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News server Romea.cz. Everything about Roma in one place

Opinion

Czech Social Democratic shadow minister: D.H. judgment key to desegregating schools

25 November 2013
3 minute read

This month marks six years since the groundbreaking judgment from the European Court of Human Rights (ECtHR) in the case of D.H. and Others vs. the Czech Republic. That judgment confirmed that the Czech Republic discriminates against Romani children by disproportionately sending them to what were once called the "special schools" and today are called "practical schools."

The judgment of 13 November 2007 ruled that the Czech Government violated the ban on discrimination and the right to education of 18 Romani children from the Ostrava area by assigning them to the "special schools". The Grand Chamber of the ECtHR handed down the ruling on appeal.

The judgment was adopted by a vote of 13:4. The Czech Republic, according to its findings, violated the article of the European Convention on Human Rights banning discrimination and an article of a protocol to that convention concerning the right to education.

Despite international criticism of the Czech Republic, the problem persists. News server Romea.cz has asked three figures involved in human rights and the schools whether the D.H. judgment has transformed Czech education, and if so, how?

We contacted Ondřej Liška, the Green Party chair and former Education Minister who advocated inclusive education during his time in office; Michaela Marksová Tominová, the Czech Social Democratic shadow minister for human rights and the family; and Jolana Šmarhovyčová of the Life Together (Vzájemné soužití) association. Thanks to that NGO, the case of D.H. and Others was filed and pursued all the way to Strasbourg.  

The following is Ms Marksová Tominová’s contribution.

The influence of the D.H. judgment is essential

In my view, the most correct response to this question is "The system has not yet transformed, but for several years it has gradually been transforming." Despite my skepticism over the slowness of this process, I am unequivocally convinced the influence of the judgment remains completely essential to this day.

It is true that from the start the Czech schools have grappled with the implications of the judgment in a very peculiar way, particularly when Dr. Pilař at the Education Ministry came up with the idea to give the former "special schools" the new name of "practical schools". However, during the past six years the judgment has been an important tool for NGOs.  

During the relatively brief period of time in which Ondřej Liška and then Marie Kopicková were in charge of the Education Ministry, the judgment was also important for pushing through changes within the ministry itself and was crucial for those bureaucrats advocating changes against those who were more or less actively opposing them. During the tenure of former Education Minister Dobeš, the part of the ministry’s organizational structure that was pushing through changes for a more inclusive school system was almost completely destroyed, but what was launched at that time does continue to move incrementally forward.     

While the progress is much slower than we would like, I hope it is inexorable. The first sign that this might be the case is the recent amendment of ministerial decrees that implement the School Act.

Currently we are waiting for a new government to be formed. It will have an enormous, greatly important task before it:  To begin actively, systematically fighting social exclusion. 

The desegregation of our schools plays a completely key role in that fight. Instructions on how to achieve it already exist, for example, in the Government’s own "Strategy for the Fight against Social Exclusion." 

What is still missing here is the clear, uncompromising political will among our governing representatives to push through these measures. I firmly believe the new government will find the will to do so.

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