Workshop on Multiple Discrimination

The following issues were discussed:

Did you come across examples in your legal practice of ‘additive’ or’ compound’ discrimination and ‘intersectionality’? If so, how were these cases addressed in court and/or by an equality body?
Does, in your view, the notion of multiple discrimination provide a useful tool and have added value in order to address in courts forms of discrimination involving more than one ground of discrimination only?

There is a huge gap between the interest shown towards multiple discrimination and the legal responses, which have been very poor. The workshop highlighted the fact that the categories that are protected under anti-discrimination law are not always followed in the theoretical discourse. When it comes to the legal responses to the problem, EU ‘hard’ law does not clearly address the problem whereas the Court of Justice of the European Union has not taken the opportunity to address multiple discrimination in cases where it could have done so. Against this background, the long-lasting US experience on multiple discrimination enriched the debate, even if the success rate of actions on multiple discrimination is very low. Most cases have failed to provide remedies to victims. Issues around the differential material scope of the EU anti-discrimination and equality directives, combined with the difficulties related to evidence, such as comparator problem, may explain the failure of multiple discrimination cases. The workshop concluded that more effective implementation and more awareness-raising are necessary to adequately address the issue of multiple discrimination. This would require training of judges, equality bodies, members of the legal profession, etc. EU ‘soft law’ and guidelines were proposed to provide a better understanding of the issue.

Discussion paper (PDF 77 kB)
Handout presentations (PDF 168 kB)
Audio recording summary workshop proceedings (mp3 6 min.)

Powerpoint presentation Prof. Julie Goldscheid (PDF 106 kB)
Powerpoint presentation Dr. Kristína Koldinská (PDF 53 kB)