Saturday, June 8, 2019

New Issue: Ethics & International Affairs

The latest issue of Ethics & International Affairs (Vol. 33, no. 2, Summer 2019) is out. Contents include:
  • Essay
    • Kimberly Hutchings, Decolonizing Global Ethics: Thinking with the Pluriverse
  • Roundtable: Artificial Intelligence and the Future of Global Affairs
    • Heather M. Roff, Artificial Intelligence: Power to the People
    • Steven Livingston & Mathias Risse, The Future Impact of Artificial Intelligence on Humans and Human Rights
    • Jeffrey D. Sachs, Some Brief Reflections on Digital Technologies and Economic Development
    • Amandeep Singh Gill, Artificial Intelligence and International Security: The Long View
    • Sara E. Davies, Artificial Intelligence in Global Health
    • Patrick Lin & Fritz Allhoff, Arctic 2.0: How Artificial Intelligence Can Help Develop a Frontier
  • Feature
    • Sarah-Vaughan Brakman, The Principle of Subsidiarity in the Hague Convention on Intercountry Adoption: A Philosophical Analysis
  • Review Essay
    • Inderjeet Parmar, Global Power Shifts, Diversity, and Hierarchy in International Politics

Call for Papers: Resistance to development projects in Latin America: Taking stock of the role of law

A call for papers and active participants has been issued for a workshop on "Resistance to development projects in Latin America: Taking stock of the role of law," to take place August 9, 2019, at the Universidad del Rosario, Faculty of Jurisprudence, Bogotá. The call is here.

Call for Papers: Constitutions of Value

A call for papers has been issued for an exploratory workshop on "Constitutions of Value," which will take place December 12-13, 2019 at the University of Würzburg. Here's the call:

Value talk abounds. Economists express concern that the economy is characterized increasingly by value extraction not value production (Mazzucato 2018); politicians worry that “illiberal democracies” erode the value base of our political communities; international institutions aiming at responsible production and consumption (SDG 12) put forward proposals on “redefining value” to make headway towards the circular economy (IRP 2018). Law figures in such debates and projects as an expression of societal values (Marks 2016), for example in the form of human rights; as a tool for the enforcement of such values; and as regulation, for example of the financial sector in order to steer investments into the “real”/“value producing” economy. In these capacities, law aims to affirm or implement, while deferring to values always already produced and identified elsewhere. The negotiations of an implementation agreement on biodiversity in areas beyond national jurisdiction – as a value to be preserved for current and future generation – provide a recent illustration. Yet, often the notion of value remains vague and the debates on the protection of societal values and economic value production remain disconnected, despite value being their shared reference. While the International Resource Panel promotes the redefinition of value to reduce resource extraction, the International Seabed Authority is drafting regulations for the mining of seabed minerals – with heated debates on valuation and value (e.g. of manganese nodules, ecosystem services and immaterial environmental damage). These law-making projects are not only illustrative of the disconnect between value debates as well as of approaches to value as pre-existent and objective, produced e.g. by scarcity, but also indicate the potential of research into the social construction and co-production of value.

With this symposium we intend to take a view of value not as exogenous to law and society, not merely something to be identified, promoted and protected by law. Rather, we begin from a view of value, value production and measurement as endogenous. We propose to engage in an internal or constitutional study of value (Desan 2017) that not only looks to the role of law, but also to the material dimensions of value production. We seek to examine the ways in which value is (co-)constituted, structured and shaped by law, politics, science and technology. We thus hope to advance understanding of the foundational role of value in political economy as well as the law-like effects of values and value measurements so constituted. More specifically, we seek to explore the disconnect between value debates in politics (centering on constitutional values (plural) such as human rights, rule of law and democracy) and value debates in economics (focusing on the production of value (singular) measured by money and expressed through price), to clarify how the two spheres of value are linked and how their separation is sustained. While we hold that value is not objective but that value is an institution (Orléans 2014), the outcome of institutional engineering and design (Desan 2017), we also intend to draw attention to the effects of that engineering that exceed the design objectives. Value brings into being universes (Graeber 2013), regimes and associations that may include but also surpass the programs underlying their inception. An inquiry into the internal design of value(s) and value production as well as its (unintended) effects appears key for understanding formations of inequality and modes of economic exploitation (Alessandrini 2016; Soederberg 2014), but also for identifying the potential for transformations of political economy through institutional engagement and change (Unger 2004; Kennedy 2013). The study of value is a necessary complement to and complexification of endeavors seeking to democratize the economy.

Central to the inquiry is an analysis of the legal construction of money and finance (Desan 2017; Pistor 2019; Hockett and Omarova 2017); how it brings into being a unit of account and a measure of value and is determinative of which economic activities have access to capital, credit and legal enforcement. Yet, no less important for an understanding of how value is measured and produced and how it shapes society will be examinations of other institutions, infrastructures and networks of value production, including, for example, the corporation, insurance arrangements, land, labour, artworks, etc.

While in this workshop we hope to illuminate the constitutive role of law in societal formations (Teubner 2010) with their respective modes of value production, we aim at transdisciplinarity and particularly encourage research into the interplay of politics, law and technologies in co-producing imaginaries (Jasanoff 2015), into the ways in which digitalization, accounting and modelling practices participate in value production (Mackenzie, Muniesa and Siu 2007; Omarova 2019). Thus, we invite examinations from different theoretical perspectives -- including but not limited to Marxist value critique, societal constitutionalism, the anthropology of value, and science and technology studies -- on the institutions of value and value production; their legal and technological co-constitution; as well as the metaphors, materialities, networks and ideological dimensions that stabilize notions of value.

Given the exploratory nature of the workshop, we encourage application of such perspectives to case studies. These may include studies on the constitutional design of (existing and utopian) money; the valuation of financial assets, natural resources and (environmental/immaterial) damages; value production through and valuation of the corporation; the role of insurance in value production and protection; rights (of nature) vis-à-vis price as the form value may/should take; international initiatives to contain resource extraction and promote the circular economy, and the concepts of value that inform them. Such case studies may serve to test and nuance the assumptions laid out above and clarify the analytical purchase of a focus on value for the study of law and political economy -- in particular one that is guided by the normative aims of equality and democratization.

We are issuing here a Call for Papers and invite lawyers from practice and academia as well as scholars from other disciplines to send an abstract of 500 words. Abstracts should concisely formulate the questions addressed and indicate method and materials employed in the proposed research. The deadline for the abstracts is 12 July 2019. Draft papers – Think Pieces of 5000-7000 words -- will be expected by 10 November 2010. Please send abstracts, accompanied by a recent CV in pdf format, to p-oerecht@jura.uni-wuerzburg.de.

Roscini: Gravity in the Statute of the International Criminal Court and Cyber Conduct That Constitutes, Instigates or Facilitates International Crimes

Marco Roscini (Univ. of Westminster- Law) has posted Gravity in the Statute of the International Criminal Court and Cyber Conduct That Constitutes, Instigates or Facilitates International Crimes (Criminal Law Forum, forthcoming). Here's the abstract:
This article explores the application of the gravity threshold to cyber conduct that might fall under the jurisdiction of the International Criminal Court. It first looks at how international crimes within the jurisdiction of the Court can be committed, instigated or facilitated in and through cyberspace and then discusses the problems that might arise when assessing gravity in this context. In particular, the article applies the elements of the gravity assessment identified in the Court’s case-law and by the Prosecutor, i.e. the identification of those “most responsible” for the alleged crimes and certain quantitative and qualitative factors, in order to determine the gravity of a case or situation involving cyber conduct.

Contesse: Sexual Orientation and Gender Identity in Inter-American Human Rights Law

Jorge Contesse (Rutgers Univ. - Law) has published Sexual Orientation and Gender Identity in Inter-American Human Rights Law (North Carolina Journal of International Law, Vol. 44, no. 2, p. 353, May 2019). Here's the abstract:

Sexual orientation and gender identity are legally-protected categories in international human rights law and in the law of many States. For the past two decades, States, regional, and the universal human rights systems have expanded the understanding of anti-discrimination law in ways that to many seemed unexpected. Along with the recognition of sexual orientation as a prohibited ground of discrimination, gender identity has also become a legally significant concept for human rights law.

In Latin America, a region traditionally labeled as socially conservative, sexuality laws have also undergone unprecedented changes. Such legal developments cannot be understood without an examination of the role of Latin America’s human rights court—the Inter-American Court of Human Rights. This Article discusses the development of sexual orientation and gender identity law by looking at the decisions of the Inter-American Court: Atala and Daughters v. Chile; Duque v. Colombia; Flor Freire v. Ecuador; and Advisory Opinion OC 24-17, concerning same-sex marriage and right to name change. The impact of these decisions demonstrates the quick nature in which the idea of sexual orientation and gender identity as a protected category has changed and developed in a short period of time.

New Issue: Global Society

The latest issue of Global Society (Vol. 33, no. 3, 2019) is out. Contents include:
  • Raluca Grosescu, Sophie Baby & Laure Neumayer, “Justice, Memory and Transnational Networks. European and South American Entanglements”
  • Daniel Gunnar Kressel, “Getting off the Tiger”: The Spanish Transitional Model and its Influence on the Democratic Transitions in Argentina and Chile, 1977–1990
  • Caroline Moine, Denouncing or Supporting the Chilean Dictatorship in West Germany? Local Associations of Solidarity and Their Transnational Networks Since the 1970s
  • David Copello, Jacques Vergès, Rupture Strategy and the Argentinean New Left: Circulations and Adaptations of a Judiciary Theory
  • Emilio Crenzel, The Crimes of the Last Dictatorship in Argentina and its Qualification as Genocide: A Historicization

Conference: The League of Nations and International law, 1919-1945

On June 13-14, 2019, the project Laying the Foundations - The League of Nations and International Law, 1919 to 1945 at the University of Copenhagen will host a conference on "The League of Nations and International law, 1919-1945." The program is here.

New Issue: European Journal of International Relations

The latest issue of the European Journal of International Relations (Vol. 25, no. 2, June 2019) is out. Contents include:
  • Rebecca Adler-Nissen & Alexei Tsinovoi, International misrecognition: The politics of humour and national identity in Israel’s public diplomacy
  • Mattias Vermeiren, Meeting the world’s demand for safe assets? Macroeconomic policy and the international status of the euro after the crisis
  • Markus Kornprobst, Framing, resonance and war: Foregrounds and backgrounds of cultural congruence
  • Nicole Sunday Grove, Weapons of mass participation: Social media, violence entrepreneurs, and the politics of crowdfunding for war
  • Tomas Wallenius, The case for a history of global legal practices
  • Robert Falkner & Barry Buzan, The emergence of environmental stewardship as a primary institution of global international society
  • Catherine Charrett, Ritualised securitisation: The European Union’s failed response to Hamas’s success
  • Benjamin de Carvalho, Niels Nagelhus Schia,& Xavier Guillaume, Everyday sovereignty: International experts, brokers and local ownership in peacebuilding Liberia
  • Kerry Goettlich, The rise of linear borders in world politics
  • Tom Lundborg, The ethics of neorealism: Waltz and the time of international life
  • Deepshikha Shahi, Introducing Sufism to International Relations Theory: A preliminary inquiry into epistemological, ontological, and methodological pathways
  • Manjeet S. Pardesi, Mughal hegemony and the emergence of South Asia as a “region” for regional order-building
  • Robert S. Ross, On the fungibility of economic power: China’s economic rise and the East Asian security order

Friday, June 7, 2019

New Issue: Asian Journal of International Law

The latest issue of the Asian Journal of International Law (Vol. 9, no. 2, July 2019) is out. Contents include:
  • Articles
    • Mohammad Shahabuddin, Post-colonial Boundaries, International Law, and the Making of the Rohingya Crisis in Myanmar
    • Debashis Chakraborty, Julien Chaisse, & Xu Qian, Is It Finally Time for India's Free Trade Agreements? The ASEAN “Present” and the RCEP “Future”

New Addition to the UN Audiovisual Library of International Law

The Codification Division of the UN Office of Legal Affairs recently added a lecture to the UN Audiovisual Library of International Law. It was given by Michelle Reyes Milk on “Tribunales ad hoc y legado para el Derecho Penal Internacional.”

Thursday, June 6, 2019

El Boudouhi: Les transports au prisme du droit international

Saïda El Boudouhi (Université Polytechnique Hauts-de-France) has published Les transports au prisme du droit international (Pedone 2019). Here's the abstract:

Cet ouvrage apporte des perspectives inédites sur les transports habituellement abordés sous l’angle exclusif du droit interne ou du droit européen. Elargissant résolument le champ habituel du « droit des transports », l’objet « transports » y donne lieu, à la lumière de plusieurs grands chapitres du droit international public, à des recherches et analyses originales. S’y croisent ainsi d’une part des regards transversaux sur plusieurs modes de transport et d’autre part des éclairages plus spécifiques portant sur un mode en particulier ou un régime lié aux aspects internationaux des transports. Y sont étudiés des questions transversales de droit international général, la difficile articulation entre les transports et la protection de l’environnement, les obstacles à une véritable intégration économique des transports au niveau international, ou encore les spécificités de la mise en œuvre du droit international public dans le domaine des transports. A côté d’analyses plus transversales, on y trouve ainsi de riches enseignements sur la coopération ferroviaire internationale, les problèmes soulevés par l’intégration économique internationale de l’aviation civile internationale ou encore sur le système international mis en place pour réparer les dommages causés par la pollution par les hydrocarbures.

Ont contribué, Niki Aloupi, Virginie Barral, Vincent Correia, Odile Delfour-Samama, Pierre Michel Eisemann, Saïda El Boudouhi, Gilbert Guillaume, Aleksandr Kuzmenko, Cécile Legros, Thomas Liebert, Antigoni Lykotrafiti, Ioannis Prezas, Sabrina Robert-Cuendet, Béatrice Trigeaud.

Conference: Les archives et le Cambodge : Une perspective internationale

On June 10, 2019, a conference on "Les archives et le Cambodge : Une perspective internationale" will take place at the Royal University of Law and Economics, Phnom Penh. The program is here.

Lando: Maritime Delimitation as a Judicial Process

Massimo Lando (International Court of Justice) has published Maritime Delimitation as a Judicial Process (Cambridge Univ. Press 2019). Here's the abstract:
Maritime Delimitation as a Judicial Process is the first comprehensive analysis of judicial decisions, state practice and academic opinions on maritime boundary delimitation. For ease of reading and clarity, it follows this three-stage approach in its structure. Massimo Lando analyses the interaction between international tribunals and states in the development of the delimitation process, in order to explain rationally how a judicially-created approach to delimit maritime boundaries has been accepted by states. Pursuing a practical approach, this book identifies disputed points in maritime delimitation and proposes solutions which could be applied in future judicial disputes. In addition, the book engages with the underlying theories of maritime delimitation, including the relationship between delimitation and delineation, the effect of third states' rights on delimitation, and the manner in which each stage of the process influences the other stages.

Wednesday, June 5, 2019

Ruiz Fabri: International Law and Litigation: A Look into Procedure

Hélène Ruiz Fabri (Max Planck Institute Luxembourg for International, European and Regulatory Procedural Law) has published International Law and Litigation: A Look into Procedure (Nomos 2019). The table of contents is here. Here's the abstract:
Containing contributions by twenty-five scholars, this volume aims to examine the increasingly notable subject of international dispute settlement from an innovative procedural perspective. Indeed, with the ‘jurisdictionalisation’ of international law that has taken place during the last thirty years, both scholars and practitioners have shown an important and growing interest in international law litigation. Yet, little attention has been paid to the procedural aspects thereof. In building upon research into subfields of international litigation (general international law analysis, international economic law procedures, human rights and European law mechanisms), this book endeavours to provide an up-to-date seminal picture of the evolution of the role of procedure across these domains as well as an overall illustration of the field.

New Volume: Recueil des Cours

Volume 395 of the Recueil des Cours, Collected Courses of the Hague Academy of International Law is out. Contents include:
  • Volume 395
    • Francesco Salerno, The Identity and Continuity of Personal Status in Contemporary Private International Law
    • Christine M. Chinkin, United Nations Accountability for Violations of International Human Rights Law

McCall-Smith, Wouters, & Gómez Isa: The Faces of Human Rights

Kasey McCall-Smith (Univ. of Edinburgh - Law), Jan Wouters (KU Leuven - Law), & Felipe Gómez Isa (Universidad de Deusto) have published The Faces of Human Rights (Hart Publishing 2019). The table of contents is here. Here's the abstract:
As human rights discourse increasingly focuses on analysing states and the institutions that promote and support the human rights machinery that states have created, this volume serves to recall that despite the growing size of the machinery and unwieldy nature of states, human rights began with real people. It samples a broad range of actors and localities where everyday people fought to ensure that the basic principles of human rights became a reality for all. This volume will give a face to the everyday people to whom credit is due for shaping human rights. It also responds to the perennial question of how to begin a career in human rights by highlighting that there is no single path into this dynamic field, a field built on the back of small initiatives by people across a broad spectrum of career paths.

Bohrer: Divisions over Distinctions in Wartime International Law

Ziv Bohrer (Bar-Ilan Univ. – Law) has posted Divisions over Distinctions in Wartime International Law (in Ziv Bohrer, Janina Dill & Helen Duffy, The Applicability of International Humanitarian Law, Part II of Max Planck Trialogues on the Law of War and Peace, Anne Peters & Christian Marxsen eds., forthcoming). Here's the abstract:

Under what conditions International Human Rights Law (IHRL) applies in wartime? Who is a combatant, and who is a non-combatant, given that International Humanitarian Law (IHL) sets very different rules for each? When do armed conflicts begin and end, and what are their spatial boundaries, given that IHL only applies to armed conflict? What conditions distinguish international from non-international armed conflict ("IAC" from "NIAC"), given that distinct IHL corpus governs each? What law applies to cross-border fights between non-State and State forces ("transnational wars"): peacetime international law, IAC-law, NIAC-law, or a new IHL altogether? Since the early-2000s, such war-related legal classifications have been evermore, un-resolvability debated.

This chapter addresses that classification crisis. It aims to enrich the discourse with the following five provocative thoughts: First, it refutes the received historical account that the current crisis results from the rise of a new kind of war. The attributes of current conflicts are much less novel than assumed. Second, it refutes the accepted (overly) Statist history of IHL, showing that IHL application to NIAC, and even to transnational wars, is much older than widely thought. Third, it shows that current uncertainty is, in part, not a crisis, rather a chronic fact of life, stemming from the inevitable nature of ‘law’ and of ‘war’. Moreover, the chapter presents a recently neglected IHL norm–The Adaptation Approach–that has long aided IHL in addressing such uncertainty. Four, it reveals the main cause for the current actual legal crisis: for two decades, a struggle has been waging in IHL, driven by the competing attempts of hardline-Statists and hardline-IHRL-advocates to take sole control over its shaping. Current escalating uncertainty primarily stems from these attempts and from the clash between them. Five, the chapter responds by rebutting the fundamental premise of each hardline faction: (a) It shows that the Hardline-Statist drive to loosen wartime legal constraints gravely underrates existing IHL. (b) It argues that IHRL-advocates over-estimate the benefits of extensive wartime application of IHRL; counter-intuitively, the co-application of IHRL and IHL diminishes (rather than increases) civilian protection. The chapter, thus, invites us to radically question the role IHRL should play in armed conflict.

Call for Submissions: Trade, Law and Development

The journal Trade, Law and Development has issued a call for submissions for its Winter 2019 issue (Vol. 11, no. 2). The call is here.

New Volume: Recueil des Cours

Volume 394 of the Recueil des Cours, Collected Courses of the Hague Academy of International Law is out. Contents include:
  • Volume 394
    • A.A. Kostin, International Commercial Arbitration, with Special Focus on Russia
    • G. Cuniberti, Le fondement de l’effet des jugements étrangers

Tuesday, June 4, 2019

New Issue: Swiss Review of International and European Law

The latest issue of the Swiss Review of International and European Law (Vol. 29, no. 1, 2019) is out. Contents include:
  • Georges Pavlides, Recouvrement des avoirs illicites: un nouvel instrument européen sur le modèle de la loi suisse

Khalilieh: Islamic Law of the Sea: Freedom of Navigation and Passage Rights in Islamic Thought

Hassan S. Khalilieh (Univ. of Haifa) has published Islamic Law of the Sea: Freedom of Navigation and Passage Rights in Islamic Thought (Cambridge Univ. Press 2019). Here's the abstract:
The doctrine of modern law of the sea is commonly believed to have developed from Renaissance Europe. Often ignored though is the role of Islamic law of the sea and customary practices at that time. In this book, Hassan S. Khalilieh highlights Islamic legal doctrine regarding freedom of the seas and its implementation in practice. He proves that many of the fundamental principles of the pre-modern international law governing the legal status of the high seas and the territorial sea, though originating in the Mediterranean world, are not a necessarily European creation. Beginning with the commonality of the sea in the Qur'an and legal methods employed to insure the safety, security, and freedom of movement of Muslim and aliens by land and sea, Khalilieh then goes on to examine the concepts of the territorial sea and its security premises, as well as issues surrounding piracy and its legal implications as delineated in Islamic law.

Moon: Delaware's New Competition

William J. Moon (Univ. of Maryland - Law) has posted Delaware's New Competition (Northwestern University Law Review, forthcoming). Here's the abstract:

It is a truism among legal scholars that corporate law is a matter of state law. According to the standard account, states (and only states) compete to supply corporate law to American corporations, with Delaware dominating the market. This competition metaphor in turn informs some of the most important policy debates in American corporate law.

This Article challenges the standard account, introducing foreign nations as emerging lawmakers that compete with American states in the increasingly globalizing market for corporate law. In recent decades, entrepreneurial foreign nations in offshore islands have attracted publicly traded American corporations by offering permissive corporate governance rules and specialized business courts. Aided in part by an elite cadre of private sector lawyers who draft legislation for these lawmakers, foreign nations enable American corporations to opt out of mandatory rules that are axiomatic features of American corporate law. Thus, for instance, shareholders of New York fashion house Michael Kors are virtually prohibited from bringing suits for managerial misconduct because the firm is incorporated in the British Virgin Islands.

The contribution of this Article is two-fold. The first is descriptive. It documents an emerging international market for corporate law that has thus far been undetected by legal scholars who presuppose an inter-state market. The second is normative. While this Article acknowledges the potential benefits offered by foreign nations competing to attract American corporations, it highlights countervailing considerations that render any claims about gains from international jurisdictional competition premature at best.

Yiallourides: Maritime Disputes and International Law: Disputed Waters and Seabed Resources in Asia and Europe

Constantinos Yiallourides (British Institute of International and Comparative Law) has published Maritime Disputes and International Law: Disputed Waters and Seabed Resources in Asia and Europe (Routledge 2019). Here's the abstract:
The settlement of the maritime boundary disputes between China and Japan in the East China Sea, and between Greece and Turkey in the Aegean Sea, is politically deadlocked. While diplomatic settlement efforts have been ongoing for the past several decades, neither side in each case appears prepared to back down from its respective maritime and territorial claims. Several incidents at sea have occurred, prompting diplomatic protests, military standoffs, even exchange of fire. The existing status quo is inherently unstable and does not favour either side to the extent that it holds hostage the multiple benefits that could otherwise be generated from the exploitation of the seabed energy and mineral resources in the disputed waters, creating an urgent need for a meaningful discussion on finding a practical way forward. This monograph undertakes a comprehensive analysis of these disputes based on the rules and principles of international law, critically evaluating possible institutional designs of inter-State cooperation over seabed activities in disputed maritime areas and makes recommendations for the prospect of realising joint development regimes in the East China Sea and the Aegean to coordinate the exploration for and exploitation of resources without having resorted previously to boundary delimitation settlement.

Conference: 1919. La conférence de la paix de Paris : Les défis d’un nouvel ordre mondial

On June 5-8, 2019, a conference on "1919. La conférence de la paix de Paris : Les défis d’un nouvel ordre mondial / The Paris Peace Conference: The Challenge of a New World Order" will be hled in Paris. The program is here. Here's the idea:

Ouverte dans un Paris portant encore les stigmates des bombardements de la guerre, la conférence de la paix de 1919-1920 frappe les esprits par son caractère cosmopolite et son ambition sans précédent. Là où le congrès de Vienne s’était donné pour tâche, en 1814-1815, la réorganisation de l’ordre européen, la conférence de Paris a bien en vue la redéfinition de l’ordre mondial.

Objet, dès son ouverture, de l’expression de doutes, voire de sarcasmes, la conférence n’en porte pas moins les grandes espérances du retour à la paix. Ses principes fondateurs – respect du droit, égalité souveraine des États, autodétermination, diplomatie publique –, les oppositions et les projets alternatifs qu’ils suscitent, ses décisions tranchantes ou ouvertes et leurs conséquences dramatiques, positives ou porteuses des nouveaux enjeux du siècle, seront au cœur des débats de ce colloque.

Opening in Paris, as it was still bearing the scars of the bombings of the war, the 1919-1920 Peace Conference struck people’s minds with its cosmopolitan character and unprecedented ambition. While Vienna had aimed at reorganizing the European order in 1814-1815, Paris had a clear aim of redefining the world order.

As soon as it was opened, the Peace Conference was met with doubts, and even cynicism. It nevertheless carried the great hopes of a return to peace. It is its founding principles – respect for the law, sovereign equality of states, self-determination, public diplomacy –, but also the oppositions and alternative projects that they raised, its sharp or open decisions and their dramatic consequences, positive or bearing the new challenges of the century, that will be at the heart of the debates at our conference.

New Issue: Manchester Journal of International Economic Law

The latest issue of the Manchester Journal of International Economic Law (Vol. 16, no. 1, 2019) is out. Contents include:
  • Asif H Qureshi, International Legal Aspects of Free Trade Agreements in Northeast Asia
  • Jure Zrilic, Armed Conflict as Force Majeure in International Investment Law
  • Md. Abu Saleh, The WTO Legality of Trade-Labour Sanction in the US GSP Programme
  • Aleksandr P. Alekseenko, New Russian Model BIT and the Practice of Investment Arbitration
  • Gonzalo Flores, At the Forefront of International Investment Law: Modernizing the Rules and Regulations of ICSID
  • Gerard J. Sanders, Co-Financing among Multilateral Development Banks of Major Infrastructure Projects
  • Heikki Cantell, The Nordic Investment Bank’s Experience of Amicable and Alternative Dispute Resolution: Is there a Nordic Approach?
  • Elena Blanco, Reflections on Vedanta’s Supreme Court Decision on Jurisdiction

Krieger & Püschmann: Securing of Resources as a Valid Reason for Using Force? – A Pre-Emptive Defence of the Prohibition on the Use of Force

Heike Krieger (Freie Universitaet Berlin - Law) & Jonas Püschmann (Max Planck Institute for Comparative Public Law and International Law) have posted Securing of Resources as a Valid Reason for Using Force? – A Pre-Emptive Defence of the Prohibition on the Use of Force. Here's the abstract:
A growing demand for natural resources embedded in current changes of the international order will put pressure on states to secure the future availability of these resources. Some political discourses suggest that states might respond by challenging the foundations of international law. Whereas the UN Charter was inter alia aimed at eliminating uses of force for economic reasons, one may observe an on-going trend of securitization of matters of resource supply resulting into the revival of self-preservation doctrines. The chapter will show that those claims lack a normative foundation in the current framework of the prohibition of the use of force. Moreover, international law has sufficient instruments to cope with disputes over access to resources by other means than the use of force. The international community, therefore, must oppose claims that may contribute to normative uncertainties and strengthen already existing instruments of pacific settlement of disputes.

Brunner & Gottlieb: Commentary on the UN Sales Law (CISG)

Christoph Brunner & Benjamin Gottlieb have published Commentary on the UN Sales Law (CISG) (Wolters Kluwer 2019). Here's the abstract:
Buyers and sellers engaging in the cross-border sale of goods are well-advised to be conversant with the United Nations Convention on Contracts for the International Sale of Goods (CISG), which governs international sales contracts. The CISG has been ratified by 89 states, which together account for over three-quarters of all world trade. This practically-oriented, article-by-article commentary on the CISG will be useful to legal practitioners, counsel and arbitrators dealing with international sales contracts. The in-depth annotations deal extensively with the legal issues likely to arise under each CISG article. The annotations include up-to-date analyses of state court and arbitral decisions, the legal doctrines derived from these decisions, and relevant scholarship to date. A

Monday, June 3, 2019

Kassoti: Bridge over Troubled Water: Opinion 1/17 and the Autonomy of the EU Legal Order

Eva Kassoti (T.M.C. Asser Instituut) has published Bridge over Troubled Water: Opinion 1/17 and the Autonomy of the EU Legal Order (Revista General de Derecho Europeo, no. 48, May 2019).

La Vaccara: When the conflict ends, while uncertainty continues : accounting for missing persons between war and peace in international law

Alessandra La Vaccara (International Commission on Missing Persons) has published When the conflict ends, while uncertainty continues : accounting for missing persons between war and peace in international law (Pedone 2019). Here's the abstract:
During an armed conflict and in its aftermath, measures must be undertaken in order to ascertain the fate of the missing and to address the emotional distress of families from the lack of news on their relatives. In the same contextual settings, cases of missing persons may involve criminal accountability, thereby triggering actions directed to answer questions like ‘who is responsible?’ and ‘what are the circumstances of the crime?’. These courses of action respond to two different needs, i.e., the need of families to know the fate and whereabouts of their missing relatives, and the societal and individual need for accountability. The book examines how the international legal framework meets these two distinct, but intertwined, needs. It captures the diversity of international rules concerning the issue of persons reported missing in armed conflict, as well as the complexity of their implementation in the transition from an armed conflict to peace. The book shows that the duty to account for missing persons has a temporal cross-cutting nature, since its implementation requires measures before, during, and after an armed conflict. Dealing with the issue of the missing across phases − i.e., durante bello and post bellum − entails a complex interplay of international norms. Affirming the relevance of the dialectic between International Humanitarian Law (IHL) and International Human Rights Law (IHRL) in the transition from conflict to peace, the book analyzes the simultaneous application of IHL and IHRL rules on missing persons in post-conflict and proposes a set of criteria that should govern their interplay. Measures that respond to the right of families to know the fate of their relatives cannot substitute those that are required to establish responsibility for IHL/IHRL violations and international crimes, and vice-versa. Examining specific examples, the book unveils the role that international law plays in the attempts of the international community to articulate humanitarian and accountability-driven efforts vis-à-vis post-conflict claims for information on the missing. In light of this analysis, the book explores the legal and policy aspects of how to build linkages between such efforts.

Sunday, June 2, 2019

Dijkstal: Yemen and the Stockholm Agreement: Background, Context, and the Significance of the Agreement

Haydee Dijkstal has posted an ASIL Insight on Yemen and the Stockholm Agreement: Background, Context, and the Significance of the Agreement.

New Issue: Questions of International Law

The latest issue of Questions of International Law / Questioni di Diritto Internazionale (no. 59, 2019) is out. Contents include:
  • The qualification of armed conflicts and the ‘Support-Based Approach’: Time for an appraisal
    • Introduced by Giulio Bartolini & Marco Pertile
    • Raphaël van Steenberghe and Pauline Lesaffre, The ICRC’s ‘support-based approach’: A suitable but incomplete theory
    • Bianca Maganza, Which role for hybrid entities involved in multi-parties NIACs? Applying the ICRC’s support-based approach to the armed conflict in Mali

Workshop: The Paths of Change in International Law

On June 6-7, 2019, the Paths of International Law Project will hold a workshop on "The Paths of Change in International Law" will take place in Geneva. The program is here.

Conference: Protecting Community Interests under International Law: Challenges and Prospects for the 21st Century

On June 3, 2019, the Norwegian Centre for Human Rights and the Research Group on Human Rights, Armed Conflicts, and the Law of Peace and Security, both at the University of Oslo, will hold a conference on "Protecting Community Interests under International Law: Challenges and Prospects for the 21st Century," in Oslo. The program is here.

New Issue: International Journal of Human Rights

The latest issue of the International Journal of Human Rights (Vol. 23, no. 3, 2019) is out. Contents include:
  • Special Issue: Human Rights Monitoring and Implementation
    • Andressa M. Gadda, Juliet Harris, E. Kay M. Tisdall, Elizabeth Millership & Ursula Kilkelly, Human rights’ monitoring and implementation: how to make rights ‘real’ in children’s lives
    • Ursula Kilkelly, The UN convention on the rights of the child: incremental and transformative approaches to legal implementation
    • Tara M. Collins, The general measures of implementation: opportunities for progress with children’s rights
    • Bronagh Byrne & Laura Lundy, Children’s rights-based childhood policy: a six-P framework
    • Simon Hoffman, The UN convention on the rights of the child, decentralisation and legislative integration: a case study from Wales
    • Andressa M. Gadda, Juliet Harris, E. Kay M. Tisdall & Elizabeth Millership, ‘Making children’s rights real’: lessons from policy networks and Contribution Analysis
    • Lisa Payne, Child Rights Impact Assessment as a policy improvement tool
    • Kasey McCall-Smith, To incorporate the CRC or not – is this really the question?
    • Joel Meekison & Suki Wan, A young person’s guide to defending human rights