Part II Means of Protection, Ch.VIII Inter-American Court of Human Rights, s.2 Jurisdiction and Functions, Article 62

This chapter analyzes Article 62 of the American Convention on Human Rights (ACHR), which is a fundamental and essential provision of the inter-American human rights protection system. Article 62 of the ACHR deals with the modalities for the recognition of the contentious jurisdiction of the Inter-American Court of Human Rights. It establishes the main feature of the exercise of this jurisdiction, namely, a State’s consent-based jurisdiction. In other words, the Court is granted an optional contentious jurisdiction, while the Inter-American Commission holds a compulsory jurisdiction to examine individual petitions on the basis of Article 44 of the ACHR. Article 62 must be analyzed in conjunction with other provisions of the Convention, including Article 61, which deals with the entities entitled to bring cases before the Court, namely, the States Parties and the Commission.