Making Rights: The Development Of Constitutional Consciousness In Russia

该项目将审查俄罗斯联邦宪法法院及其在保护公民权利方面的作用。自1992年以来，数以万计的俄罗斯公民提交了请愿书，要求法院帮助他们实现宪法保障的权利。在典型的一年里，该法院会收到1万多份这样的请愿书。虽然许多请愿书不属于法院的管辖范围，但大约一半的请愿书提出了一个值得进一步分析的宪法问题。虽然法院很少通过正式公布的是非曲直裁决来答复这些请愿，但法院回复了每封信，试图在一对一的基础上澄清请愿人的法律权利，或在不作出正式裁决的情况下协助确定请愿人的法律选择。首席调查员将通过抽取请愿书样本，审查请愿人提出的要求以及法院的答复，来研究这种正在发展的关于权利的对话。通过研究过去十年的这种相互作用，本研究将追踪俄罗斯在后苏联的第一个十年中宪法意识的出现。

This project will examine the Constitutional Court of the Russian Federation and its role in the protection of the rights of citizens. Since 1992, tens of thousands of Russian citizens have filed petitions, asking the court to assist them in realizing their constitutionally guaranteed rights. In a typical year, the court gets more than 10,000 such petitions. While many fall outside court's jurisdiction, about half of the petitions raise a constitutional question that merits further analysis. And while the court answers few of these petitions through formal published decisions on the merits, the court answers every letter, trying to clarify petitioners' legal rights on a one-to-one basis or assisting in defining the petitioners' legal options without rendering a formal decision. The principal investigator will study this developing dialogue about rights by drawing a sample of petitions and examining the claims that petitioners have made, as well as the court's responses. By studying this interaction over the last ten years, this research will trace the emergence of constitutional consciousness in Russia in its first post-soviet decade.