Practice of the European Court of Human Rights in defining the range of permissible restrictions on the freedom to conduct a business
Authors: Yakimova E. M. 
Published: March 2022

The subjectof the article is the application of the concept of the range of permissible restrictions on rights and freedoms that not enshrined in the Convention for the Protection of Human Rights and Fundamental Freedoms in the practice of the European Court of Human Rights.

The purposeof the research is to identify the basic position of the Court on the question of determining the degree of proportionate balance between public and private interests in establishing restrictions on the rights and freedoms of a person in the sphere of business activity.

The methodology. In the process of the research, both general scientific and special methods of knowing socio-legal phenomena (formal legal method, circular causality method) were used. The multivariance of achieving common standards for assessing the range of permissible restrictions on the freedom to conduct a business is determined by analyzing the balanced influence of internal and external factors, the interaction of many dichotomies and adichotomies.

Results, scope of application. The provisions of the Convention define the range of rights and freedoms protected. However, the Court in its practice broadly interprets the list of rights and freedoms protected by the Convention. The Court considers the Convention as a "living instrument" in order to adapt it to changing conditions of public life. The Court’s current practice does not imply that the Court has exceeded its powers. The court implements the idea of circular causality of legal phenomena, perceived including in European space. European tradition recognizes the possibility of changing the legal space in different ways. The main way of transforming the legal system is to change quantitative parameters. It is possible to accumulate the qualities of practical implementation of the principles enshrined in the Convention by ensuring the realization of human rights and fundamental freedoms. Investigators of the Court's practice mainly analyse the characteristics of the protection of human rights and freedoms explicitly mentioned in the Convention. The complexity of the study of the Court's practice for the protection of unrecognized human rights and freedoms stems from its heterogeneity. However, an analysis of the practice of protecting such rights and freedoms reveals the internal mechanisms of the Court to ensure the equilibrium of legal space. The article defines the basic position of the Court on the question of determining the degree of proportionate balance between public and private interests in establishing restrictions on the rights and freedoms of a person and a citizen not expressly enshrined in the Convention. The realization of economic rights and freedoms requires the greatest flexibility of the mechanism for the protection of rights and freedoms. Intensive economic development requires a rapid change in the legal space. The interpretation of human rights and freedoms has an impact on the level of protection of the economic rights and freedoms. The text of the Convention has been modified without adopting its new edition.

Conclusions.Law enforcers are particularly interested in analyzing the Court's practice in cases related indirectly to the protection of freedom to conduct a business. The Court determines the main vectors of interpretation of the freedom to conduct a business. Law enforcers can use the Court's approach in interpreting the provisions of the Convention without risking being accused of human rights and freedoms violations. The generalizations make it possible to establish the ideological and substantive component of the basic axiological imperative of the Court in the protection of the economic rights and freedoms through the protection of the right to property. It was concluded that the Court's decisions justified the need to protect the freedom to conduct a business by its inherent connection with the right to property, as well as the universality of the criteria for determining the legality of restricting the rights and freedoms.