Hostname: page-component-8448b6f56d-xtgtn Total loading time: 0 Render date: 2024-04-19T05:48:20.744Z Has data issue: false hasContentIssue false
  • English
  • Français

Recognising legal capacity: commentary and analysis of Article 12 CRPD

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  15 February 2017

Clíona de Bhailís  and
Eilionóir Flynn
Clíona de Bhailís*
Affiliation:
Centre for Disability Law and Policy, NUI Galway, Ireland. E-mail: cliona.debhailis@nuigalway.ie; eilionoir.flynn@nuigalway.ie.
Eilionóir Flynn
Affiliation:
Centre for Disability Law and Policy, NUI Galway, Ireland. E-mail: cliona.debhailis@nuigalway.ie; eilionoir.flynn@nuigalway.ie.
*
cliona.debhailis@nuigalway.ie
Get access Rights & Permissions [Opens in a new window]

Abstract

This paper aims to summarise the current understanding and literature around Article 12 of the Convention on the Rights of Persons with Disabilities (CRPD). It provides a brief history of the key terms associated with the right to equal recognition before the law and encompasses both academic writing in this area and General Comment No. 1 from the Committee on the Rights of Persons with Disabilities. The content is intended to provide readers of this Special Issue with a general understanding of developments surrounding Article 12 so they can fully engage with the other papers within this Special Issue and with the content of the Voices of Individuals: Collectively Exploring Self-determination (VOICES) project as a whole.

Type
Articles
Information
International Journal of Law in Context , Volume 13 , Special Issue 1: Legal Capacity and Human Rights , March 2017 , pp. 6 - 21
Copyright
Copyright © Cambridge University Press 2017 

Access options

Get access to the full version of this content by using one of the access options below. (Log in options will check for institutional or personal access. Content may require purchase if you do not have access.)

Footnotes

We wish to thank the two anonymous reviewers and the following members of the Advisory Committee and Steering Group for the VOICES project for their valuable feedback on an earlier draft of this article: Tina Minkowitz for her contributions on the history and drafting of the CRPD and for recommending further readings, Elizabeth Kamundia and Mirraim Nthenge for sourcing materials from the global south and key clarifications on the concepts of support, Michelle Browning for recommending readings from the Australian perspective and alternative views on substituted decision making, Alexander Ruck Keene for his guidance on issues relating to the Mental Capacity Act and factual incapacity, Theresia Degener for recommending further reading on the history and drafting and Piers Gooding for recommending further reading and highlighting important clarifications. However, any errors or inaccuracies are the sole responsibility of the authors.

References

Ad Hoc Committee (2006a) Final Report of the Ad Hoc Committee on a Comprehensive and Integral International Convention on the Protection and Promotion of the Rights and Dignity of Persons with Disabilities, A/61/611, 61st session, 6 December 2006. New York: United Nations.Google Scholar
Ad Hoc Committee (2006b) Report of the Ad Hoc Committee on a Comprehensive and Integral International Convention on the Protection and Promotion of the Rights and Dignity of Persons with Disabilities on Its Seventh Session, A/AC.265/2006/2, February 2006. Available at: <http://www.un.org/esa/socdev/enable/rights/ahc7docs/ahc7report-e.pdf> (accessed 3 December 2015).+(accessed+3+December+2015).>Google Scholar
Arbour, Louise (2006) ‘Statement by Louise Arbour UN High Commissioner for Human Rights on the Ad Hoc Committee's Adoption of the Convention on the Rights of Persons with Disabilities’, 5 December. Available at: <http://www.un.org/esa/socdev/enable/rights/ahc8hrcmsg.htm> (accessed 16 October 2015). (accessed 16 October 2015).' href=https://scholar.google.com/scholar?q=Arbour,+Louise+(2006)+‘Statement+by+Louise+Arbour+UN+High+Commissioner+for+Human+Rights+on+the+Ad+Hoc+Committee's+Adoption+of+the+Convention+on+the+Rights+of+Persons+with+Disabilities’,+5+December.+Available+at:++(accessed+16+October+2015).>Google Scholar
Arstein-Kerslake, Anna and Flynn, Eilionóir (2016) ‘The General Comment in Article 12 of the Rights of Persons with Disabilities: A Roadmap for Equality before the Law’, International Journal of Human Rights 20(4): 471–490.Google Scholar
Arstein-Kerslake, Annaand and Flynn, Eilionóir (2017) ‘The Right to Legal Agency: Domination, Disability, and the Protections of Article 12 of the Convention on the Rights of Persons with Disabilities’, International Journal of Law in Context 13(1), 22–38.Google Scholar
Australian Law Reform Commission (2014) Equality, Capacity and Disability: Final Report. Sydney: ALRC Report 124, August 2014.Google Scholar
Bach, Michael and Kerzner, Lana (2010) ‘A New Paradigm for Protecting Autonomy and the Right to Legal Capacity’, prepared for the Law Commission of Ontario. Available at: <http://www.lco-cdo.org/disabilities-commissioned-paper-bach-kerzner.pdf> (accessed 4 January 2016).+(accessed+4+January+2016).>Google Scholar
Bartlett, Peter (2014) ‘Implementing a Paradigm Shift: Implementing the CRPD in the Context of Mental Disability Law’ in Torture in Healthcare Settings: Reflections on the Special Rapporteur on Torture's 2013 Thematic Report. Washington: Centre for Human Rights and Humanitarian Law, American University Washington College of Law, 169–180.Google Scholar
Blackstone, William (1979) Commentaries on the Laws of England: A Facsimile of the First Edition of 1765–1769 with an Introduction by Stanley N. Katz. London and Chicago: University of Chicago Press.Google Scholar
BROSNAN, Liz and FLYNN, Eilionóir (2017) ‘Freedom to Negotiate: A Proposal Extricating “Capacity” From “Consent”’, International Journal of Law in Context 13(1): 58–76.Google Scholar
Browning, Michelle, Bigby, Christine and Douglas, Jacinta (2014) ‘Supported Decision Making: Understanding How Its Conceptual Link to Legal Capacity Is Influencing the Development of Practice’, Research and Practice in Intellectual and Developmental Disabilities 1(1): 34–45.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Carney, Terry and Beaupart, Fleur (2013) ‘Public and Private Bricolage: Challenges Balancing Law, Services and Civil Society in Advancing the CRPD Supported Decision Making’, University of New South Wales Law Journal 36(1): 175–201.Google Scholar
Commissioner for Human Rights (2012) ‘Who Gets to Decide? Right to Legal Capacity for Persons with Intellectual and Psychosocial Disabilities’, Comm DH/Issue Paper (2012)2. Strasbourg: Council of Europe.Google Scholar
Committee on The Rights of Persons with Disabilities (2014) General Comment No. 1 – Article 12: Equal Recognition Before the Law, UN Doc. No. CRPD/C/GC/1, adopted at the 11th Session, April 2014. Geneva: United Nations.Google Scholar
Dawson, John (2015) ‘A Realistic Approach to Assessing Mental Health Law Compliance with the UNCRPD’, International Journal of Law and Psychiatry 40: 70–79.Google Scholar
Dhanda, Amita (2006–2007) ‘Legal Capacity in the Disability Rights Convention: Stranglehold of the Past or Lodestar of the Future?’, Syracuse Journal of International Law and Commerce 34: 429–462.Google Scholar
Flynn, Eilionóir and Arstein-Kerslake, Anna (2014a) ‘Legislating Personhood: Realising the Right to Support in Exercising Legal Capacity’, International Journal of Law in Context 10(1): 81–104.Google Scholar
Flynn, Eilionóir and Arstein-Kerslake, Anna (2014b) ‘The Support Model of Capacity: Fact, Fiction or Fantasy?’, Berkeley Journal of International Law 32(1): 124–143.Google Scholar
Flynn, Eilionóir and Arstein-Kerslake, Anna (2017) ‘State Intervention in the Lives of People with Disabilities: The Case for a Disability Neutral Framework’, International Journal of Law in Context 13(1): 39–57.Google Scholar
Freeman, Melvyn Colin, KOLAPPA, Kavitha, DE ALMEIDA, Jose Miguel Caldas, KLEINMAN, Arthur, MAKHASHVILI, Nino, PHAKATHI, Sifiso, SARACENO, Benedetto and THORNICROFT, Graham (2015) ‘Reversing Hard Won Victories in the Name of Human Rights: A Critique of the General Comment on Article 12 of the UN Convention on the Rights of Persons with Disabilities’, Lancet Psychiatry 2(9): 844–850.CrossRefGoogle ScholarPubMed
Gold, Deborah (1994) ‘“We Don't Call It a ‘Circle’”: The Ethos of a Support Group’, Disability and Society 9(4): 435–452.Google Scholar
Gooding, Piers (2013) ‘Supported Decision-Making: A Rights-Based Disability Concept and Its Implications for Mental Health Law’, Psychiatry, Psychology and Law 20(3): 431–451.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Gooding, Piers (2015) ‘Navigating the “Flashing Amber Lights” of the Right to Legal Capacity in the United Nations Convention on the Rights of Persons with Disabilities: Responding to Major Concerns’, Human Rights Law Review 15(1): 45–71.Google Scholar
Gooding, Piers and Flynn, Eilionóir (2015) ‘Querying the Call to Introduce Mental Capacity Testing to Mental Health Law: Does the Doctrine of Necessity Provide an Alternative?’, Laws 4(2): 245–271.Google Scholar
Gooding, Piers, Arstein-Kerslake, Anna and Flynn, Eilionóir (2015) ‘Assistive Technology as Support for the Exercise of Legal Capacity’, International Review of Law, Computers & Technology 29(2–3): 245–265.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Gordon, Robert M. (2000) ‘The Emergence of Assisted (Supported) Decision-Making in the Canadian Law of Adult Guardianship and Substitute Decision-Making’, International Journal of Law and Psychiatry 23(1): 61–77.Google Scholar
Haleem, Chief Justice Muhammad (1988) ‘The Domestic Application of International Human Rights Norms’ in Developing Human Rights Jurisprudence: The Domestic Application of International Human Rights Norms : Judicial Colloquium in Bangalore, 24–26 February 1988. London and Bangalore: Human Rights Unit, Commonwealth Secretariat, 97.Google Scholar
Healy, Kevin (2015) ‘The Assisted Decision Making (Capacity) 2013: A Step in the Right Direction but Does It Go Far Enough?’, Cork Online Law Review 14: 22–35.Google Scholar
Herr, Stanley S. (2003) ‘Self Determination Autonomy and Alternatives for Guardianship’, in Stanley S. Herr, Harold Hongju Koh, Lawrence Ogalthorpe Gostin and Larry Ogalthorpe Gostin (eds) Human Rights of Persons with Intellectual Disabilities. Oxford: Oxford University Press, 429–450.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Hoffman, István and Könczei, György (2011) ‘Legal Regulations Relating to the Passive and Active Legal Capacity of Persons with Intellectual and Psychosocial Disabilities in Light of the Convention on the Rights of Persons with Disabilities and the Impending Reform of the Hungarian Civil Code’, Loyola of Los Angeles International and Comparative Law Review 33: 143–172.Google Scholar
HOLNESS, Willene (2014) ‘Equal Recognition and Legal Capacity for Persons with Disabilities: Incorporating the Principle of Proportionality’, South African Journal on Human Rights 30(2): 313–344.Google Scholar
IDA CRPD Forum (2008) ‘Principles for the Implementation of Article 12. IDA Legal Capacity Task Force’. Available at: <http://wnusp.rafus.dk/ida-crpd-forum-principles-for-the-implementation-of-article-12.html> (accessed 5 December 2015).+(accessed+5+December+2015).>Google Scholar
International Disability Caucus (IDC) (2005) ‘Updated Contribution on the Draft Text of A Comprehensive and Integral International Convention on Protection and Promotion of the Rights and Dignity of Persons with Disabilities’. Available at: <http://www.un.org/esa/socdev/enable/rights/ahc5docs/ahc5idcaucus.doc> (accessed 3 December 2015).+(accessed+3+December+2015).>Google Scholar
International Disability Caucus (IDC) (2006a) ‘IDC Modification to Article 12, Draft EU Position Elaborated Together with Canada, Australia, Norway, Costa Rica, USA, Liechtenstein’. Available at: <http://www.un.org/esa/socdev/enable/rights/ahc7docs/ahc7idcmodart12e.doc> (accessed 3 December 2015).+(accessed+3+December+2015).>Google Scholar
International Disability Caucus (IDC) (2006b) ‘Nothing about Us without Us’, International Disability Caucus Special Edition, 31 January. Available at: <http://www.ideanet.org/content.cfm?ID=595D77> (accessed 4 December 2015).+(accessed+4+December+2015).>Google Scholar
Kanter, Arlene S. (2014) The Development of Disability Rights under International Law: From Charity to Human Rights. New York: Routledge.Google Scholar
Kayess, Rosemary and French, Philip (2008) ‘Out of Darkness into Light? Introducing the Convention on the Rights of Persons with Disabilities’, Human Rights Law Review 8(1): 1–34.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Keys, Mary (2009) ‘Legal Capacity Law Reform in Europe: An Urgent Challenge’ in Quinn, Gerard and Waddington, Lisa (eds) European Yearbook of Disability Law, Volume 1. Oxford: Intersentia, 59–88.Google Scholar
McSherry, Bernadette (2012) ‘Legal Capacity Under the Convention on the Rights of Persons with Disabilities’, Journal of Law and Medicine 20: 22–27.Google ScholarPubMed
McSherry, Bernadette and Wilson, Kay (2015) ‘The Concept of Capacity in Australian Mental Health Law Reform: Going in the Wrong Direction?’, International Journal of Law and Psychiatry 40: 60–69.CrossRefGoogle ScholarPubMed
Mégret, Frederic (2008) ‘The Disabilities Convention: Human Rights of Persons with Disabilities or Disability Rights?’, Human Rights Quarterly 30(2): 494–516.Google Scholar
Mental Disability Advocacy Center (2007a) Guardianship and Human Rights in Hungary: Analysis of Law, Policy and Practice. Budapest: Mental Disability Advocacy Center.Google Scholar
Mental Disability Advocacy Center (2007b) Guardianship and Human Rights in Russia: Analysis of Law, Policy and Practice. Budapest: Mental Disability Advocacy Center.Google Scholar
Minkowitz, Tina (2013) ‘CRPD Article 12 and the Alternative to Functional Capacity’: Preliminary Thoughts Towards Transformation’, published on academia.edu. Available at: <https://www.academia.edu/5675658/CRPD_Article_12_and_the_Alternative_to_Functional_Capacity_Preliminary_Thoughts_towards_Transformation> (accessed 4 December 2015).+(accessed+4+December+2015).>Google Scholar
Minkowitz, Tina (2006–2007) ‘The United Nations Convention on the Rights of Persons with Disabilities and the Right to Be Free from Nonconsensual Psychiatric Interventions’, Syracuse Journal of International Law and Commerce 34: 405–428.Google Scholar
Minkowitz, Tina (2010) ‘Norms and Implementation of Article 12 CRPD’. Available at: <http://papers.ssrn.com/sol3/Delivery.cfm/SSRN_ID2037452_code1348856.pdf?abstractid=2037452&mirid=1&type=2> (accessed 2 December 2015).+(accessed+2+December+2015).>Google Scholar
Minkowitz, Tina (2013) ‘CRPD Advocacy by the World Network of Users and Survivors of Psychiatry: The Emergence of a User/Survivor Perspective in Human Rights’. Available at: <http://papers.ssrn.com/sol3/Delivery.cfm/SSRN_ID2326668_code1348856.pdf?abstractid=2326668&mirid=1&type=2> (accessed 3 December 2015).+(accessed+3+December+2015).>Google Scholar
Minkowitz, Tina (2014) ‘Rethinking Criminal Responsibility from a Critical Disability Perspective: The Abolition of Insanity/Incapacity Acquittals and Unfitness to Plead, and Beyond’, Griffith Law Review: Special Issue – Disability at the Peripheries 23(4): 434–466.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Perlin, Michael (2015) ‘“God Said to Abraham/Kill Me a Son”: Why the Insanity Defence and the Incompetency Status Are Compatible with and Required by the Convention on the Rights of Persons with Disabilities and Basic Principles of Therapeutic Justice’. Available at: <http://papers.ssrn.com/sol3/Delivery.cfm/SSRN_ID2692768_code200886.pdf?abstractid=2683480&mirid=1> (accessed 4 January 2015).+(accessed+4+January+2015).>Google Scholar
Quinn, Gerard (2009) ‘A Short Guide to the United Nations Convention on the Rights of Persons with Disabilities’ in Quinn, Gerard and Waddington, Lisa (eds) European Yearbook on Disability Law: Volume 1. Oxford: Intersentia, 89–114.Google Scholar
Quinn, Gerard (2010) ‘Personhood and Legal Capacity: Perspectives on the Paradigm Shift of Article 12 CRPD’, paper presented at the HPOD Conference on Disability and Legal Capacity under the CRPD, Harvard Law School, 20 February 2010. Available at: <http://www.nuigalway.ie/cdlp/documents/publications/Harvard%20Legal%20Capacity%20gq%20draft%202.doc> (accessed 16 October 2015).+(accessed+16+October+2015).>Google Scholar
Series, Lucy (2015a) ‘Legal Capacity and Participation in Litigation: Recent Developments in the European Court of Human Rights’ in Quinn, Gerard, Waddington, Lisa and Flynn, Eilionóir (eds) European Yearbook of Disability Law Volume 5. Oxford: Intersentia, 103–128.Google Scholar
Series, Lucy (2015b) ‘Relationships, Autonomy and Legal Capacity: Mental Capacity and Support Paradigms’, International Journal of Law and Psychiatry 40: 80–91.Google Scholar
Steiner, Henry J., Alston, Philip and Goodman, Ryan (2008) International Human Rights in Context: Law, Politics, Morals: Text and Materials. New York: Oxford University Press.Google Scholar
Trömel, Stefan (2009) ‘A Personal Perspective on the Drafting History of the United Nations Convention on the Rights of Persons with Disabilities’ in Quinn, Gerard and Waddington, Lisa (eds) European Yearbook on Disability Law: Volume 1. Oxford: Intersentia, 115–138.Google Scholar
University of Cambridge, Cambridge Intellectual & Developmental Disabilities Research Group (2014) Submission to the CRPD Committee on the Draft General Comment on Article 12 CRPD, 31 January 2014. Available at: <http://www.ohchr.org/Documents/HRBodies/CRPD/GC/UniversityCambridgeGCArticle12.doc> (accessed 22 October 2015).+(accessed+22+October+2015).>Google Scholar
Ward, Adrian (2011) ‘Adults with Incapacity: Freedom and Liberty, Rights and Status: Part 1’, Scots Law Times 5: 21–25.Google Scholar
Ward, Adrian (2015) ‘Abolition of Guardianship? “Best Interests” versus “Best Interpretation”’, Scots Law Times 32: 150–154.Google Scholar
Working Group to The Ad Hoc Committee (2004) Report of the Working Group to the Ad Hoc Committee, Draft Comprehensive and Integral International Convention on the Protection and Promotion of the Rights and Dignity of Persons with Disabilities. Available at: <http://www.un.org/esa/socdev/enable/documents/ahcwgreport.pdf> (accessed 3 December 2015).+(accessed+3+December+2015).>Google Scholar
World Network of Users and Survivors of Psychiatry and The Center for The Human Rights Users and Survivors of Psychiatry (2014) ‘Joint Submission to the CRPD Committee on the Draft General Comment on Article 12 CRPD’. Available at: <http://www.ohchr.org/Documents/HRBodies/CRPD/GC/WNUSP-CHRUSP.doc> (accessed 22 October 2015).+(accessed+22+October+2015).>Google Scholar