Country of residence

Germany

Brief introduction

Research Fellow, Max Planck Institute for Comparative Public Law and International Law, Heidelberg

Education

Master in Law (Master, Legal Studies, 2003, KULeuven, Belgium) / PhD Candidate (Doktor Iuris, Legal Studies, 2012 [not obtained yet], Ruprecht-Karls-Universität Heidelberg)

Academic profile

Educational legislation in many European countries maintains conditions that isolate Roma from the acquisition of economically and socially meaningful knowledge. Minority educational rights mostly focus on education as a means for the preservation of minority culture and traditions and therefore do not take fully into account the need for desegregation of Roma in education. Conversely, those international instruments focusing on non-discrimination rights disregard the necessity for the Roma minority to preserve their culture and traditions. Apart from these two approaches, which should be combined, attention should also be paid to the multicultural aspect of education, fulfilling a function of mutual understanding and conflict prevention. The most far-reaching European standard for the protection of national minorities, including Roma, is the CoE Framework Convention for the Protection of National Minorities, covering also educational rights. The major legal instrument to combat discrimination against Roma at EU level is the Racial Equality Directive 2000/43/EC, which provides a high level of protection from structural discrimination in education. The overall aim of my thesis is to assess the effectiveness and appropriateness of both the Framework Convention and the Racial Equality Directive as tools for desegregation of Roma in education and for the promotion of Roma educational rights in general. It wants to investigate whether these two tools tackle the problems met by Roma in education: whether they have been correctly implemented/transposed, whether they dispose of an added value compared to the already existing international instruments and in what ways they have contributed to the improvement of the situation of Roma in education ‘in the field’.

Publications

• Over de rechtmatigheid van de Franse verwijderingsmaatregelen tegen Roemeense en Bulgaarse Roma. In: Chroniques de Droit Public - Publiekrechtelijke Kronieken 1, 132-151 (2011).
• Roma Segregation in Education: Direct or Indirect Discrimination? An analysis of the parallels and differences between Council Directive 2000/43/EC and recent ECtHR case law on Roma educational matters. In: ZaöRV 71/4, 719-753 (2011).
• ECHR rules on illegal ban of Warsaw equality parade: the case of Baczkowski v. Poland. In: German Law Journal 8/9, (1 September 2007), available on-line.

Keywords

Minority Rights, Roma Rights, Non-discrimination, Human Rights, Right to Education

Contact

vandenbogaert@mpil.de browse members list