SAVICKIS AND OTHERS v. LATVIA JUDGMENT (iv) The proportionality of the difference in treatment (α) Preliminary considerations 200. The Court reiterates at the outset that it has in the past examined several cases concerning the obligations of the successor States to the former Yugoslavia as regards individual patrimonial rights and interests after the disintegration of that State (see, for example, Kurić and Others, cited above, and Kovačić and Others v. Slovenia ([GC], nos. 44574/98 and 2 others, 3 October 2008). However, it considers that the rules and principles of international law concerning State succession in pension matters are of little or no use for the purposes of the present case, as the official and consistent legal position of Latvia is based on the doctrine of State continuity, in the sense of a firm and coherent denial of any link of State succession between the former Soviet Union and the Latvian State. 201. The Court also reiterates that there is no right under Article 1 of Protocol No. 1 taken alone to receive a social security benefit or pension payment of any kind or amount, unless national law provides for such an entitlement (see, for example, Damjanac v. Croatia, no. 52943/10, § 87, 24 October 2013). Furthermore, given that the Latvian legislature has decided to grant occupational retirement pensions for the work performed during the historical period in question, the Court perceives no reasonable objection, from the point of view of Convention law, to a policy generally excluding periods of employment accrued while individuals were residing and working outside the Latvian territory. The core issue in the present case, however, is not whether the legitimate aims pursued by Latvia can justify not granting pensions at all, or granting them for the periods of work done in Latvia only, but whether they can justify the difference made in this regard between those holding Latvian citizenship and those holding the status of “permanently resident non-citizens”, and whether there is sufficient justification for this difference in treatment in the light of all the circumstances of the case. 202. The Court further notes that in the case of Andrejeva, cited above, it found a violation of Article 14 of the Convention taken in conjunction with Article 1 of Protocol No. 1. While mindful of the broad margin of appreciation enjoyed by the respondent State in the field of social security, the Court was not convinced that there had been a reasonable relationship of proportionality with respect to the legitimate aim of protecting the country’s economic system (ibid, § 89). In this regard, the Court reiterates that, while it is not formally bound to follow its previous judgments, it is in the interests of legal certainty, foreseeability and equality before the law that it should not depart, without good reason, from precedents laid down in previous cases (see Martinie v. France [GC], no. 58675/00, § 54, ECHR 2006-VI, and Magyar Helsinki Bizottság v. Hungary [GC], no. 18030/11, § 150, 8 November 2016). The Court must therefore determine whether there are any such 67