New Issue: Transnational Dispute Management

The latest issue of Transnational Dispute Management (2013, no. 2) is out. This is a special issue on "EU, Investment Treaties, and Investment Treaty Arbitration - Current Developments and Challenges." The table of contents is here.

New Issue: Mealey's International Arbitration Report

The latest issue of Mealey's International Arbitration Report (Vol. 28, no. 2, February 2013) is out.

Strong: Beyond the Self-Execution Analysis: Rationalizing Constitutional, Treaty and Statutory Interpretation in International Commercial Arbitration

S.I. Strong (Univ. of Missouri - Law) has posted Beyond the Self-Execution Analysis: Rationalizing Constitutional, Treaty and Statutory Interpretation in International Commercial Arbitration (Virginia Journal of International Law, forthcoming). Here's the abstract:

International commercial arbitration has long been considered one of the paradigmatic forms of private international law and has achieved a degree of legitimacy that is virtually unparalleled in the international realm. However, significant questions have recently begun to arise about the device’s public international attributes, stemming largely from a circuit split regarding the nature of the New York Convention, the leading treaty in the field, and Chapter 2 of the Federal Arbitration Act, which helps give effect to the Convention in the United States.

Efforts have been made to place the debate about the New York Convention within the context of post-Medellin jurisprudence concerning self-executing treaties. However, that framework does not adequately address the difficult constitutional question as to what course should be adopted when a particular issue is governed by both a treaty and a statute that is meant to incorporate that treaty into domestic law.

This Article addresses that question by considering the role of and relationship between the New York Convention and the Federal Arbitration Act, and by providing a robust analysis of the constitutional, statutory and public international issues that arise in cases involving international treaties and incorporative statues. Although the discussion is rooted in the context of international commercial arbitration, the Article provides important theoretical and practical insights that are equally applicable in other types of public international law.

Spiro: Sovereigntism's Twilight

Peter J. Spiro (Temple Univ. - Law) has posted Sovereigntism's Twilight (Berkeley Journal of International Law, forthcoming). Here's the abstract:

Sovereigntism is having a good run in the academy and the courts. Scholars skeptical of international law succeeded in prompting a searching reexamination of the Restatement (Third) of Foreign Relations Law and the conventional wisdom it had come to represent. Sovereigntist positions have found a receptive audience in recent decisions of the Roberts Court, with additional victories just over the horizon.

But sovereigntism is bound to fail. Massive material changes in the nature of global interaction will overwhelm sovereigntist defenses, which (notwithstanding their constitutional pedigree and apparent gravity) are in the end incapable of stemming the tide. International law is insinuating itself into U.S. law through multiple channels. In the end, globalization is not a quantity to be rejected, accommodated, or accepted as a policy option. The Constitution will not be able to plug the gaps.

This essay considers four clusters of cases that appear to evidence sovereigntism’s continued ascendancy, relating to self-execution, the Alien Tort Statute, the detention of terror suspects, and the use of international law in constitutional interpretation. Although these clusters appear to vindicate sovereigntist perspectives, short-term victories are likely to be reversed by material forces of globalization. The Constitution will inevitably and radically adapt to the changed international context.

Meyer: Epistemic Institutions and Epistemic Cooperation in International Environmental Governance

Timothy Meyer (Univ. of Georgia - Law) has posted Epistemic Institutions and Epistemic Cooperation in International Environmental Governance (Transnational Environmental Law, forthcoming). Here's the abstract:

Much recent scholarship in international law on the relationship between science and policy argues that the expert bodies that generate policy-relevant scientific advice (“epistemic institutions”) should be autonomous from the institutions which use that advice as an input to make international legal rules (“legal institutions”). In this article, I argue that legal institutions’ acquisition of policy-relevant scientific advice is akin to the make-or-buy decision faced by firms: legal institutions can either acquire such advice from independent epistemic institutions or they can seek such advice from an internal and hierarchically subordinate epistemic institution. I then apply the theory of the firm to show that the conventional wisdom about the benefits of scientific autonomy is incorrect.

Scientific advice must be credible in the eyes of non-expert regulators in order to support the widespread adoption of legal rules to address transnational environmental problems. Where states individually lack the incentive to regulate an environmental problem absent a collective decision, states that lack the capacity to directly assess the credibility of the scientific record may block the adoption of legal rules in international institutions out of fear that the scientific assessment process is biased to produce particular policy outcomes. Hierarchical control of epistemic institution can overcome this problem by giving such states direct oversight of the scientific assessment process, thereby reassuring them of the credibility of the scientific record.

By contrast, where states internalize a sufficient amount of the benefit from regulating an international problem unilaterally, fragmenting legal and epistemic institutions is optimal. Where a collective decision is not necessary to coordinate state behavior, the decentralized adoption of policy-relevant scientific recommendations signals to scientifically-disadvantaged states that the scientific record is credible, thereby eliminating the need for hierarchical controls to perform the same function. Fragmentation is thus the ideal mode of organization because it best facilities the development and diffusion of policy-relevant science.

This framework explains much of the variation we observe in the independence of international scientific bodies from legal institutions. Legal institutions governing commons issues, such as the International Whaling Commission or a variety of fisheries regimes, have integrated scientific bodies to deal with the opportunism issues created by the need for collective decision-making. By contrast, organizations such as the International Renewable Energy Agency – an independent epistemic institution that produces and disseminates information about renewable energy technologies and their economic viability – do not create the same kinds of opportunism issues because states have an incentive to act individually on the basis of the epistemic institution’s recommendations. More generally, the application of new institutional economics to explain vertical integration decisions within international institutions opens a field of inquiry that might be expanded to explain a variety of regime design puzzles in international law, such as for example the variation in the extent to which international legal institutions create institution-specific courts (such as the International Tribunal for the Law of the Sea) or outsource disputes to standing bodies (such as the International Court of Justice).

New Issue: Goettingen Journal of International Law

The latest issue of the Goettingen Journal of International Law (Vol. 4, no. 3, 2012) is out. Contents include:

• Articles
• Jochen von Bernstorff, Georg Jellinek and the Origins of Liberal Constitutionalism in International Law
• Lando Kirchmair, The ‘Janus Face’ of the Court of Justice of the European Union: A Theoretical Appraisal of the EU Legal Order’s Relationship with International and Member State Law
• Ana Constanza Conover, The Supplement of Deficiencies in the Complaint Within the WTO Dispute Settlement Mechanism
• Principles of International Criminal Law
• Britta Lisa Krings, The Principles of ‘Complementarity’ and Universal Jurisdiction in International Criminal Law: Antagonists or Perfect Match?
• Hiromi Sato, Modes of International Criminal Justice and General Principles of Criminal Responsibility
• The Impact of Human Rights on International and National Developments
• Patricia Tarre Moser, Non-Recognition of State Immunity as a Judicial Countermeasure to Jus Cogens Violations: The Human Rights Answer to the ICJ Decision on the Ferrini Case
• Roee Ariav, National Investigations of Human Rights Between National and International Law
• Semahagn Gashu Abebe, The Need to Alleviate the Human Rights Implications of Large-scale Land Acquisitions in Sub-Saharan Africa

Talmon: The Occupation of Iraq: Volume 2

Stefan Talmon (Universität Bonn - Law) has published The Occupation of Iraq: Volume 2, The Official Documents of the Coalition Provisional Authority and the Iraqi Governing Council (Hart Publishing 2013). Here's the abstract:

The invasion and occupation of Iraq rank among the most controversial and complex issues in international law in recent history. This volume of documents covers the occupation of Iraq from the planning stages of the invasion of Iraq in early 2002 to the transfer of governing authority to the Iraqi Interim Government on 28 June 2004. The book presents 595 selected documents including the first complete set of all Regulations, Orders, Memoranda and Public Notices issued by the US-led occupation administration of Iraq, the Coalition Provisional Authority (CPA), several of which were never published on the CPA`s website or promulgated in Alwaqai Aliraqiya, the Official Gazette of Iraq. Some of these legal acts have shaped the economic and political system of present day Iraq and will be part of the country`s legal order for years to come. The book also includes some 120 other CPA and CPA-related documents selected from more than 5000 unclassified CPA documents and received under freedom of information requests lodged in the United States, the United Kingdom, Australia and Switzerland. These documents include instructions and proclamations to the Iraqi people in the early stages of the occupation, organizational charts, internal legal opinions, diplomatic notes, international agreements concluded by the CPA with other States, and numerous internal memoranda for the head of the CPA, Ambassador Paul L Bremer, on legal, diplomatic and political issues. The book also presents for the first time all 235 resolutions passed by the Iraqi Governing Council (IGC) between July 2003 and June 2004. The resolutions as well as many of the 25 other important IGC documents (including various political statements, press releases and decrees of the Council`s Higher National De-Ba`athification Commission) have been translated from Arabic and are presented here for the first time in English. These documents are complemented by the relevant United Nations documents on the occupation of Iraq as well as some 50 policy documents of the United States, the United Kingdom and the Iraqi opposition movement as well as all relevant fatwas (religious rulings) of Grand Ayatollah Ali al-Sistani which shaped the internal Iraqi political process during the occupation.

This collection archives these important documents for future use and makes them easily accessible to researchers and professionals. Considering that the main source of information for the occupying powers in Iraq were the precedents set during the First and Second World Wars, the occupation of Iraq will serve as a modern precedent for future administrations of occupied territory. The documents are made easily accessible by a comprehensive table of documents, a list of abbreviations, more than 1100 explanatory notes and cross-references and a substantive subject index.

New Volume: Anuario Colombiano de Derecho Internacional

The latest volume of the Anuario Colombiano de Derecho Internacional (Vol. 5, 2012) is out. Contents include:

• Joaquín González Ibáñez, Pedagogía jurídica, Estado de derecho y derechos humanos. El profesor, la toga del juicio de Baltasar Garzón y Miguel de Unamuno
• Rosmerlin Estupiñán Silva, Les mesures d’éloignement et le droit à la vie privée et familiale des étrangers en Europea
• Ilich Felipe Corredor Carvajal, Analyse de la compétence juridictionnelle à partir de la première décision de la Cour Africaine des Droits de l’Homme et des Peuples: l’affaire Hissène Habré
• Juan Manuel Medina Amador, Aplicabilidad del derecho internacional general dentro del mecanismo de solución de controversias de la OMC: el caso del derecho a la salud
• Andrés Sarmiento Lamus, La Corte Internacional de Justicia y la intervención de terceros en cuestiones marítimas: A propósito de la decisión en las solicitudes de intervención de Costa Rica y Honduras en la Controversia territorial y marítima (Nicaragua vs. Colombia)
• Juan Nicolás Guerrero Peniche, La opinión consultiva del Tribunal Internacional del Derecho del Mar: Aspectos relativos a la determinación del vínculo efectivo entre los Estados y las personas jurídicas a las que patrocinan para llevar a cabo actividades en la Zona
• Ricardo Abello Galvis, Walter Arévalo Ramírez, Andrés Sarmiento & María Carolina Caro Ferneynes (Traductores), El diferendo territorial y marítimo entre Nicaragua y Colombia. Traducción del Fallo de la Corte Internacional de Justicia en el “Diferendo Territorial y Marítimo” (Nicaragua c. Colombia). Decisión sobre el fondo
• Ricardo Abello Galvis & Cristhian Ferrer Acuña (Traductores), Traducción de la Sentencia de la Corte Internacional de Justicia sobre el diferendo relativo a la aplicación del Acuerdo Provisional del 13 de septiembre de 1995 (Ex - República Yugoslava de Macedonia c. Grecia) Decisión sobre el fondo

New Issue: Transnational Legal Theory

The latest issue of Transnational Legal Theory (Vol. 3, no. 3, September 2012) is out. Contents include:

• Leonardo Pierdominici, Constitutional Adjudication and the ‘Dimensions’ of Judicial Activism: Comparative Legal and Institutional Heuristics
• Karl-Heinz Ladeur, The Emergence of Global Administrative Law and Transnational Regulation
• Sujith Xavier, Theorising Global Governance Inside Out: A Response to Professor Ladeur

Clavin: Securing the World Economy: The Reinvention of the League of Nations, 1920-1946

Patricia Clavin (Univ. of Oxford - History) has published Securing the World Economy: The Reinvention of the League of Nations, 1920-1946 (Oxford Univ. Press 2013). Here's the abstract:

Securing the World Economy explains how efforts to support global capitalism became a core objective of the League of Nations. Based on new research drawn together from archives on three continents, it explores how the world's first ever inter-governmental organization sought to understand and shape the powerful forces that influenced the global economy, and the prospects for peace. It traces how the League was drawn into economics and finance by the exigencies of the slump and hyperinflation after the First World War, when it provided essential financial support to Austria, Hungary, Greece, Bulgaria, and Estonia and, thereby, established the founding principles of financial intervention, international oversight, and the twentieth-century notion of international 'development'.

But it is the impact of the Great Depression after 1929 that lies at the heart of this history. Patricia Clavin traces how the League of Nations sought to combat economic nationalism and promote economic and monetary co-operation in a variety of, sometimes contradictory, ways. Many of the economists, bureaucrats, and policy-advisors who worked for it played a seminal role in the history of international relations and social science, and their efforts did not end with the outbreak of the Second World War. In 1940 the League established an economic mission in the United States, where it contributed to the creation of organizations for the post-war world - the United Nations Organization, the IMF, the World Bank, the UN Food and Agriculture Organization - as well as to plans for European reconstruction and co-operation. It is a history that resonates deeply with challenges that face the Twenty-First Century world.

de Búrca, Keohane, & Sabel: New Modes of Pluralist Global Governance

Gráinne de Búrca (New York Univ. - Law), Robert O. Keohane (Princeton Univ. - Woodrow Wilson School of Public and International Affairs), & Charles F. Sabel (Columbia Univ. - Law) have posted New Modes of Pluralist Global Governance (New York University Journal of International Law and Politics, forthcoming). Here's the abstract:

This paper describes three modes of pluralist global governance. Mode One refers to the creation and proliferation of comprehensive, integrated international regimes on a variety of issues. Mode Two describes the emergence of diverse forms and sites of cross-national decision making by multiple actors, public and private as well as local, regional and global, forming governance networks and “regime complexes,” including the orchestration of new forms of authority by international actors and organizations. Mode Three, which is the main focus of the paper, describes the gradual institutionalization of practices involving continual updating and revision, open participation, an agreed understanding of goals and practices, and monitoring, including peer review. We call this third mode Global Experimentalist Governance.

Experimentalist Governance arises in situations of complex interdependence and pervasive uncertainty about causal relationships. Its practice is illustrated in the paper by three examples: the arrangements devised to protect dolphins from being killed by tuna fishing practices; the UN Convention on the Rights of Persons with Disabilities; and the Montreal Protocol on the Ozone Layer. Experimentalist Governance tends to appear on issues for which governments cannot formulate and enforce comprehensive sets of rules, but which do not involve fundamental disagreements or high politics, and in which civil society is active. The paper shows that instances of Experimentalist Governance are already evident in various global arenas and issue areas, and argues that their significance seems likely to grow.

New Volume: Anuário Brasileiro de Direito Internacional

The latest volumes of the Anuário Brasileiro de Direito Internacional (Vol. 7, nos. 1 & 2, 2012) are out. Contents include:

• Alberto do Amaral Júnior, Una Nueva Relación Entre Comercio Internacional y La Protección Del Medio Ambiente
• Alexandre Martins B. Leite, ‘Horizontal Agreements’ e o Destino das Relações Brasileiras com a União Europeia em Matéria de Aplicação Civil
• Fernando Serva Café Carvalhaes, A Proteção Contra o Trabalho Infantil: uma análise do instituto em face do Direito Internacional do Trabalho e algumas práticas adotadas pelo Brasil para a erradicação deste tipo de trabalho
• André de Carvalho Ramos, A Relação entre o Direito Internacional e o Direito Interno no contexto da pluralidade das ordens jurídicas
• Délber Andrade Lage, Os países em desenvolvimento e o futuro das negociações ambientais internacionais após a Rio+20
• Dominique Carreau, Mondialisation et Transnationalistation du Droit International
• Frédérique Coulee, Les Developpements Contemporains du Droit International de L’eau
• Gabriel Pablo Valladares, El Comité Internacional de la Cruz Roja (CICR) y su contribución a los últimos desarollos del derecho internacional humanitario.
• Jean Baptiste Harelimana, L’interaction Normative entre Droit International Humanitaire Et Droit International dês Droits de L’homme: De La Fragmentation a La Complementarité
• Geneviève Saumier & Lauro Gama Junior, Contratos Internacionais e os (futuros) Princípios da Haia”: desafios da aplicação e interpretação do direito não-estatal (non-state law)
• Johannes van Aggellen, Stocktaking at the Evolution of the UN Human Rights Program
• Marcelo D. Varella, As transformações do direito internacional e algumas visões sobre um eventual processo de constitucionalização
• Leonardo Nemer Caldeira Brant, O Alcance do Consentimento Como Fundamento da Autoridade da Sentença da Corte Internacional de Justiça
• Renata Mantovani de Lima, Armed Conflicts and the Rights of Minorities: The Case of Lebanon
• Susana Camargo Vieira, From the Sustainable Development to Earth System Governance – a view from the south
• Suzana Santi Cremasco, A Arbitrabilidade dos Litígios Transnacionais de Propriedade Industrial – Uma Leitura a partir do ordenamento jurídico português
• Thiago Braz Jardim de Oliveira, La Diligence Due Dans La Prévention dês Dommages à L’Environment

New Issue: Internationales Handelsrecht

The latest issue of Internationales Handelsrecht (2013, no. 1) is out. Contents include:

• Rodrigo Momberg, Change of circumstances under the Common European Sales Law
• CISG-AC – The CISG and Regional Harmonization (Declaration No.1) CISG Advisory Council
• Raphael Koch, Der Vorrang des Speziellen: Ein Beispiel für die Systematik des UN-Kaufrechts – zugleich Anmerkung zum BGH-Urteil vom 26.9.2012 – VIII ZR 100/11

Moore: International Arbitration: Contemporary Issues and Innovations

John Norton Moore (Univ. of Virginia - Law) has published International Arbitration: Contemporary Issues and Innovations (Martinus Nijhoff Publisher 2013). The table of contents is here. Here's the abstract:

Arbitration is a staple of international dispute resolution. Though the international community now has a plethora of courts and tribunals at its disposal, for numerous reasons international arbitration remains a central mechanism—perhaps even the central mechanism in third-party resolution of international commercial disputes. International Arbitration: Contemporary Issues and Innovations brings together some of the world’s most distinguished experts to examine important contemporary issues and trends in international arbitration. The volume offers a broad range of analysis beginning with current key procedural issues. Both Private and Public International Law are examined, including such topics as investor-state relations, arbitration in the law of the sea and human rights and investment arbitration.

New Volume: New Zealand Yearbook of International Law

The latest volume of the New Zealand Yearbook of International Law (Vol. 8, 2010) is out. Contents include:

• Jane Kelsey, How the Trans-Pacific Partnership Agreement Could Heighten Financial Instability and Foreclose Governments’ Regulatory Space
• Jessica Giovanelli, Australia – Apples: How the WTO Appellate Body Dealt with the Application of Jurisprudence from the Continued Suspension Dispute
• Benedetta Ubertazzi, Territorial and Universal Protection of Intangible Cultural Heritage from Misappropriation
• Mohsen al Attar, The Transnational Peasant Movement: Legalising Freedom from Want
• Justin Harder, A future Perspective on the Disposition of the Insane and the Unfit to Stand Trial in the International Criminal Court

Ratner: Ethics and International Law: Integrating the Global Justice Project(s)

Steven R. Ratner (Univ. of Michigan - Law) has posted Ethics and International Law: Integrating the Global Justice Project(s) (International Theory, forthcoming). Here's the abstract:

Academic discourse on global justice is at an all-time high. Within ethics and international law, scholars are undertaking new inquiries into age-old questions of building a just world order. Ethics – political and moral philosophy – poses fundamental questions about responsibilities at the global level and produces a tightly reasoned set of frameworks regarding world order. International law, with its focus on legal norms and institutional arrangements, provides a path, as well as illuminates the obstacles, to implementing theories of the right or of the good. Yet despite the complementarity of these two projects, neither is drawing what it should from the other. The result is ethical scholarship that often avoids, or even misinterprets, the law; and law that marginalizes ethics even as it recognizes the importance of justice. The cost of this avoidance is a set of missed opportunities for both fields. This article seeks to help transform the limited dialogue between philosophers and international lawyers into a meaningful collaboration. Through a critical stocktaking of the contributions of the two disciplines, examining where they do and do not engage with the other, it offers an appraisal of the causes and costs of separation and an argument for an interdisciplinary approach.

New Volume: Anuario Mexicano de Derecho Internacional

The latest volume of the Anuario Mexicano de Derecho Internacional (Vol. 13, 2013) is out. Contents include:

• Artículos
• Susana Borras Pentinat, La justicia climática: entre la tutela y la fiscalización de las responsabilidades
• Karlos A. Castilla Juárez, ¿Control interno o difuso de convencionalidad? Una mejor idea: la garantía de tratados
• Luis Jardón, The Interpretation of Jurisdictional Clauses in Human Rights Treaties
• Valerio de Oliveira Mazzuoli & Gustavo de Faria Moreira Teixeira, O direito internacional do meio ambiente e o greening da Convenção Americana sobre Direitos Humanos
• Rosa Riquelme Cortado, Marruecos frente a la (des)colonización del Sáhara Occidental
• César Villegas Delgado, La preeminencia del derecho en derecho internacional: elementos para una definición
• Comentarios
• Humberto Fernando Cantú Rivera, Empresas y derechos humanos: ¿Hacia una regulación jurídica efectiva, o el mantenimiento del status quo?
• Fabián Augusto Cárdenas Castañeda, A Call for Rethinking the Sources of International Law: Soft Law and the Other Side of the Coin
• Nicolás Carrillo Santarelli, The Protection of Global Legal Goods
• Horacio Esteban Correa, Emergencia del Ius Atlanticum sobre el derecho de gentes
• Imanol de la Flor, El acta de nacimiento mexicana como vehículo para ejercer el derecho a la educación; caso de los hijos de migrantes en retorno
• Daniel García San José, The Juridical Conceptualization of the Human Embryo in the Law of the European Union. A Well-Aimed Step in the Wrong Direction
• Wilson Adalid Mamani Prieto, La dinámica de los acuerdos internacionales de inversión en los andinos
• Juan Carlos Velázquez Elizarrarás, El derecho del espacio ultraterrestre en tiempos decisivos: ¿estatalidad, monopolización o universalidad?
• Juliana Vengoechea Barrios, Labor Trafficking in the Americas in Context: a Look into the Guest Worker Program

New Issue: International Law: Revista Colombiana de derecho Internacional

The latest issue of International Law: Revista Colombiana de derecho Internacional (No. 21, Julio-Diciembre 2012) is out. Contents include:

• Juana I. Acosta López, The Cotton Field case: gender perspective and feminist theories in the Inter−American Court of Human Rights jurisprudence
• Fernando M. Lynch, Legislación del vicio: ¿vicio de la legislación? Una hermenéutica jurídica de la prohibición de las drogas
• Tom McNamara & María Carolina Caro Ferneynes, Reflexiones sobre la inmunidad soberana de la
• Jorge Oviedo Albán, La ley aplicable a los contratos internacionales
• Juan Antonio Ramírez Márquez, La problemática de la asunción de la propiedad de las mercancías por parte del comprador para ejercer su derecho de rechazarlas, de conformidad con CISG
• Laura Bernal Bermúdez, A review of the interconnectedness and indivisibility of the human rights, human development and human security agendas: The Case of the Colombian internally displaced population
• Marco Alberto Velásquez Ruiz, International Law and Economic Sanctions imposed by the United Nations
• Fernando Villamizar Lamus, Tratado antártico y mecanismos de protección del territorio antártico
• Camila Uribe, Do amnesties preclude justice?

Thielen: Le recours à la force dans les opérations de maintien de la paix contemporaines

Ophélie Thielen has published Le recours à la force dans les opérations de maintien de la paix contemporaines (L.G.D.J. 2013). Here's the abstract:

De la pratique contemporaine des Nations Unies est né un genre nouveau d’opérations de maintien de la paix, caractérisé par une autorisation, au niveau tactique, d’user de la force et de la contrainte armées pour l’exécution du mandat, la protection des populations ou la lutte contre les groupes armés irréguliers. Cette évolution empirique fait l’objet d’une réflexion au sein des instances onusiennes, visant à conceptualiser, en partenariat avec les États décideurs et contributeurs, ce qu’implique l’autorisation d’user de la force, en termes d’interprétation et de mise en oeuvre des mandats et des règles d’engagement, de planification des opérations et d’entraînement et d’équipement des contingents. Cette réflexion semble pour autant rester axée sur les questions de faisabilité politique et opérationnelle, sans que soient analysés les aspects juridiques de l’autorisation de l’usage de la force par les Casques bleus. Cette pratique soulève ainsi de multiples questions – s’agissant du statut des forces de maintien de la paix au regard du droit international humanitaire, des règles encadrant la conduite des opérations militaires, de la non-indemnisation par les Nations Unies des dommages résultant des opérations de combat ou encore des particularités du statut pénal des membres des forces de maintien de la paix – questions renouvelées dans leur contenu et, pourtant, encore largement occultées, que cette étude se propose de contribuer à clarifier, à défaut de prétendre résoudre.

Reich: Internationale Verwaltung im Kosovo: Rechtsgrundsätze internationaler Administration am Beispiel der UNMIK

Ursel Alice Reich has published Internationale Verwaltung im Kosovo: Rechtsgrundsätze internationaler Administration am Beispiel der UNMIK (Nomos 2012). Here's the abstract:

Anhand der UN-Verwaltung im Kosovo stellt das Buch internationale, völkerrechtlich nachweisbare Standards für rechtsstaatliches Verwalten auf. Danach muss sich eine internationale Mandatsverwaltung in der Ausübung hoheitlicher Gewalt gegenüber Einzelnen auf eine rechtliche Grundlage stützen. Zudem müssen die in ihren Entscheidungen zu beachtenden Interessen rechtlich geregelt sein. Drittens muss das Verwaltungshandeln einer Kontrolle anhand rechtlicher Maßstäbe durch ein unabhängiges Verfahren unterliegen und die Möglichkeit für Rechtsschutz des Einzelnen bestehen.

In der Untersuchung des Verwaltungshandelns der UN-Mission im Kosovo anhand dieser Maßstäbe zeigt sich, dass trotz fest etablierter Verwaltungsstrukturen derartige Standards in der täglichen Praxis der Verwaltungsorgane keine maßgebliche Bedeutung entfaltet haben. Ein wesentlicher Grund hierfür wird in fehlenden Implementationsmechanismen gesehen. Die Autorin schlägt deshalb die Einrichtung eines unabhängigen Gerichts oder interner Kontrollinstanzen vor, durch die ein für die Effektivität des Rechts erforderlicher Diskurs um akzeptables Verwalten institutionell gewährleistet wird.

Shany: The Effectiveness of the Human Rights Committee and the Treaty Body Reform

Yuval Shany (Hebrew Univ. of Jerusalem - Law) has posted The Effectiveness of the Human Rights Committee and the Treaty Body Reform (in Der Staat im Recht. Festschrift für Eckart Klein Zum 70. Geburtstag, M. Breuer, A. Epiney, A. Haratsch, S. Schmahl, & N. Weiß eds., forthcoming). Here's the abstract:

A recent report issued by the High Commissioner for Human Rights (hereinafter ‘the Pillay Report’), as part of a process designed to strengthen the UN human rights treaty bodies, suggests that the HRC, like the other treaty bodies, suffers from a number of serious chronic problems. In particular, the positive reputation of the HRC (and some of the other treaty bodies) has not translated itself into high levels of compliance with the state-parties’ procedural reporting obligations; nor, perhaps, to a high degree of compliance with the Committee’s substantive recommendations.In addition, the HRC and the other treaty bodies face significant backlogs in their work, and have been forced to reduce the average time allocated to the review of each country report – endangering thereby the quality of their output. The tension between the widely perceived quality of the HRC’s work, on the one hand. and the serious difficulties the Committee encounters in adequately performing its tasks, on the other hand, complicates attempts to assess its overall record of achievement. Put differently, it is difficult to ascertain whether the HRC is, on the whole, an effective body. In any event, whether the HRC is considered more or less effective, one may still discuss the merits or demerits of specific proposals aimed at improving its effectiveness.

This chapter will apply to the study of the HRC the goal-based approach to evaluating the effectiveness of international institutions developed by the present author elsewhere.In Part One, I will briefly present the goal-based approach, and identify within its framework the principal goals of the HRC. In Part Two, I will evaluate the main findings of the Pillay Report in light of the goal-based approach. While I find many of the recommendations found in the Pillay Report conducive to strengthening the effectiveness of the HRC and other treaty bodies, I criticize some recommendations as problematic for: (1) trading breadth (increase in the number of reviewed reports) for depth of review, and therefore producing arguably only limited effectiveness dividends; and (2) accepting as fait accompli some of the most inefficient features of the existing treaty body system (such as the limited-in-time expert meeting sessions). Part Three concludes.

Lieblich: International Law and Civil Wars: Intervention and Consent

Eliav Lieblich (Radzyner School of Law) has published International Law and Civil Wars: Intervention and Consent (Routledge 2013). Here's the abstract:

This book examines the international law of forcible intervention in civil wars, in particular the role of party-consent in affecting the legality of such intervention.

In modern international law, it is a near consensus that no state can use force against another – the main exceptions being self-defence and actions mandated by a UN Security Council resolution. However, one more potential exception exists: forcible intervention undertaken upon the invitation or consent of a government, seeking assistance in confronting armed opposition groups within its territory. Although the latter exception is of increasing importance, the numerous questions it raises have received scant attention in the current body of literature.

This volume fills this gap by analyzing the consent-exception in a wide context, and attempting to delineate its limits, including cases in which government consent power is not only negated, but might be transferred to opposition groups. The book also discusses the concept of consensual intervention in contemporary international law, in juxtaposition to traditional legal doctrines. It traces the development of law in this context by drawing from historical examples such as the Spanish Civil War, as well as recent cases such those of the Democratic Republic of the Congo, Somalia, Libya, and Syria.

Thirlway: The Law and Procedure of the International Court of Justice: Fifty Years of Jurisprudence

Hugh Thirlway (formerly, International Court of Justice) has published The Law and Procedure of the International Court of Justice: Fifty Years of Jurisprudence (Oxford Univ. Press 2013). Here's the abstract:

This book provides a complete overview into the work of the International Court of Justice in the last twenty years. Since 1989, the author, a former Principal Legal Secretary to the International Court of Justice, contributed frequent articles on this subject to the British Yearbook of International Law continuing the work begun by Sir Gerald Fitzmaurice in 1950. This work brings together these articles in one place for the first time, with extensive cross-references, and a thorough index and tables, making it more accessible than ever. This collection addresses all of the areas of international law that the International Court of Justice has addressed with depth and nuance. The topics considered include general principles of law, sources of law, treaty interpretation, substantive issues such as the law of the sea, state sovereignty, and state responsibility, questions of jurisdiction and competence, and questions of the Court's procedure.

New Issue: International Environmental Agreements: Politics, Law and Economics

The latest issue of International Environmental Agreements: Politics, Law and Economics (Vol. 13, no. 1, March 2013) is out. Contents include:

• Special Issue: Institutions and Global Environmental Governance: A Tribute to Oran Young
• Ronald B. Mitchell, Oran Young and international institutions
• Arild Underdal, Meeting common environmental challenges: the co-evolution of policies and practices
• Jon Birger Skjærseth, Governance by EU emissions trading: resistance or innovation in the oil industry?
• Øistein Harsem & Alf Håkon Hoel, Climate change and adaptive capacity in fisheries management: the case of Norway
• Olav Schram Stokke, Regime interplay in Arctic shipping governance: explaining regional niche selection
• Oran R. Young, Sugaring off: enduring insights from long-term research on environmental governance

Symposium: Guide to Practice on Reservations to Treaties

The European Journal of International Law will be publishing a symposium, edited by Marko Milanovic and Linos-Alexandre Sicilianos, on the International Law Commisssion’s Guide to Practice on Reservations to Treaties. The draft symposium papers (by Alain Pellet, Michael Wood, Daniel Mueller, and Ineta Ziemele and Lāsma Liede) are now available as part of New York University’s Jean Monnet Working Papers Series. For additional information, see Marko's post at EJIL: Talk!.

Wessel & Blockmans: Between Autonomy and Dependence: The EU Legal Order under the Influence of International Organisations

Ramses A. Wessel (Universiteit Twente - Law) & Steven Blockmans (Centre for European Policy Studies) have published Between Autonomy and Dependence: The EU Legal Order under the Influence of International Organisations (Asser Press 2013). The table of contents is here. Here's the abstract:

The European Union’s legal order is traditionally seen as largely autonomous within the global legal system. At the same time, the EU is an important player in the global governance network and has revealed its dependence on international law and international normative processes. The strong and explicit link between the EU and a large number of other international organisations raises questions concerning the impact of decisions taken by those organisations and of international agreements concluded with those organisations on the autonomy of the EU legal order. While the relationship between international and EU law as such is a popular academic theme, the increasing influence of norms enacted by international organisations and more loosely structured bodies on the shaping of the EU and its legal order has never before been studied in a similar comprehensive fashion.

Fan: Arbitration in China: A Legal and Cultural Analysis

Kun Fan (Chinese Univ. of Hong Kong - Law) has published Arbitration in China: A Legal and Cultural Analysis (Hart Publishing 2013). Here's the abstract:

In the context of harmonisation of arbitration law and practice worldwide, to what extent do local legal traditions still influence local arbitration practices, especially at a time when non-Western countries are playing an increasingly important role in international commercial and financial markets? How are the new economic powers reacting to the trend towards harmonisation? China provides a good case study, with its historic tradition of non-confrontational means of dispute resolution now confronting current trends in transnational arbitration. Is China showing signs of adapting to the current trend of transnational arbitration? On the other hand, will Chinese legal culture influence the practice of arbitration in the rest of the world?

To address these challenging questions it is necessary to examine the development of arbitration in the context of China's changing cultural and legal structures. Written for international business people, lawyers, academics and students, this book gives the reader a unique insight into arbitration practice in China, based on a combination of theoretical analysis and practical insights. It explains contemporary arbitration in China from an interdisciplinary perspective and with a comparative approach, setting Chinese arbitration in its wider social context to aid understanding of its history, contemporary practice, the legal obstacles to modern arbitration and possible future trends.

New Issue: Journal of World Investment & Trade

The latest issue of the Journal of World Investment & Trade (Vol. 13, no. 6, 2012) is out. Contents include:

• Rafael Leal-Arcas, Unilateral Trade-related Climate Change Measures
• James Harrison, The Life and Death of BITs: Legal Issues Concerning Survival Clauses and the Termination of Investment Treaties
• Badar Alam Iqbal, Munir Hassan, & Bhawana Rawat, FDI in Retail Sector in South Asia: A Case of India
• Alberto Tita, Global energy institutions. Russia at the IEA can tip the scale, assuring enhanced governance
• C. Chatterjee, The Effect of Apparent Bias or Suspicion of Bias or Unconscious Bias may not necessarily be different from that of Actual Bias - An English Perspective
• Jacques Werner, The Goff Lecture 2011 The case for better, and better-armed arbitrators

New Issue: Journal of International Trade Law and Policy

The latest issue of the Journal of International Trade Law and Policy (Vol. 12, no. 1, 2013) is out. Contents include:

• Joonheon Song & Kyoungjoo Lee, Bureaucratic Politics, Policy Learning, and Changes of Antidumping Policy and Rules in Japan
• Valerie D. Dye, 'Deference as Respect' in WTO standard of Review
• Vanessa Constant LaForce, A comparison between the Cotonou Agreement and the EU Generalized System of Preferences: the case of sugar
• Manpreet Kaur, Surendra S Yadav, & Vinayshil Gautam, A bivariate causality link between Foreign Direct Investment and Economic growth: Evidence from India
• Ludo Cuyvers & Reth Soeng, The EU GSP Exports and Utilization by Asian and Latin American Countries