main research question of the book is: what are the characteristics of verticalised cases and how should the ECtHR deal with such cases?