User:LegesFundamentales/Draft: Constitutional complaint

A constitutional complaint is a specialized legal procedure by which the violation of some provision of a constitution may be contested directly by a complainant before a constitutional court. It is a form of judicial review of state action; in some jurisdictions, it may be limited just to acts of one function of state (such as the executive ‒ sometimes without the gubernative ‒, judicial, or legislative function).

As a mode of judicial review
''Main article: Judicial review. See also: Constitutional court.'' Between such jurisdictions as permit judicial review of sovereign acts (of the legislature, of the executive branch, or of other courts), a contrast may be drawn between those which provide for "diffuse review" and those which provide for "concentrated review". The --> Kelsen concentration constitutional review model


 * No ability to vindicate constitutional rights directly
 * Incidental vindication of constitutional rights by ordinary courts (U.S., CH, Norway)

Scope of review
In some jurisdictions, the constitutional complaint procedure lets the court review the challenged action only insofar as the action may violate specific individual rights. Others allow the court to determine the challenged action's conformity with all of constitutional law; for example, the constitutional court might overturn a court decision that rests on a law enacted in violation of a point of legislative procedure (legislative procedure being a matter of the structural constitution, and not, for example, one of rights guaranteed to the individual in a bill of rights or similar constitutional catalogue of fundamental rights). In this way, provisions of constitutional law that are only intended to objectively decide the organizational structure of the state may virtually give rise to a subjective, enforceable right to be governed only by a state meeting the constitutional mandates for this organizational structure.

Situation by country
For list of countries in Europe, see Table 1 in the Venice Commission report (p. 62). For other countries, refer to Gentili 2011.