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25 - Generative AI and Article 6 of the European Convention on Human Rights

The Right to a Human Judge?

from Part IV - The Use of Generative AI in Legal and Related Sectors

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  08 August 2025

Mimi Zou
Affiliation:
University of New South Wales, Sydney
Cristina Poncibò
Affiliation:
University of Turin
Martin Ebers
Affiliation:
University of Tartu, Estonia
Ryan Calo
Affiliation:
University of Washington
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Summary

There is growing global interest in how AI can improve access to justice, including how it can increase court capacity. This chapter considers the potential future use of AI to resolve disputes in the place of the judiciary. We focus our analysis on the right to a fair trial as outlined in Article 6 of the European Convention on Human Rights, and ask: do we have a right to a human judge? We firstly identify several challenges to interpreting and applying Article 6 in this new context, before considering the principle of human dignity, which has received little attention to date. Arguing that human dignity is an interpretative principle which incorporates protection from dehumanisation, we propose it provides a deeper, or “thicker” reading of Article 6. Applied to this context, we identify risks of dehumanisation posed by judicial AI, including not being heard, or not being subject to human judgement or empathy. We conclude that a thicker reading of Article 6 informed by human dignity strongly suggests the need to preserve human judges at the core of the judicial process in the age of AI.

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Publisher: Cambridge University Press
Print publication year: 2025

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