Call for Participants: International Symposia on the Right to Freedom of Association

The right to freedom of association is recognised as a human right in constitutions and international human rights treaties throughout the world. Yet caselaw and scholarship on this fundamental right is relatively sparse. Perhaps this is because the right to freedom of association is so unusual: it recognises and protects individuals, but in their sociality rather than their individuality. It thereby transcends the individual-state paradigm by relying on the existence and flourishing of private associations.

SOCIETAS is a four-year funded project led by Maria Cahill (School of Law, University College Cork) exploring the potential of freedom of association, beginning with a comparative doctrinal analysis of the ways in which this right is understood and vindicated across multiple jurisdictions, and building a theoretical framework for understanding this right, drawing on insights from theories of selfhood and theories of collective intentionality. 

The research team will host a virtual symposium on the right to freedom of association in March 2023 followed by an in-person hybrid symposium at University College Cork in June 2023. We are eager to hear from lawyers in as many different jurisdictions as possible and particularly from lawyers in Africa, Asia, Oceania, and South America.

“Mapping the Legal Landscape of Freedom of Association” (Virtual Symposium) - Friday 31st March 2023

“The Purpose and Potential of Freedom of Association” (In-Person/Hybrid Symposium) - June 2023, date to be confirmed in December 2022

The virtual symposium will explore how the right to freedom of association is currently protected by domestic and international legal orders. Participants are invited to contribute to a discussion of the nature and content of the right to freedom of association in their respective jurisdictions. Having mapped out the legal landscape in the virtual symposium, the in-person hybrid event will focus on the deeper purposes of the right to freedom of association, considering the rationales for its protection and the value that it provides. This event will be held in Cork, Ireland, in June 2023, and will be a hybrid event. Funding will be available to financially support contributors wishing to attend in person (subject to overall budgetary limits).

The purpose of these events is to build collaboration among a network of scholars who are working on freedom of association and to explore this right from a comparative perspective. These events will lead to an edited comparative study of the right to freedom of association in legal systems around the world.

If you are interested in participating in these events and developing a country or regional report on how the right to freedom of association is understood and vindicated by a specific constitution or international treaty, please register by emailing Maria Cahill (maria.cahill@ucc.ie) or SocietasProject@gmail.com, using ‘FOA Comparative Symposia’ as the subject heading. Please also send a 300-400-word abstract setting out preliminary details of how the right is protected in that jurisdiction/region, along with a short biography. The deadline to register as a participant will be Friday 2nd December, 2022. Full details are available at the following link: Freedom of Association Symposia - Call for Participants.