The legal controversies that accompany contemporary war—from drones and detainees to intervention and interrogation—are often linked to the idea that the laws of war have struggled to keep up with changing modes of warfare in our global age. No longer confined to a site of battle, war today is everywhere and nowhere. Such irregular forms of warfare—generally waged by and against nonstate actors—are often assumed, almost by definition, to have been external or tangential to the historical development of a legal infrastructure designed to regulate inter-state war. This panel turns the table on that assumption and places irregular warfare at the heart of the development of the laws of war since the mid-nineteenth century.
The panel aims to uncover the close, albeit contentious, relationship between practices of irregular conflict and the laws of war; to explain divergent military practices and legal developments as contingent upon the course of particular asymmetric conflicts; and to contribute some historical context to contemporary law-of-war debates. The panel turns on three milestones in the development of the laws of war: General Order 100, the 1863 U.S. military code issued during the American Civil War; the 1949 Geneva Conventions for the protection of war victims, a set of treaties pushed by the international Red Cross movement (established in the year General Order 100 was issued); and the 1977 Additional Protocols to the 1949 Geneva Conventions, which updated the laws of war in the wake of decolonization.
The first paper shows that General Order 100 was less a building block of modern international law than a stumbling block for U.S. adherence to that law. The order’s legitimation of brutal practices helps explain both U.S. wartime conduct up through the Boxer Rebellion and Philippine War, and American alienation from late nineteenth century international legal standards requiring humane treatment of prisoners and noncombatants. The second paper traces debates within the Red Cross movement over that very requirement of humane treatment in internal wars from 1863 to 1949, when the requirement was codified as Common Article 3 of the Geneva Conventions. While the perceived need for humanitarian protections in internal wars became widespread as a result of the rise of European self-determination movements after World War I, formalizing those protections in 1949 ultimately had less significance for Europeans than it did for colonial peoples struggling for independence. The third paper shows how one of those struggles, the Vietnam War, prompted the development of a key legal requirement of modern war—that force be used proportionately—which was then formalized in the 1977 Additional Protocols.
In reappraising the development of the laws of war, the panel hopes to spark a conversation about the relationship between that history and present-day issues. Our Commentator is a leading expert on the laws of war as practiced today, and our audience, we are sure, would be eager to engage on a topic that marries historical scholarship with contemporary concern.
Saturday, January 9, 2016
Conference Panel: Irregular Armed Conflict and the Development of the Laws of War, 1863–1977
Call for Papers: DEBACLES - Illusions and Failures in the History of International Adjudication
24-25 NOVEMBER 2016
MAX PLANCK INSTITUTE LUXEMBOURG
RESEARCH WORKSHOP
DEBACLES
ILLUSIONS AND FAILURES IN THE HISTORY OF INTERNATIONAL ADJUDICATION
ILLUSIONS ET ÉCHECS DANS L’HISTOIRE DE LA JURIDICTION INTERNATIONALE
CALL FOR PAPERS
DEADLINE: 1 MARCH 2016
CALL FOR PAPERS | Encouraged by the post-Cold War rise of international adjudication, most international lawyers — with some notable recent exceptions — have focused their attention on judicial ‘success stories.’ They have thereby revitalized a liberal-modernist narrative that views the constant expansion and improvement of international adjudication as historically ineluctable. Against this background, the DEBACLES project casts an unconventional light on the history of international adjudication, bringing to the foreground its many illusions and failures, the paths it has not taken, and, more generally, the nonlinearity of its developments.
We are therefore inviting submissions that engage either with specific failed attempts to create and operate international judicial forums (case studies) or with broader historical/ theoretical issues related to such failures. Submissions should include as a starting point a comprehensive working definition of what counts as a ‘debacle’ or ‘failure’ in the field of international adjudication. Abstracts of no more than 600 words, written in English or French and including the author’s name, e-mail address and a one-page curriculum vitae, should be submitted to the following e-mail address: debacles@mpi.lu. The deadline for submission of abstracts is 1 March 2016. Successful applicants will be notified via e-mail by 14 March 2016 and are expected to produce a draft paper by 31 August 2016. The organizers will reimburse travel and accommodation costs.
APPEL À CONTRIBUTIONS | Encouragés par l’essor de la juridiction internationale dans l’après-Guerre Froide, les experts de droit international ont généralement centré leur regard sur les succès de cette entreprise, revitalisant par là l’idée liberale suivant laquelle le mouvement vers des formes d’administration de la justice internationale de plus en plus parfaites correspond à une tendance historique inexorable. À partir de ce constat, le projet DEBACLES a pour objectif d’apporter un éclairage non conventionnel sur l’histoire de la juridiction internationale, visant notamment à mettre en exergue les nombreux échecs qui la tapissent ainsi que les illusions dont elle s’est nourrie, les voies qu’elle n’a pas empruntées et, plus généralement, les aspects non linéaires de ses trajectoires.
Sur cette base, nous lançons un appel à contributions qui pourraient porter soit sur des échecs particuliers, se situant donc dans la logique de l’étude de cas, soit sur des problématiques historico-théoriques plus vastes, toujours en partant d’une conception aussi large que possible de la notion d’échec. Les propositions de contribution (600 mots maximum), rédigées en français ou en anglais et accompagnées de l’adresse e-mail de l’auteur et d’un CV d’une page, devront être envoyées avant le 1er mars 2016 à l’adresse suivante: debacles@mpi.lu. Les auteurs des propositions retenues seront informés avant le 14 mars 2016 et devront envoyer leur rapport provisoire avant le 31 août 2016. L’organisation prendra en charge les frais de voyage et de logement.
Friday, January 8, 2016
Martineau: Le débat sur la fragmentation du droit international : Une analyse critique
Cet ouvrage cherche à analyser de manière critique le débat sur la fragmentation du droit international tel qu’il est apparu à la fin des années 1990. Débattre de la fragmentation, c’est débattre du sort réservé au droit international en raison de la prolifération des institutions et des modes de pensée spécialisés. De l’extérieur, le droit international public semble dépassé par les structures dynamiques et informelles de gouvernance privée tandis que de l’intérieur, la croissance continue de ses branches spécialisées pose la question de savoir s’il existe encore un tronc commun ou un noyau dur autour duquel la discipline serait unifiée. Du point de vue interne, donc, la multiplication des règles et des institutions spécialisées est perçue comme un danger qui doit –et qui peut– être évité, tant et aussi longtemps que l’on assure la cohérence du droit international général et de ses branches spécialisées, travail qui incombe à la dogmatique juridique ainsi qu’à la pratique juridictionnelle. Du point de vue externe, l’apparition des régimes de régulation fonctionnels témoigne plus simplement de l’impact de la mondialisation sur le droit (international) et de la façon dont celui-ci s’adapte à celle-là au travers de nouveaux processus déformalisés de juridisation.
L’objectif de cet ouvrage n’est pas de trancher entre les positions internes et externes prises par les internationalistes. Il s’agit plutôt de montrer qu’aucune des positions ne peut l’emporter sur les autres de manière décisive, d’expliquer les raisons de ce phénomène et d’en analyser les conséquences.
Call for Papers: Adjudicating International Trade and Investment Disputes: Between Interaction and Isolation
CALL FOR PAPERS
Adjudicating international trade and investment disputes:
between interaction and isolation
PluriCourts conference
Thursday and Friday 25-26 August 2016
Call for papers
1 January 2016
Abstracts due
1 March 2016
Notifications of acceptance
15 March 2016
Draft papers due
15 August 2016
The PluriCourts Centre of Excellence at the University of Oslo is organizing a conference titled ‘Adjudicating international trade and investment disputes: between interaction and isolation.’ The conference will be hosted at the Faculty of Law of the University of Oslo on Thursday and Friday 25- 26 August 2016. Submission procedures and timelines are detailed at the end of this call.
This conference aims to focus on the relationship, interactions and comparisons between the international trade and investment regimes in the context of adjudication of disputes. The conference will welcome research across the disciplines of law, political science, and philosophy relating to three themes: the new mega-regionals, comparisons and practices, and cross-fertilization and learning.
Historically, the global regulation of international trade and investment relations have been closely interrelated; but in the post-war period, international trade law and international investment law developed on largely divergent paths. While international trade regulation has culminated in a multilateral regime with a permanent dispute settlement mechanism, the international regulation of foreign direct investment is primarily governed by 3500 essentially bilateral treaty relationships calling for ad hoc investor – state arbitration potentially to be hosted by a variety of international institutions. Despite these seemingly distinct structures, there is a recent trend that some say signal a move towards regime convergence: most clearly seen in the rise of mega-regional free trade agreements (FTAs) with investment chapters.
This potential convergence may be deceiving, however. The investment chapters of FTAs remain separate from the rest of the agreements and provide for distinct rules and procedures on dispute settlement. Moreover, issues of overlap between trade chapters and investment chapters have not been resolved, which means that the same case could possibly be raised simultaneously in two separate disputes under the same FTA. Legal disputes based on investment chapters in FTAs to date (ie under the NAFTA and DR-CAFTA) appear to interpret the investment protection chapters as standalone agreements with little or no reference to other sections of the FTAs.
Despite the limitations to integration that this new generation of trade and investment agreements may represent, there are other areas of interaction between the trade and investment regimes that could provide better evidence of a gradual move towards cohesion. This conference aims to look at the development of the new mega-regionals, but also the ways (or lack thereof) that the trade and investment regimes share practices and cross-fertilize.
Theme 1: The new mega-regionals
The first theme will focus on research relating to the increasing negotiation of mega-regional FTAs with investment chapters and what effects these agreements will or could have on the adjudication of international trade and investment disputes. The conference will seek to discuss state-of-the-art research, from both legal and social science perspectives, relating to the dispute settlement options under FTAs, including existing (inter alia NAFTA, ECT, ASEAN, DR-CAFTA) and emerging (inter alia CETA, TPP, RCEP, TISA, TTIP). Additionally, and given the EU’s recent preference for FTAs, the conference will also seek research on how the EU’s post-Lisbon trade and investment policy may have spill-over effects for the global trade and investment regimes. Papers under this theme could address the following:
- Analysis of the TPP, TTIP drafts and other recently signed FTAs: how will disputes be resolved?
- The relationship between the WTO agreements and FTA provisions: potential conflicts or cohesion in the adjudication of disputes?
- What relevance will the shift towards mega-regionals have for the legitimacy of international adjudication?
- Recent investment arbitration jurisprudence under FTAs with investment chapters: new developments?
- The proposal for a TTIP investment court: a dispute settlement mechanism for investment protection modelled on the WTO?
- The EU strategy for extra-EU BITs after Lisbon: A potential move towards multilateralization?
Theme 2: Comparisons and practices
The second theme of the conference will invite research focusing on comparisons between the WTO dispute settlement mechanism and investment treaty arbitrations tribunals; and research that focuses on the practices of WTO disputes and investment tribunals. The conference will also seek research relating to the distinct practices and structures of international trade and investment disputes may affect both their normative and sociological legitimacy. There are significant structural differences between WTO dispute resolution and investment treaty arbitration. Despite these differences, there are some similarities in the subject matter (global economic governance) that make these systems of international dispute settlement worthy of comparison. Papers under this theme could address the following:
- Are there important? Salient? differences in the appointment and selection of adjudicators in investment arbitration and WTO panels?.
- Comparative approaches in managing legitimacy: how do arbitrators, judges and institutions in trade and investment adjudication legitimize themselves?
- Public opinion and the anti-globalization movement: a valid constraint on the development of trade and investment adjudication?
- What are the roles and influences of institutional secretariats in the adjudication of trade and investment disputes?
- Litigating trade and investment disputes: what is the role of legal counsel in regime shaping and targeting?
- How have the trade and investment regimes comparatively dealt with issues of systemic interpretation and the inclusion of extra-sector concerns such as human rights and the environment?
- The possibilities for multilaterizing investment treaty law: are there lessons to be learned from the WTO?
Theme 3: Cross-fertilization and learning
The third theme will focus on the interaction between the international trade and investment regimes in the context of adjudication. The conference seeks research on how the interaction (or lack thereof) between WTO disputes, FTA trade disputes, investment treaty arbitration and other areas of international law affects the legitimacy and efficacy of international economic governance. The conference will seek both social science and legal research focusing on issues of judicial dialogue between trade and investment tribunals; and how cross-fertilization of ideas and practices between tribunals affects the development of the jurisprudence and the legitimacy of these institutions. Papers under this theme could address the following:
- Issues relating to overlapping jurisdiction: increasing fragmentation or opportunities for coherence?
- Is there judicial dialogue and cross-fertilization between trade and investment tribunals?
- Are there differences or similarities in how trade and investment tribunals deal with issues of legal interpretation and with the precedential value of previous awards?
- Treaty shopping issues in trade and investment disputes: is it actually a problem?
- The relationship between investment chapters and other chapters in FTAs: investment chapters as stand-alone agreements?
- What are the implications of the overlap between the trade in services and investment protection regimes?
Submission procedure
We invite researchers from the disciplines of law, political science and philosophy to submit abstracts of no more than 500 words along with a CV of no more than two pages to Dr. Daniel Behn d.f.behn@jus.uio.no by 1 March 2016. Please indicate in the subject line of the email as to which Theme your abstract corresponds. Selection of papers will be based on abstracts as assessed through a blind process of a five person committee. Notification of successful applicants will be made by 15 March 2016. We will aim to select approximately 15 papers for presentation. Selected applicants will be required to submit a draft paper of 5000 to 7000 words two weeks prior to the conference. Travel funding may be available to paper presenters. Please indicate in the application your needs for funding.
Stewart & Kiyani: The Ahistoricism of Legal Pluralism in International Criminal Law
International criminal law (“ICL”) is legally plural, not a single unified body of norms. As a whole, trials for international crimes involve a complex dance between international and domestic criminal law, the specificities of which vary markedly from one forum to the next. To date, many excellent scholars have suggested that the resulting doctrinal diversity in ICL should be tolerated and managed under the banner of Legal Pluralism. To our minds, these scholars omit a piece of the puzzle that has major implications for their theory – the law’s history. Neglecting the historical context of the international and national criminal laws that inform ICL leads to the uncritical adoption of criminal law doctrine as a proxy for diverse social, cultural and political values. This, we say, is often a false equation that results in important normative distortions, with major implications for the field’s self-image, function and legitimacy. In particular, scholars and courts overlook that much criminal law doctrine globally is the result of either a colonial imposition or an “unsuccessful” legal transplant. In this Article, we revisit a cross-section of this missing history to contribute to both Legal Pluralism and ICL. For the former, we demonstrate that there is nothing inherently good about Legal Pluralism, and that in some instances, a shift from its descriptive origins into a more normative managerialism risks condoning illegitimate law. For ICL, our historiography shows how partiality is embedded in the very substance of ICL doctrine, beyond just the politics of its enforcement. At one level, this realization opens up the possibility of renegotiating a universal ICL that is actually more plural in terms of values and interests than doctrinal pluralism. At another, it suggests that institutions capable of trying international crimes need to do far more to step away from the ugly legal history they have inherited.
New Issue: Journal of International Economic Law
The latest issue of the Journal of International Economic Law (Vol. 18, no. 4, December 2015) is out. Contents include:- General Articles
- Gregory Shaffer, Robert Wolfe, & Vinhcent Le, Can Informal Law Discipline Subsidies?
- Nicolas Lamp, How Some Countries Became ‘Special’: Developing Countries and the Construction of Difference in Multilateral Trade Lawmaking
- Ben Czapnik, The Unique Features of the Trade Facilitation Agreement: A Revolutionary New Approach to Multilateral Negotiations or the Exception Which Proves the Rule?
- Tania Voon, Evidentiary Challenges for Public Health Regulation in International Trade and Investment Law
- Jeffrey S. Vogt, The Evolution of Labor Rights and Trade—A Transatlantic Comparison and Lessons for the Transatlantic Trade and Investment Partnership
- Frank J. Garcia, Lindita Ciko, Apurv Gaurav, & Kirrin Hough, Reforming the International Investment Regime: Lessons from International Trade Law
- Karl P. Sauvant & Michael D. Nolan, China’s Outward Foreign Direct Investment and International Investment Law
Bignami: Theories of Civil Society and Global Administrative Law: The Case of the World Bank and International Development
For over two decades, the concept of civil society has informed institutional design in the international realm. Empowering civil society has served as a key rhetorical and policy response to the criticism that the social and economic processes of globalization and the international organizations that have emerged to govern the global realm are illegitimate, elite driven, and anti-democratic. This chapter, which appears in the Elgar Research Handbook on Global Administrative Law, unpacks the concept of civil society with the aim of understanding the institutional reforms that have been undertaken in one important area of global governance — the international development law of the World Bank and other multilateral development banks. The chapter identifies five lines of theoretical argument in favor of civil society: liberal, social capital, multicultural, cosmopolitan, and effective governance. It then canvasses the evolving law of the World Bank, with reference where relevant to other multilateral development banks. The chapter demonstrates that the reforms undertaken in the 1990s — analytical and participation requirements in project planning and funding for civil society groups — were motivated by the social capital and multicultural theories. By contrast, the reforms of the 2000s — transparency and consultation — were driven by the liberal and effective governance theories. Surprisingly, cosmopolitan theories that posit transnational associations as representatives of a global people are largely absent from the law of the World Bank.
Thursday, January 7, 2016
Symposium: Asian Challenges to International Investment Law: Viewing from Internal and Comparative Perspectives
Investment treaty law and arbitration has historically developed so as to protect foreign direct investment made by investors from European and North American countries towards the rest of the world. In the 2010s, however, Asia is playing increasingly a role in changing this traditional landscape: Asian companies began to bring investment claims against European countries by way of arbitration. Also, Asia takes initiatives in investment law-making at a regional level such as Japan-Korea-China investment agreement and the Trans-Pacific Partnership (TPP). This seminar thus aims to understand these Asian challenges to international investment law from both internal as well as comparative perspectives so as to prospect a future Asian contribution to global economic governance.
New Issue: Transnational Legal Theory
- César Arjona, Joshua Anderson, François Meier & Sierra Robart, What law for transnational legal education? A cooperative view of an introductory course to transnational law and governance
- Paolo Novak, Refugee status as a productive tension
- Lars Viellechner, Responsive legal pluralism: The emergence of transnational conflicts law
- Stepan Wood, Kenneth W Abbott, Julia Black, Burkard Eberlein & Errol Meidinger, The interactive dynamics of transnational business governance: A challenge for transnational legal theory
- John Biggins & Colin Scott, Licensing the gatekeeper? Public pathways, social significance and the ISDA Credit Derivatives Determinations Committees
- Karin Buhmann, Business and human rights: Understanding the UN Guiding Principles from the perspective of transnational business governance interactions
- David J. Doorey, Mapping the ascendance of the ‘living wage’ standard in non-state global labour codes
- Kernaghan Webb, ISO 26000 social responsibility standard as ‘proto law’ and a new form of global custom: Positioning ISO 26000 in the emerging transnational regulatory governance rule instrument architecture
Call for Papers: International Criminal Justice: Theory, Policy and Practice
International Criminal Justice: Theory, Policy and Practice
Socio-Legal Studies Association Annual Conference
Lancaster University
Call for Papers
This proposed stream contains four panel sessions and invites submissions on all areas of substantive international criminal justice, whether on theory, policy or practice. Empirical work would be particularly welcomed and papers based on “works in progress” will be considered so long as the work is sufficiently developed. Both individual papers and panel submissions (of three related papers) can be submitted for consideration. Postgraduate students are also encouraged to submit abstracts.
Selected papers from the conference will be published. Details of which will be available shortly.
For an informal discussion please email the convenor, Anna Marie Brennan at Anna.Marie.Brennan@liverpool.ac.uk
Abstracts may only be submitted via EasyChair. For more information on the submission process see here. Abstracts must be no longer than 300 words and must include your title, name and institutional affiliation and your email address for correspondence.
The deadline for the submissions is Monday 18 January 2016.
AJIL Unbound Symposium: The International Legal Obligation to Criminalize Marital Rape
Fry: Legal Recharacterisation and the Materiality of Facts at the International Criminal Court: Which Changes are Permissible?
The ICC’s Regulation 55, which allows the Trial Chamber to modify the legal characterization of facts in the final judgment, has been used too often and too carelessly. Characterization must not exceed the facts and circumstances described in the charges, but material facts and their legal qualification are like communicating vessels. Changing the latter affects the former (and vice versa). In their application of Regulation 55 to date, chambers have underappreciated this, treating cases as if they have blurry factual boundaries where material facts can be swapped, neglected, or created at will. This paper is not a plea for abolition of Regulation 55, though, but explores which modifications are permissible, and finds that when comparing a change regarding the contextual elements or (sub)categories of crimes to a change regarding the mode of participation the latter is most problematic and often detrimental to the rights of the accused.
Ramji-Nogales: Prohibiting Collective Expulsion of Aliens at the European Court of Human Rights
Conference: Pluralist Approaches to International Criminal Justice
The conference will serve as a platform for the interdisciplinary and critical debate on the normative, institutional, and legal-cultural diversity of international criminal justice. The concept of pluralism has multiple dimensions. This perspective has been variously applied to the issues and challenges in international criminal justice, and it may furnish scholars and practitioners with a potent toolkit for the analysis and critique of its standards, practice, and ramifications. The event will bring together academics and practitioners to discuss the promises and limitations of the pluralist approaches, drawing upon insights from practice of ICL and from other disciplines. In particular, the participants will explore whether and how the different visions of pluralism (institutional, legal, cultural, etc.) could advance the ongoing debates about the challenges and dilemmas facing international criminal justice.
Hakimi & Cogan: The Two Codes on the Use of Force
The jus ad bellum—the international regime that governs cross-border force—is an enigma. The regime is foundational to the global order and has been remarkably resilient over time. And yet, it is deeply discordant, even incoherent, in its operation. A few use of force norms are settled and robust. Although states occasionally deviate from these norms, the deviations are widely viewed and treated as legal violations. Other use of force norms are noticeably more compromised. Operations that stray from these norms are still perceived to be unlawful, but such operations might be tolerated or even supported in practice. Still other norms are highly contested. The norms’ substantive content is so openly and heatedly debated that the credibility of the entire regime has been called into question.
To the extent that the legal literature accounts for these features of the regime, it reverts to claims about what the law is or should be. This approach treats the disharmony in the jus ad bellum as either a function of the law’s ambiguity or evidence of states’ lawlessness—and thus as a problem to be solved. But the approach requires suppressing the very tensions and inconsistencies that shape the regime’s day-to-day operation. It therefore cannot account for how the regime actually works. And it has limited practical value to analysts who must plan for different eventualities, anticipate how varied actors will engage with the regime in concrete cases, or assess the impact of particular decisions on the regime’s long-term viability.
This Article takes a different approach. It aims not to advance a particular position on the content of the law but rather to present a positive theory that explains how the regime actually operates and why. What accounts for the combined resilience and disharmony of this regime? Why do different norms on the use of force display such varied characteristics? And how are specific norms likely to be invoked or applied in any given case? We argue that the regime on the use of force is constituted by two fundamentally different and competing visions of the legal order—two codes. Each code has its own substantive policies, decisionmaking processes, and key advocates. The way in which the two codes’ advocates interact in any given context determines whether and how particular use of force norms are articulated, invoked, or applied. Only by uncovering the two codes—and assessing their interactions—can we appreciate why the regime operates as it does.
Wednesday, January 6, 2016
Franck & Wylie: Predicting Outcomes in Investment Treaty Arbitration
Crafting appropriate dispute settlement processes is challenging for any conflict management system, particularly for politically sensitive international economic law disputes. As the United States negotiates investment treaties with Asian and European countries, the terms of dispute settlement have become contentious. There is a vigorous debate about whether investment treaty arbitration (ITA) is an appropriate dispute settlement mechanism. While some sing the praises of ITA, others offer a spirited critique. Some critics claim ITA is biased against states, while others suggest ITA is predictable but unfair due to factors like arbitrator identity or venue. Using data from 159 final cases derived from 272 publicly available ITA awards, this Article examines outcomes of ITA cases to explore those concerns. Key descriptive findings demonstrate states reliably won a greater proportion of cases than investors; and for the sub-set of cases investors won, the mean award was US $45.6 million with mean investor success rate of 35%. State success rates were roughly similar to respondent-favorable or state-favorable results in whistleblowing, qui tam, and medical malpractice litigation in U.S. courts. The Article then explores whether ITA outcomes varied depending upon investor identity, state identity, the presence of repeat-player counsel, arbitrator-related, or venue variables. Models using case-based variables always predicted outcomes whereas arbitrator-venue models did not. The results provide initial evidence that the most critical variables for predicting outcomes involved some form of investor identity and the experience of parties’ lawyers. For investor identity, the most robust predictor was whether investors were human beings, with cases brought by people exhibiting greater success than corporations; and when at least one named investor or corporate parent was ranked in the Financial Times 500, investors sometimes secured more favorable outcomes. Following Mark Galanter’s scholarship demonstrating repeat player lawyers are critical to litigation outcomes, attorney experience was also critical to ITA outcomes. For investors, investors with experienced counsel were more likely to obtain a damage award against a state, whereas, states retaining experienced counsel were only reliably associated with decreased levels of relative investor success. Although there was variation in outcomes, ultimately, the data did not support a conclusion that ITA was completely unpredictable; rather, the results called into question critiques of ITA and did not prove ITA is a wholly unacceptable form of dispute settlement.
Saganek: Unilateral Acts of States in Public International Law
In Unilateral Acts of States in Public International Law Przemysław Saganek discusses one of the most important sources of States’ obligations in international law. He analyzes in a critical way the classical catalogue of unilateral acts comprising: promise, waiver, recognition and protest. He convincingly proves that this list is misleading as it oversees several important acts of States. On the other hand, several classical acts do not necessarily give rise to legal effects or are not necessarily unilateral. The author undertakes a thorough analysis of several types of acts, showing their similarities and dissimilarities. He concludes that the group category of ‘unilateral acts’ covers such diverse elements that they could be hardly codified in a single set of rules.
New Volume: Recueil des Cours
Volume 375 of the Recueil des Cours, Collected Courses of the Hague Academy of International Law is out. Contents include:- Volume 375
- E. Jayme, Narrative Norms in Private International Law – The Example of Art Law
- Th.M. de Boer, Choice of Law in Arbitration Proceedings
- Manlio Frigo, Circulation des biens culturels, détermination de la loi applicable et méthodes de règlement des litiges
Schabas: The Cambridge Companion to International Criminal Law
- William A. Schabas, Introduction
- Andrew Clapham, Human rights and international criminal law
- Lawrence Douglas, Truth and justice in atrocity trials
- Stephan Parmentier, Transitional justice
- Mark Drumbl, Punishment and sentencing
- Alfred de Zayas, Peace
- Göran Sluiter, Ad hoc international criminal tribunals (Yugoslavia, Rwanda, Sierra Leone)
- Leila Sadat, The International Criminal Court
- Fannie Lafontaine, National jurisdictions
- David Scheffer, The United Nations Security Council and international criminal justice
- William A. Schabas, Atrocity crimes
- Roger S. Clark, Treaty crimes
- Benjamin B. Ferencz & Donald M. Ferencz, Criminalising the illegal use of force
- Diane Marie Amann, Children
- Kai Ambos, Adolf Eichmann
- Michael Scharf, Slobodan Milošević
- Charles Chernor Jalloh, Charles Taylor
- Hans-Peter Kaul, The International Criminal Court of the future
- M. Cherif Bassiouni, Challenges to international criminal justice and international criminal law
New Issue: Journal of International Organizations Studies
The latest issue of the Journal of International Organizations Studies (Vol. 6, no. 2, Fall 2015) is out. Contents include:- Peter Kotzian & Beate Kohler-Koch, Holding International Governance to Account: Do Civil Society Organizations Have a Chance to Exert Accountability?
- Bessma Momani & Mark Hibben, Cooperation or Clashes on 19th Street? Theorizing and Assessing IMF and World Bank Collaboration
- Rafael Biermann, Designing Cooperation among International Organizations: The Quest for Autonomy, the Dual-Consensus Rule, and Cooperation Failure
- Eduardo Uziel, The Vote of Brazil in the United Nations Security Council (1942-2011) and the Role of Elected Members in the Decision-Making Process
- Susanne Lütz, From Washington Consensus to Flexible Keynesianism? The International Monetary Fund after the Financial Crisis
Tuesday, January 5, 2016
Call for Submissions: Polish Yearbook of International Law (Reminder)
POLISH YEARBOOK OF INTERNATIONAL LAW
Call for papers (Volume XXXV)
Polish Yearbook of International Law (PYIL) is currently seeking articles for its next volume (XXXV), which will be published in June 2016. Authors are invited to submit complete unpublished papers in areas connected with public and private international law, including European law. Although it is not a formal condition for acceptance, we are specifically interested in articles that address issues in international and European law relating to Central and Eastern Europe. Authors from the region are also strongly encouraged to submit their works.
Submissions should not exceed 15,000 words (including footnotes) but in exceptional cases we may also accept longer works. We assess manuscripts on a rolling basis and will consider requests for expedited review in case of a pending acceptance for publication from another journal.
All details about submission procedure and required formatting are available at the PYIL’s webpage.
Please send manuscripts to pyil@inp.pan.pl. The deadline for submissions is 31 January 2016.
Call for Papers: The Force of Law in World Society (Reminder)
Call for Proposals
10th Pan-European Conference on International Relations, Izmir, Turkey, 7-10 September 2016
Section S44: The Force of Law in World Society
Section Chairs: Tanja E. Aalberts (CePTL/VU) & Nikolas M. Rajkovic (Tilburg Law School)
Section description
A long-standing presumption of international theory has been that international law is both a symptom and cause of an evolving society of states. Yet, transformations since 1945 suggest perhaps a more radical evolution: where the increasingly transnational configuration of persons, goods, crime and wealth now strains the competences of the traditional inter-state form of legal organization. These empirical shifts are further enhanced by a normative turn beyond a sole focus on sovereignty as a fundamental norm of international society, towards more cosmopolitan values of human rights and world society, advocated by a plurality of actors. Together this suggests that the formalism of international law, as a state-centric normative framework, no longer constitutes the world of international legality but rather represents a world of cooperation in a universe of heterogeneous juridical practices. Accordingly, international law now interacts with, rather than controls, other juridical practices and projects that are engaged in legal ordering with often competing purposes. As a result, increasingly novel forms of socio-legal organization are disrupting political and legal categories that used to form the basis of modern international order. These categories traditionally separate domestic from international affairs, public from private issues, and law from politics. This trend speaks to a broader issue of the changing meaning of boundaries in this latest era of globalization.
Closer scrutiny suggests new patterns of socio-legal organization are realigning legal ordering considerably beyond what the inter-state model has long insisted was global legal reality. With other values, norms, actors, practices, scales, geographies, and technologies involved in the contemporary international ordering the question arises: what is the status and force of law in world society and how does it operate? This section will explore how formal and informal legal practices are mutating the normative horizons and structures of global legal rule beyond (or in interaction with) the inter-state model. This runs from debates about the legal justifications of military humanitarian intervention, to Guantanamo Bay as a distinct juridical space, to the increasing “private” power Foreign Investment and Trade Treaties vis-a-vis public law, to the seeming jurisdictional immunity of “global value chains”, to whether rights should be re-conceptualized as governmental technologies, and to whether and how disciplinary characterizations should now shift from referencing international order to more accurately global or transnational legal order. Moreover, technological innovations notwithstanding, this section wonders to what extent this is a late twentieth century phenomenon, or how we can trace the roots of a heterogeneous global legal order in the nineteenth century expansion of international society or even the Age of Discovery.
Against this background, this section will host panels concerned with theorizing and evaluating the force of law within world society. Approaching this theme from various angles and perspectives, the panels together aim to (i) develop new conceptualizations that articulate different modes of the force of law (ii) combine theoretical engagements with empirical analyses; and (iii) engage in a crossdisciplinary debate
Submission
The section is particularly interested in papers that discuss one of the following panel themes:
(1) The Changing Architecture of Legal Rule in World Society
(2) Lex Imperialism: Regimes as Informal World Empires
(3) The Historical Sociology of the Global Legal Order
(4) Law, Technology and the New Global Security Law
(5) The ICC and the Criminalization of World Society
(6) Saving the soul of Human Rights
We invite you to submit a paper abstract for one of these themes. Please indicate for which theme you submit your abstract by including the number in the proposal title (e.g. “paper title” [P1]). We also welcome full panel proposals that speak to the overall theme of the section.
The 5 panels for this section will be selected on the basis of the most interesting proposals that together make the most challenging and coherent panels.
Deadline for submission of abstracts (max. 200 words): 08 January 2016
For submission please register here
For more information visit here
For any questions regarding this section please contact the section chairs at t.e.aalberts@vu or N.M.Rajkovic@uvt.nl
Please note that only abstracts that are submitted via the online submission system Conftool can be considered for inclusion in the conference programme.
Baylis: What Internationals Know: Improving the Effectiveness of Post-Conflict Justice Initiatives
The field of post-conflict or transitional justice has developed rapidly over the last thirty years. The United States, the United Nations, and many other international organizations, governments, and institutions have contributed to hundreds of international criminal trials and rule of law programs. International staff, known as “internationals,” travel among post-conflict states and international criminal tribunals to carry out these initiatives. In addition to being a field of work, post-conflict justice also constitutes an emergent body of legal knowledge, composed of substantive standards, rules of procedure, best practices, and other elements. Just as the programs and institutions of post-conflict justice have grown quickly on the ground, so also its body of knowledge has become an established, if still evolving, set of norms and practices. This Article contributes to the literature on transitional justice by examining how internationals are developing the information and skills that comprise post-conflict justice knowledge, and whether they are able to effectively implement that knowledge in their work.
Schouppe: La dimension institutionnelle de la liberté de religion dans la jurisprudence de la Cour europénne des droits de l'homme
La liberté de religion prend de plus en plus d’importance dans la jurisprudence de la Cour européenne des droits de l’homme. Bien que le centre de gravité historique de ce droit fondamental réside dans sa dimension individuelle, les juges sont fréquemment confrontés à des aspects « institutionnels » ou communautaires de la liberté de religion : des droits revenant aux groupements religieux comme tels. En quête des prémisses de cette liberté, le chapitre premier retrace les apports spécifiques du christianisme, du judaïsme et de l’islam en la matière. Les principaux instruments de droit international, universels et européens, ainsi que la jurisprudence de la Cour de Justice de l’Union européenne, sont abordés au chapitre 2 du point de vue de la liberté de religion collective et institutionnelle comme la toile de fond nécessaire à l’activité de la Cour de Strasbourg. Le chapitre 3 examine l’article 9 de la CEDH ainsi que d’autres articles protégeant des droits connexes à la liberté de religion avant de se pencher sur la notion de groupement religieux, dont la distinction d’avec les sectes (dangereuses) s’avère souvent problématique. Les deux derniers chapitres sont consacrés à une étude systématique de la jurisprudence de Strasbourg depuis l’admission, en 1979, de la première requête d’une « église requérante ». Le versant procédural, puis les droits substantiels sont successivement abordés. Leurs contenus seront analysés selon un double axe : d’abord, la liberté d’« existence » du groupement, puis les plus nombreuses facettes de sa liberté d’« action » ou de son « autonomie ». Plus de 200 arrêts et décisions de la Cour sont analysés.
Mitchell, Sheargold, & Voon: Good Governance Obligations in International Economic Law: A Comparative Analysis of Trade and Investment
International trade and international investment agreements typically contain provisions requiring the parties to comply with good governance principles, such as procedural fairness and transparency. These provisions are increasingly the subject of disputes before international tribunals. The scope of these obligations is often unclear, as treaty provisions usually employ broad standards rather than specific rules. For example, the requirement to accord investors ‘fair and equitable treatment’ is common in international investment agreements, while WTO agreements demand the ‘reasonable and impartial administration of measures’. This paper compares approaches in international investment and trade law to three aspects of good governance: procedural fairness, transparency, and reasonable administration of measures. Despite textual differences, the standards adopted by these two regimes are remarkably similar. Consequently, decisions from these two branches of international economic law may provide states, tribunals, market participants and scholars with valuable insights into the conduct required by good governance obligations.
New Issue: World Politics
The latest issue of World Politics (Vol. 68, no. 1, January 2016) is out. Contents include:- Research Articles
- Anna GrzyMala-Busse, Weapons of the Meek - How Churches Influence Public Policy
- Erica S. Simmons, Market Reforms and Water Wars
- Abby Córdova & Matthew L. Layton, When is “Delivering the Goods” Not Good Enough? - How Economic Disparities in Latin American Neighborhoods Shape Citizen Trust in Local Government
- Adam Michael Auerbach, Clients and Communities - The Political Economy of Party Network Organization and Development in India’s Urban Slums
- John D. Huber & Pavithra Suryanarayan, Ethnic Inequality and the Ethnification of Political Parties - Evidence from India
New Issue: International & Comparative Law Quarterly
The latest issue of the International & Comparative Law Quarterly (Vol. 65, no. 1, January 2016) is out. Contents include:- Articles
- Rosalyn Higgins, The United Nations at 70 Years: The Impact Upon International Law
- Dominic McGoldrick, A Defence of the Margin of Appreciation and an Argument for its Application by the Human Rights Committee
- Tom Ruys & Luca Ferro, Weathering the Storm: Legality and Legal Implications of the Saudi-Led Military Intervention in Yemen
- Annamaria La Chimia, Food Security and the Right to Food: Finding Balance in the 2012 Food Assistance Convention
- David Erdos, European Union Data Protection Law and Media Expression: Fundamentally Off Balance
- Nikos Vogiatzis, The Admissibility Criterion Under Article 35(3)(B) ECHR: A ‘Significant Disadvantage’ to Human Rights Protection?
- Shorter Articles and Notes
- Andrew Sanger, State Immunity and the Right of Access to a Court under The EU Charter of Fundamental Rights
- Barbara Cooreman, Addressing Environmental Concerns Through Trade: A Case for Extraterritoriality?
- Ben TC Warwick, Socio-Economic Rights During Economic Crises: A Changed Approach to Non-Retrogression
Monday, January 4, 2016
Lavallée: La protection internationale des droits de l'enfant
Le respect des droits de la personne constitue l’un des principes fondamentaux des sociétés démocratiques. L’émergence des droits de l’enfant découle des luttes antérieures menées contre les autres formes d’inégalité. Les instruments internationaux relatifs aux droits de la personne sont applicables aux enfants, mais ils se sont avérés inadéquats pour assurer leur protection spécifique. En effet, les enfants peuvent être doublement discriminés ; à la fois en tant qu’enfant et en tant que membre d’un autre groupe vulnérable. De plus, les enfants sont des personnes en développement, et cette situation justifie qu’on leur octroie une protection spécifique. Cette vulnérabilité constitue le fondement traditionnel de l’incapacité juridique des mineurs. Or, cette reconnaissance de l’enfant en tant que sujet de droits est maintenant de plus en plus souvent critiquée. La théorie des droits de l’enfant met en avant de nouveaux paramètres, tels que la capacité progressive, l’autonomie, l’intérêt et le droit de participation de l’enfant. Ces paradigmes sont désormais relayés par le droit international, et plus particulièrement par la Convention internationale relative aux droits de l’enfant, adoptée par l’Assemblée générale des Nations Unies en 1989. Or, la mise en œuvre des droits de l’enfant s’avère complexe à cause de cette dualité de l’enfant, à la fois sujet de droit et objet de protection.
Cet ouvrage constitue une mise en contexte des droits de l’enfant. La première partie est consacrée à l’étude du statut juridique de l’enfant en droit international. L’analyse porte également sur les textes régionaux applicables aux enfants, en Amérique, en Europe et en Afrique. La deuxième partie montre la nécessité d’un équilibre entre le droit à l’autonomie et le droit à la protection de l’enfant. En effet, l’adoption d’une approche holistique et respectueuse des capacités progressives de l’enfant dans la mise en œuvre de ses droits ne doit pas nous faire oublier que l’enfant a également droit à une protection efficace contre les différentes formes d’exploitation dont il est encore aujourd’hui trop souvent l’objet.
Call for Submissions: Utrecht Journal of International and European Law
von Bernstorff: Hans Kelsen on Judicial Law-Making by International Courts and Tribunals: A Theory of Global Judicial Imperialism?
This paper examines Hans Kelsen's theory of international adjudication and its political implications in the context of Kelsen's post-war calls for compulsory jurisdiction. It defends Kelsen's position on judicial law-making against claims by scholars such as Hardt and Negri that it amounts to a theory of 'judicial imperialism'. The paper, to finish, examines the ramifications of Kelsen's theory of compulsory jurisdiction in times of fragmentation.
Blokker: The Governance of International Courts and Tribunals: Organizing and Guaranteeing Independence and Accountability
International courts and tribunals have by now become well-established institutions. Many books and articles have been published on the law and practice of, for example, the International Criminal Court, various international criminal tribunals - notably those for the former Yugoslavia and for Rwanda - the International Tribunal for the Law of the Sea (ITLOS), the Appellate Body of the World Trade Organization, international administrative tribunals (dealing with complaints of staff of international organizations), regional courts in Europe, Africa and America (such as the European Court of Justice (ECJ) and the European Court of Human Rights (ECtHR)). At the same time, significantly less research has been done into the law and practice of those international organs (‘governance institutions’) that carry out the necessary governance functions over all these international courts and tribunals. Examples of such organs are the Assembly of States Parties (the governance institution for the ICC), the Meeting of States Parties to the UN Convention on the Law of the Sea (‘SPLOS’, for ITLOS), the Dispute Settlement Body of the WTO (for the WTO Appellate Body), the Committee of Ministers and the Parliamentary Assembly of the Council of Europe (for the ECtHR). These governance institutions elect the judges of international courts and tribunals, adopt their budgets, supervise the implementation of judgments and take other decisions that are of fundamental importance for the way in which international courts and tribunals can carry out their judicial tasks independently. This paper is an appeal for more research into the law and practice of what I will call international judicial governance institutions (injugovins).
McCall-Smith: Human Rights Treaty Bodies, Proceduralization and the Development of Human Rights Jus Commune
The obligations set out in UN human rights treaties are open-textured and evolutionary, therefore they present a particular challenge in articulating the basis of a substantive breach that is universally applicable. Universal applicability, however, is a primary goal of international human rights and fundamental to the recognition of a jus commune of human rights. As the specialist supervisory mechanisms of the core UN human rights treaties, the human rights treaty bodies must balance the progressive realisation of rights against the historic state sensitivity to interference in domestic affairs, an exercise that has often put the treaty bodies at odds with states. Review of treaty body jurisprudence suggests that migration toward a procedural approach to human rights violations may resonate more naturally with states due to the simplicity of establishing procedural infractions. This observation stems from examining how treaty body jurisprudence is utilised in national judicial decisions. It is argued that proceduralized decisions aid in the establishment of human rights jus commune by slowly moving away from value-based determinations, a practice that sits more easily with States. This migration is reflected in two identifiable practices. The first sees states in breach of obligations based on the failure to adhere to rules of procedure or procedural obligations under a treaty. The second bases a breach determination on the procedural dimension of a substantive right. The lingering question is whether this is a positive development in the overall protection of human rights and how this impacts the growing common law of human rights. An examination of treaty body jurisprudence across the UN treaty bodies will allow the proceduralization of human rights at the international level to be evaluated in terms of individual human rights protection. The tedious balance that must be maintained in order to advance the human rights jus commune should be evaluated from a universal perspective to assess whether proceduralization of rights adds to or detracts from the overall human rights project.
Crepet Daigremont: La clause de la nation la plus favorisée
Technique ancienne du droit des traités, la clause de la nation la plus favorisée connaît une vigueur renouvelée du fait de l’évolution considérable des relations économiques internationales depuis les années 1970.
Disposition fondamentale du GATT et des accords OMC, longtemps conclue en matière diplomatique et consulaire et dans le domaine de la condition des étrangers, elle est aussi présente dans les traités de promotion et de protection des investissements étrangers et s’applique parfois en matière fiscale.
Issu d’une thèse soutenue à l’Université Panthéon-Assas sous la direction de Charles Leben, le présent ouvrage étudie la clause de la nation la plus favorisée dans tous ses domaines d’application pour tenter de dégager la signification juridique d’une telle clause de nondiscrimination qui ne cesse de susciter débats et controverses depuis la fin du XIXème siècle au moins.
L’analyse de ses rapports avec les principes de réciprocité et d’égalité permet notamment d’éclairer les problèmes actuels liés principalement à la délimitation du champ d’action de la clause: d’une part la prolifération des accords commerciaux régionaux, d’autre part la portée procédurale dont elle est dotée en matière de règlement arbitral des différends relatifs à des investissements étrangers, semblent mettre en cause son autorité.
Une clause de la nation la plus favorisée ne permet toutefois pas d’éliminer toutes les différences de traitement. Une telle clause permet à ses bénéficiaires de jouir des privilèges accordés dans les mêmes circonstances à des États déterminés dans un domaine convenu de relations.
Sunday, January 3, 2016
New Issue: Manchester Journal of International Economic Law
- Weihuan Zhou, Rethinking National Treatment and the Role of Regulatory Purpose: Lessons from the ‘Theory of Distortions and Welfare’
- Rawan Al-Louzi, A Coherence Review of Investment Protection under Bilateral Investment Treaties and Free Trade Agreements
- Dominic N Dagbanja, The Investment Treaty Regime and Environmental Protection in Ghana: A Constitutional and General International Law Perspective on How to Retain Environmental Regulatory Autonomy
- Henok Birhanu Asmelash, Ethiopia’s Long Walk to WTO Membership: Exploring the Implications of the 2012 WTO Accession Guidelines for Least Developing Countries
- Anindita Jaiswal, Effects Doctrine in India versus the US: Developing & Developed Country Perspectives
