STRASBOURG, France (CN) — When teacher Kerstin Wienrank walked off her job at a German vocational school in 2009, she joined thousands of others fighting for better conditions. But, as a civil servant, the home economics teacher was legally barred from striking.
On Thursday, Europe’s top rights court upheld a German law banning such strikes. That court, the European Court of Human Rights, ruled that Germany did not violate Wienrank’s right to freedom and assembly, finding that it did not prevent unions from organizing.
“While the right to strike is an important element of trade-union freedom, strike action is not the only means by which trade unions and their members can protect the relevant occupational interests,” the 17-judge panel wrote.
Together with three other teachers, Wienrank complained to the Strasbourg-based court that the ban on striking violated her rights after the Federal Constitutional Court in Germany upheld the law in 2018.
Pushing back on that logic, the high court ruled that civil servants have a “duty of loyalty” that other types of employees do not.
Not every teacher in Germany is considered a civil servant. The country's educational employment system is complex and depends on location and other factors. Wienrank was fined 100 euros ($109) and had her salary reduced by 150 euros ($163) for refusing to turn up for one day of school.
During a hearing in March, lawyers for Germany defended the practice. “The last two years have provided ample evidence for stable and reliable conditions in schools,” lawyer Christian Walter told the court, referring to the lockdowns during the Covid pandemic.
Lawyers for Wienrank and the other teachers argued that the lack of right to strike hamstrung their ability to organize. “Are teachers not allowed to defend themselves?” lawyer Rudolf Buschmann asked during the hearing, after describing increasingly difficult working conditions for educators.
Although the ECHR concluded the law was out of line with other European countries, it found it did not rise to a violation of the European Convention of Human Rights. Adopted in the aftermath of World War II, the treaty protects the civil and political rights of Europeans and underpins the court.
According to the judges, Germany’s intent wasn’t to prevent unions from operating but to ensure the government could continue to function. The court found that “the prohibition on strikes by civil servants generally pursued the overall aim of providing good administration.”
Labor organizers will get another crack at guaranteeing the right to strike in 2024. The International Labour Organization, the United Nations agency responsible for labor standards, asked the U.N.’s high court to issue an advisory opinion on the right to strike. The Hague-based court has been asked if the right to strike is protected under a 1948 labor convention.
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