Bulgarian Lawyer: State of Emergency or Emergency Situation Defy Rule of Law

There is no control over assessment of what is emergent and to what extent, lawyer says

There is a good chance that when we are in an emergency situation, we will not actually have the rule of law, told BNR lawyer Deyana Marcheva, Chief Assistant Professor of Constitutional Law at the New Bulgarian University. She is among the participants in the conference themed "State of Emergency: Concepts, Practices, Policies".

 "The question is not whether the state of emergency includes some truncated version of the rule of law. We probably have to admit that since the emergency is the opposite of normal, and the law implies a normal structure of relations, there is a high probability that when we are in an emergency situation, we will not actually have the rule of law", according to Marcheva.

 The most famous theorist of the state of emergency of the 1920s, Carl Schmitt, is also the greatest opponent of the law-governed state, she added.

Whenever we talk about a state of emergency, an emergency situation, even an emergency epidemic situation, we have to realize as lawyers that we exclude the rule of law by default, Marcheva said for the "Before All" radioshow .

 There was no need to introduce a state of emergency as early as spring, even then the Public Health Act envisioned opportunities for the introduction of an emergency epidemic situation, believes Deyana Marcheva. According to her, the introduction of a state of emergency was due to legal ambiguities.

What are the lessons the law learned about from the application of the two models of restrictions?

The big problem from a legal point of view is exactly who decides what is extraordinary and to what extent it is extraordinary, commented Deyana Marcheva.