In this joint Centre for Law and Social Justice and Centre for Disabilities seminar, two visiting scholars presented papers and invited discussion on the implementation of the UN Convention on the Rights of Persons with Disabilities in their respective countries.
The UN CRPD in Italian Case Law
Italy was among the first countries to sign the UN Convention on the Rights of Persons with Disabilities (CRPD) in 2007, and ratified it by Law 18/2009. So far, the Convention has displayed significant influence on case law. This paper discusses how and to what extent the Italian Constitutional Court (ICC) and ordinary courts have referred to the Convention to advance the protection of the rights of persons with disabilities. It focuses on interesting and recent decisions of the ICC and of the Supreme Court of Cassation. On the whole, by highlighting why Italy represents an interesting case study, the paper attempts to draw more general conclusions on the potential for and the challenges of enforcing the rights provided by the CRPD in domestic legal orders.
About the speaker
Dr. Delia Ferri is a Lecturer in Law at Maynooth University Department of Law, where she lectures primarily in the fields of EU law and International and European Disability Law. She is currently the Director of the Law PG Research Programmes (M.Litt and Ph.D.) at Maynooth University Department of Law, and a member of the Maynooth University Social Sciences Institute (MUSSI), and of the Maynooth Centre for European and Eurasian Studies (MUCEES). She is also Associate Direction of the ALL Insitute of Maynooth University. She is an affiliated researcher at the Dirpolis Institute of Scuola Superiore Sant’Anna (Italy) within the research cluster on social rights, social inclusion and disability, and a fellow at the Burton Blatt Institute of Syracuse University (USA). Dr. Ferri academic work has focused on the rights of people with disabilities, participatory processes, and cultural diversity in the European Union.
