Acceso usuarios
Official Whistleblower – Duty of Confidentiality vs. Loyalty to the Constitution This is an enquiry into the extent of a civil servant’s duty to secrecy with respect to his duty to act in accordance with the constitution. The leading case is called Werner Pätsch, a 1965 decision by the Bundesgerichtshof, i.e. the highest appellate court of justice for criminal cases in Germany. This case will be discussed in the first section, with an emphasis on its similarities to the case of Edward Snowden. In the second section, the present legal situation is analyzed. As a result, it is noted that it is legally allowed to blow the whistle as a civil servant – albeit under a number of not clearly predefined circumstances. The article will conclude by arguing infavor of legislative reforms of the legal status of the civil servant as a whistleblower.
