This article examines the German Pfandbrief (“covered bond”) as an example of the banking practice of “originate to hold” by which mortgage debts are retained on the balance sheet of the originator and not sold on to a third party such as an investor or hedge fund. The global financial crisis (GFC) of 2008-2009 will be forever linked to the process known as “securitization” and the distribution of mortgage-backed securities throughout willing and later remorseful financial markets. But this is not the only model. As a member of the Executive Board of the European Central Bank (ECB) noted in June of 2008, “it may be worth recalling that this [originate to distribute model] is not the way banks have historically done business. Under the traditional—perhaps, I should say secular—‘originate to hold’ business model, banks extend loans to firms and households and hold them in their balance sheets until they mature or are paid off.”

In a pluralistic society, agreement over complex issues is frequently difficult to achieve. This is amply demonstrated by the question of cultivation of Genetically Modified Organisms (GMOs), where scientific uncertainty relating to potential threats to the environment or human health runs parallel with concerns over ethics, freedom of choice, and competing agricultural and economic interests. Conflict centres over the objective of free trade of GMOs and the circumstances in which restrictions may legitimately be imposed to deal with the abovementioned concerns, in particular regarding cultivation.

The article describes the original Stem Cell Act, the reform discussion following its enactment and the reform of the Act adopted by the German Bundestag on 11 April 2008.

Whether or not the prohibition of torture allows exemptions is controversial not only in Germany but worldwide. The European Court of Human Rights (ECHR) had to answer this question in the case of Gäfgen versus Germany (App. 22978/05). The Grand Chamber of the Strasbourg court delivered its judgment on 1 June 2010. It held that the prohibition of torture (Article 3 of the European Convention for the Protection of Human Rights and Fundamental Freedoms) does not grant any exemptions, even if the life of another is at risk. The present case commentary agrees with this result of the judgment. The next question is even more interesting from the legal point of view: What are the legal consequences of a violation of Article 3 of the Convention, especially with regard to criminal court cases against the offender and the victim of torture? The ECHR emphasizes the necessity of the effectiveness of the protection of the fundamental rights under the Convention. As a result, it argues for a thorough investigation and deterrent punishment of the offenders on the one hand and for an extensive exclusion of evidence obtained as a consequence of torture from the proceedings against the victim of torture on the other.

Since the ECJ handed down the Mangold v. Rüdiger Helm (Mangold) decision in 2005, scholars have provided sometimes quite far reaching and sharp critiques of the decision and of what they took to be its consequences for European Union law. The decision concerned several questions, but the core issue was the applicability of (then) Community (now European Union) age-based anti-discrimination law in the case of a fixed-term employment contract. The contract at issue was based on a law that allowed fixed-term contracts without demanding objective reasons justifying the limitation of the period of employment beyond the age of 52. The law is enmeshed in the political problem of including people older than 52 in the workforce without depriving them of secure working conditions. The legal issue was complicated by the fact that the transposition time of the relevant directive 2000/78/EC including the prohibition of discrimination on the ground of age had not yet expired because of a permissible extension of that time by Germany. The ECJ declared the relevant norm to be contrary to Community law and thus not applicable in the case at hand. It applied the directive in question despite the still pending time limit for transposition, arguing with the requirement under Community law that Member States refrain from taking any measures liable to seriously compromise the attainment of the result prescribed by the directive. It buttressed its argument with the duty to report about the progress made during the extended transposition time. This provision was held to imply that the Member State was not allowed to adopt measures incompatible with progressive implementation. Furthermore, the ECJ interpreted the prohibition of age discrimination as an expression of a fundamental principle of Community law: the principle of equal treatment in the field of employment and occupation. Applying a proportionality test, the court found this foundational principle to have been violated. The ECJ also underlined the broad discretion the Member States retained in the field of social and employment policies. Because the provision's only criterion for allowing fixed-term contracts without an objective reason was age, without any other consideration linked to the structure of the labor market in question or of the personal situation of the person concerned, the Court found that even in light of this broad discretion, the respective norm was not appropriate and necessary to vocationally integrating unemployed older workers, which formed the purpose of the norm.