Article 3 of the Basic Law and the principle of equal treatment contained therein provide for general protection against discrimination. This constitutionally stipulated protection against discrimination constitutes a rule of law principle and is valid in all areas of law. It operates vertically between state and citizen. However, claiming this principle of equal treatment by way of court procedures is tedious and extremely difficult.

The General Equal Treatment Act (AGG), which is based on European Equal Treatment Directives, offers comprehensive protection against discrimination in private law. This will make it possible to sanction discrimination by private actors against other private actors based on ethnic origin, religion, gender, age, disability or sexual orientation. However, the AGG does not cover state action unless it affects labour laws.

Although ​​education is listed in the AGG ‘s scope of application, no sanctioning possibilities are provided for the AGG. However, the education laws of the Länder contain different forms of the principle of equal treatment. For the police, the principle of equal treatment of the Basic Law is binding.

In both areas, there is no directly applicable legal framework that could address cases of institutional discrimination. BUG promotes strengthening the protection against discrimination also in the field of public law and therefore it has developed a draft of an anti-discrimination law covering public law.