In episode 186 of “Follow the Rechtsstaat”, Prof. Niko Härting and Dr Stefan Brink discuss data protection, legal positivism and a recent ruling by the Federal Constitutional Court.
First, they discuss whether data protection regulations prevented the publication of police photos following an attack. Härting and Brink analyse the allegations from a legal perspective.
They then turn their attention to an article by legal historian Peter Oestmann on legal positivism and the question of how political protests and blockades should be assessed from a legal perspective.
Finally, the discussion turns to the Federal Constitutional Court’s ruling of 2 July 2026 on the criminal law ban on so-called child sex dolls. Härting and Brink discuss, in particular, the legislature’s discretion and the dissenting opinion of one of the constitutional judges.