Tom Campbell is well known for his distinctive contributions to legal and political philosophy over three decades. In emphasizing the moral and political importance of taking a positivist approach to law and rights, he has challenged current academic orthodoxies and made a powerful case for regaining and retaining democratic control over the content and development of human rights.

This collection of his essays reaches back to his pioneering work on socialist rights in the 1980s and forward from his seminal book, The Legal Theory of Ethical Positivism (1996). An...

The European Convention on Human Rights (ECHR) has a large impact on national law, in particular through the case-law of the European Court of Human Rights (ECtHR). In most ECHR States, the authorities loyally implement the Court's interpretations in their legislation, case-law, and administrative decisions. Over the past few years, however, especially in some Western European democracies where the ECHR is robustly incorporated into the national legal systems, critical voices have been raised to question the degree of the Court's influence over national law and politics. It turns out that...