Granting fundamental rights to companies – nature of freedom as a fundamental value in EU law – intrinsic value of protecting freedom of individuals and instrumental value of protecting freedom of companies – Dan Cohen and rationale for protecting rights of organisations – transformation of the right to conduct business in EU law in Alemo Herron and subsequent case law – from right to do that which the law allows to right to be free from constraints – whose freedom is at stake when a company’s right to conduct business is protected – theories of the firm – company as a nexus of contracts or as a subject of rights on its own behalf – company as a locus of authority and as a jurisdiction – protecting freedom of company to restrict freedom of human beings – ideological underpinnings of extensive protection of freedom of companies – dehumanisation of fundamental rights.

Directive principles of social or state policy – use of constitutional provisions in parliamentary debates – economic, social and cultural rights – political constitutionalism – Article 45 of the Constitution of Ireland – constitutional culture – constitutional narrative – failure of constitutional culture to take hold – limits of constitutional text

A functional universalistic approach to human dignity in legal argumentation – a theory which applies three variables to define the functions of dignity: content width, argumentative power, and applicability before courts – relative individual right, objective value and source of human rights as legitimate basic functions – the problematic nature of hybrid functions created by blending the basic functions – a set of principles to avoid hybrid functions and minimise the problems caused by them – qualitative analysis of several examples of judgments by supreme, constitutional and international courts to support the theory