In January 2021 the Hungarian Constitutional Court launched an ambitious project with the aim to encourage the use of foreign jurisprudence in constitutional adjudication by setting up an English-language database of European constitutional court decisions. The European Constitutional Communication Network, ECCN in short, stands for both an online database as well as an international collaboration of eight European constitutional courts, dedicated to contribute to the European transjudicial dialogue.
The consideration or application of foreign case-law in the decision-making of constitutional courts is used to enlarge the discussion with a broader range of arguments in order to reach a detailed and well-based decision. The relevance of the practice of foreign constitutional courts before a domestic constitutional court rests on two pillars: on the one hand, the similarity of the issues, challenges the courts face, and on the other hand, the similarity of constitutional values and approach to fundamental rights stemming from a shared cultural heritage. In Europe, especially in Central-Eastern Europe, the constitutional courts face an increasing number of challenges that are European or global in nature. Challenges, such as pandemics, war, economic crisis, migration, or the more prolonged threat of climate change raise several unprecedented questions of constitutional law relevance. In such cases constitutional courts can benefit from looking abroad to see how other States have responded to similar problems. ECCN was grounded on the premises that the diversity in national approaches to global problems shall be appreciated, given that these constitutional systems are all founded on similar constitutional values of the rule of law, democracy, and the protection of human rights. The mission of ECCN is to make European constitutional case-law transparent and accessible, so that through the mutual exchange of decisions the European community would be provided with collective wisdom, from which all can benefit.