HUDOC Researcher

Paragraph-level case-law search with citation tracking and source-exact HUDOC text

A research dashboard for exploring European Court of Human Rights judgments as structured legal data, while keeping the wording and organisation of the HUDOC source documents visible.

Open dashboard Source code
Paragraph-levelstructural search
Source-exactHUDOC DOCX text
Bidirectionalcitation tracking

What it does

  • Searches judgment paragraphs with filters for Convention articles, respondent States, judges, importance, sections, and document type.
  • Rebuilds paragraphs from HUDOC source DOCX files rather than relying on scraped webpage text.
  • Extracts the ECtHR decisions and domestic-law sources cited by each judgment, plus later cases that cite it back.
  • Includes case analytics and an in-browser classifier for creating custom paragraph labels.
  • Uses an automated data pipeline for rebuilding and deploying the searchable corpus.

Design principle

The dashboard combines computational analysis with a source-first reader. Search and citation graphs help users find relationships, but the primary legal text remains the centre of the interface and can be traced back to HUDOC.