Indicator history

The judiciary's response to racist violence and hate crime is hampered by the lack of legal hate crime provisions and the deficiently narrow understanding of racism as phenomena primarily related to right-wing extremism (ECRI 2009, p. 30). According to the UN Special Rapporteur on Contemporary Forms of Racism, the narrow understanding of racism (see above) prevails in many relevant institutions, including the police and the courts (UN General Assembly 2010, p. 17). ECRI (2009) recommended in its fourth country report on Germany that more efforts are necessary to 'provide training to police officers, prosecutors and judges on issues pertaining to the implementation of criminal legislation addressing racism and racial discrimination'. Such efforts should 'ensure that all offences with racist motivations, whether or not they fall into the category of extremist crimes, are properly identified and dealt with as racially motivated offences' (ECRI 2009, p. 15). While robust data on the operational readiness/capacity and effective persecution of racist/hate crime by judicial system are lacking, these international reports suggest substantial weakness of the judicial response to racist violence and hate crimes, not only but especially in cases where the perpetrator is not regarded as affiliated with the extreme right-wing scene.

Source:

European Commission on Racism and Intolerance (ECRI) (2009), Fourth Country Report on Germany – fourth monitoring cycle.

United Nations General Assembly/Human Rights Council (2010) Report of the Special Rapporteur on contemporary forms of racism, racial discrimination, xenophobia and related intolerances, Githu Muigai. Mission to Germany.