124 THE YALE JOURNAL OF INTERNATIONAL LAW [Vol. 33: 113 of protection in the many other cons titutional democracies with economic and social rights guarantees—such as Indi a, Argentina, Hu ngary, or Spain, 55 or even for the st ate constitutions of the Uni ted States 56 —is furthered by the textual similarities between rights protected in differ ent constitutions (and the international human rights covenants) and by the transnational judicial 57 dialogue which complements and exp ands upon these similarities. Nonetheless, it appears that this potential has yet to be gr asped by judges or by advocates asserting economic and social rights in constitutional law. The relative rarity of the minimum core concept’s application in constitutional law obscures its deeper con nection with this system of law. A little digging reveals that the concept in herits its structur e from the German Basic Law,58 where the “core” or “essential c ontent” of certain constitutional rights lies beyond the reach of permissible limitation. 59 Despite the fact that the provision gives rise to a “r emarkable variety of vi ews as to what it means”60—a criticism not confined to German constitutional commentary, but exemplified by Parts II to IV of this Article—the pr otection of an es sential component of rights, which remains secure against limitation, is a common structural feature of constitutions, either articulated as part of the right itself, or within a constitutional limitation clause. This genealogy signals the first constitutional operation for the minimum core—as a concept which mediates the necessary limitations on rights by requiring a particular level of justificat ion if the minimum of the right is not satisfied, which the state, rather than the claimant, must pr ove. Similarly, because the minimum core concept confronts the de gree to which rights can be “progressively realized,” as well as limited, it can borrow from own lack of institutional capacity); South Africa v Grootboom 2001 (1) SA 46 (CC) at 66 (S. Afr.) (declining to decide on the question of a m inimum core of the right of access to adequate housing and pointing to a lack of information before the court necessary for such a determination). 55. For a (som ewhat optimistic) discussion of th e concept’s deploym ent in jurisprudence in these countries, see Fons Coom ans, Some Introductory Remarks on the Justiciability of Economic and Social Rights in a Comparativ e Constitutional Context, in JUSTICIABILITY OF ECONOMIC AND SOCIAL RIGHTS: EXPERIENCES FROM DOMESTIC SYSTEMS 1, 9-13 (Fons Coomans ed., 2006) [hereinafter JUSTICIABILITY OF ECONOMIC AND SOCIAL RIGHTS]. 56. E.g., Helen Hershkoff, Positive Rights and State Constitu tions: The Limits of Federal Rationality Review, 112 H ARV. L. REV. 1131, 1193 (1999); Burt Neuborne, Foreword: State Constitutions and the E volution of Positive Rig hts, 20 R UTGERS L.J. 881, 893 (1989) (describing the more promising potential for rights in education, health, nutrition, and shelter to operate at the state level rather than the federal level). 57. See, e.g., Sujit Choudhry, Migration as a New Metaphor in Comparative Constitutional Law, in THE MIGRATION OF CONSTITUTIONAL IDEAS (Sujit Choudhry ed., 2006); Martha F. Davis, The Spirit of Our Times: State Constitu tions and International Human Rights , 30 N.Y.U. REV. L. & SOC. CHANGE 359 (2006); Vicki C. Jackson, Constitutional Dialogue a nd Human Dignity: States and Transnational Constitutional Discourse, 65 MONT. L. REV. 15, 21-27 (2004) (describing the influence of transnational law—especially th e Universal Declaration of Human Rights—on the text of Montana Constitution). 58. GRUNDGESETZ [GG] [Constitution] art. 19(2 ) (F.R.G.) (stating “[ i]n no case m ay the essential content of a basic right be encroached upon”) (in the author’s translation, “ Wesensgehalt” refers to “essential content” rather than “essence”). 59. Esin Örücü, The Core of Rights and Free doms: The Limits of Limits , in HUMAN RIGHTS: FROM RHETORIC TO REALITY 37 (Tom Campbell et al. eds., 1986). As well as the Germ an Basic Law, Örücü referenced the core formulation in the Turkish Constitution of 1961 (replaced in 1982). 60. DAVID P. CURRIE, THE CONSTITUTION OF THE FEDERAL REPUBLIC OF GERMANY 178 n.15 (1994); see also id. at 306 (“Despite early expectations, the [essential content] provision has played little part in the decisions.”).