New Issue: Nordic Journal of International Law

The latest issue of the Nordic Journal of International Law (Vol. 89, no. 1, 2020) is out. Contents include:

• Shorena Nikoleishvili, Waiting for Abkhazia: Secession and Borders as International Legal Instruments in Contested Sovereignty
• Tero Lundstedt, Inherited National Questions: The Soviet Legacy in Russia’s International Law Doctrine on Self-determination
• Miriam Bak McKenna, Contesting Self-determination in the Wake of Empire: Sovereignty, Human Rights and Economic Justice
• Inger Österdahl, Deployment of Armed Forces: Swedish Constitutional Considerations
• Amanda Bills, The Relationship between Third-party Countermeasures and the Security Council’s Chapter VII Powers: Enforcing Obligations erga omnes in International Law

Peters, Gless, Thomale, & Weller: Business and Human Rights: Making the Legally Binding Instrument Work in Public, Private and Criminal Law

Anne Peters (Max Planck Institute for Comparative Public Law and International Law), Sabine Gless (Univ. of Basel), Chris Thomale (Universität Heidelberg), & Marc-Philippe Weller (Universität Heidelberg) have posted Business and Human Rights: Making the Legally Binding Instrument Work in Public, Private and Criminal Law. Here's the abstract:

The paper’s starting point is the United Nations Human Rights Council working group’s revised draft of a Legally Binding Instrument to Regulate, in International Human Rights Law, the Activities of Transnational Corporations and other Business Enterprises of July 2019. The paper examines the draft treaty’s potential to activate and operationalize public law, private law, and criminal law for enforcing human rights. It conceptualizes a complementary approach of these three branches of law in which private and criminal legal enforcement mechanisms stand in the foreground. It argues for linking civil (tort) and criminal liability for harm caused by hands-off corporate policies, complemented by the obligation to interpret managerial duties in conformity with the human rights standards of public international law. The combination of public, private, and criminal law allows effective enforcement of human rights vis-à-vis global corporations.

von Bogdandy & Villarreal: International Law on Pandemic Response: A First Stocktaking in Light of the Coronavirus Crisis

Armin von Bogdandy (Max Planck Institute for Comparative Public Law and International Law) & Pedro Villarreal Max Planck Institute for Comparative Public Law and International Law) have posted International Law on Pandemic Response: A First Stocktaking in Light of the Coronavirus Crisis. Here's the abstract:

The coronavirus (SARS-CoV-2) pandemic is currently raging throughout the world. The ensuing crisis has acquired a multidimensional nature, affecting all levels of society. Measures adopted by domestic authorities have included a broad spectrum of restrictions: from general alerts to mandatory quarantines and isolations of individuals, to blanket travel bans and cordoning-off of cities and, in some cases, countries. Many governments have declared states of emergency, thereby assuming exceptional powers. This dire crisis leads to our core questions: What are the relevant obligations, powers and procedures under public international law? Have they been complied with? What role, if any, has international law, via its institutions, played so far?

The World Health Organization, a specialized agency of the United Nations, is the international institution with a core mandate in issues of global health. Moreover, the International Health Regulations (IHR) is the main legally binding instrument laying down rules for the cross-border spread of disease. Against this backdrop, in order to address the core questions, this paper provides an overview of the IHR in light of current issues and disputes. The paper then evaluates those issues and disputes under other regimes of international law, such as human rights, trade law, peace and security law, and the law of development finance. Lastly, the paper offers conclusions by way of answers to the research questions.

Hayashi: Military Necessity: The Art, Morality and Law of War

Nobuo Hayashi (United Nations Interregional Crime and Justice Research Institute) has published Military Necessity: The Art, Morality and Law of War (Cambridge Univ. Press 2020). Here's the abstract:

What does it mean to say that international humanitarian law (IHL) strikes a realistic and meaningful balance between military necessity and humanity, and that the law therefore 'accounts for' military necessity? To what consequences does the law 'accounting for' military necessity give rise? Through real-life examples and careful analysis, this book challenges received wisdom on the subject by devising a new theory that not only reaffirms Kriegsräson's fallacy but also explains why IHL has no reason to restrict or prohibit militarily unnecessary conduct on that ground alone. Additionally, the theory hypothesises greater normative significance for humanitarian and chivalrous imperatives when they conflict with IHL rules. By combining international law, jurisprudence, military history, strategic studies, and moral philosophy, this book reveals how rational fighting relates to ethical fighting, how IHL incorporates contrasting values that shape its rules, and how law and theory adapt themselves to war's evolutions.

New Issue: Ethics & International Affairs

The latest issue of Ethics & International Affairs (Vol. 34, no. 1, Spring 2020) is out. Contents include:

• Essays
• Luke Glanville, Hypocritical Inhospitality: The Global Refugee Crisis in the Light of History
• Mathias Risse, On American Values, Unalienable Rights, and Human Rights: Some Reflections on the Pompeo Commission
• Julia Gray, Life, Death, Inertia, Change: The Hidden Lives of International Organizations
• Roundtable: World Peace (And How We Can Achieve It)
• Alex J. Bellamy, Introduction: Taking World Peace Seriously
• Alex J. Bellamy, Thinking about World Peace
• Pamina Firchow, World Peace Is Local Peace
• Nils Petter Gleditsch, Toward a Social-Democratic Peace?
• A. C. Grayling, Toward Peace
• Jacqui True, Continuums of Violence and Peace: A Feminist Perspective
• Review Essay
• Adam Henschke, Why Would I Be a Whistleblower?

New Issue: Journal of World Intellectual Property

The latest issue of the Journal of World Intellectual Property (Vol. 23, nos. 1-2, March 2020) is out. Contents include:

• Shirin Syed, Incorporation of competition‐related TRIPS flexibilities in the domestic law: A case study of India
• Johan Rochel, Intellectual property and its foundations: Using Art. 7 and 8 to address the legitimacy of the TRIPS
• Gregory D. Graff & Philip G. Pardey, Inventions and patenting in Africa: Empirical trends from 1970 to 2010
• Pratik P. Dixit, Dynamic injunctions against Internet intermediaries: An overview of emerging trends in India and Singapore
• Ankita Aseri, Commercializing religion via trademarking God
• Teshome H. Mulesa & Ola T. Westengen, Against the grain? A historical institutional analysis of access governance of plant genetic resources for food and agriculture in Ethiopia
• Carlos M. Correa, Juan I. Correa, & Bram De Jonge, The status of patenting plants in the Global South

New Issue: Journal of International Criminal Justice

The latest issue of the Journal of International Criminal Justice (Vol. 17, no. 5, December 2019) is out. Contents include:

• Articles
• Alexandre Skander Galand, The Nature of the Rome Statute of the International Criminal Court (and its Amended Jurisdictional Scheme)
• Rosemary Grey, Jonathan O’Donohue, Indira Rosenthal, Lisa Davis & Dorine Llanta, Gender-based Persecution as a Crime Against Humanity: The Road Ahead
• Thijs B. Bouwknegt, Beyond ‘African Solutions to African Problems’ at the Extraordinary African Chambers and ‘Distant Justice’ at the International Criminal Court
• Sarah Nimigan, The Malabo Protocol, the ICC, and the Idea of ‘Regional Complementarity’
• Cheah W.L., Culture-specific Evidence before Internationalized Criminal Courts: Lessons from Asian Jurisdictions
• Cases Before International Courts and Tribunals
• Naomi Roht-Arriaza & Santiago Martínez, Grand Corruption and the International Criminal Court in the ‘Venezuela Situation’
• Caroline Sweeney, Accountability for Syria: Is the International Criminal Court Now a Realistic Option?
• National Prosecution of International Crimes: Legislation and Cases
• Linde Bryk & Miriam Saage-Maa, Individual Criminal Liability for Arms Exports under the ICC Statute: A Case Study of Arms Exports from Europe to Saudi-led Coalition Members Used in the War in Yemen

New Issue: Climate Law

The latest issue of Climate Law (Vol. 10, no. 1, 2020) is out. Contents include:

• Special Issue: Polluter Pays Principle and Climate Law
• Suzanne Kingston, The Polluter Pays Principle in EU Climate Law: an Effective Tool before the Courts?
• Nicolas de Sadeleer, Consistency between the Granting of State Aid and the Polluter-Pays Principle: Aid Aimed at Mitigating Climate Change
• Paul A. Barresi, The Polluter Pays Principle as an Instrument of Municipal and Global Environmental Governance in Climate Change Mitigation Law: Lessons from China, India, and the United States
• Dirk Heine, Michael G. Faure & Goran Dominioni, The Polluter-Pays Principle in Climate Change Law: an Economic Appraisal

Strezhnev, Simmons, & Kim: Rulers or Rules? International Law, Elite Cues and Public Opinion

Anton Strezhnev (Harvard Univ), Beth A. Simmons (Univ. of Pennsylvania), & Matthew Kim (Univ. of St. Thomas) have posted Rulers or Rules? International Law, Elite Cues and Public Opinion (European Journal of International Law, forthcoming). Here's the abstract:

One of the mechanisms by which international law can shape domestic politics is through its effects on public opinion. However, a growing number of national leaders have begun to advocate policies that ignore or even deny international law constraints. This article investigates whether international law messages can still shift public opinion even in the face of countervailing elite cues. It reports results from survey experiments conducted in three countries, the United States, Australia and India, which examined attitudes on a highly salient domestic political issue: restrictions on refugee admissions. In each experimental vignette, respondents were asked about their opinion on a proposed or ongoing restrictive refugee policy that was endorsed by the government but also likely contravened international refugee law. Respondents were randomly exposed to messages highlighting the policy’s illegality and/or the elite endorsement. The results show that, on average, the international law messages had a small but significant persuasive effect in reducing support for the restrictive policy – at most 10 percentage points. Surprisingly, there was no evidence that the countervailing elite endorsement was a significant moderator of this effect. However, in the case of the United States and among Republican co-partisans of the President, the elite endorsement independently increased respondents’ beliefs that the restriction was legal under international law while having no effect on support for the policy. The results suggest that cues from domestic elites do not strictly trump those from international sources and that despite cues about national leaders’ policy advocacy, international law can affect the attitudes of some voters even on an issue as heavily politicized as refugee policy.

Call for Papers: American Society of Comparative Law 2020 Annual Meeting

The American Society of Comparative Law has issued a call for papers for its 2020 Annual Meeting, which will take place October 15-17, at Boston University School of Law. The theme is: "Comparative Legal History." The call is here.

New Issue: Journal of Human Rights and the Environment

The latest issue of the Journal of Human Rights and the Environment (Vol. 11, no. 1, March 2020) is out. Contents include:

• Editorial
• Anna Great & Julia Dehm, Frames and contestations: environment, climate change and the construction of in/justice
• Articles
• M Joel Voss, Contesting human rights and climate change at the UN Human Rights Council
• Gavin Byrne, Climate change denial as far-right politics: How abandonment of scientific method paved the way for Trump
• Sabina Cardenas & Esteban Angulo, Human rights vs. Eco-justice: conflicts and other futures in urban open spaces in Cali, Colombia
• Sumudu Atapattu, Climate change and displacement: protecting 'climate refugees' within a framework of justice and human rights
• Matilda Arvidsson, The swarm that we already are: artificially intelligent (AI) swarming 'insect drones', targeting and international humanitarian law in a posthuman ecology

Kaoutzanis: The UN Security Council and International Criminal Tribunals: Procedure Matters

Christodoulos Kaoutzanis has published The UN Security Council and International Criminal Tribunals: Procedure Matters (Springer 2020). Here's the abstract:

The book explains why and how the UN Security Council authorizes international criminal investigations into mass atrocities. In doing so, it tackles head-on the obvious double standards of global justice, where few atrocities get investigated and most slip below the headlines. The book argues that the Council’s decision-making procedure is central to understanding the Council’s decisions. This procedure is broken into three distinct steps, namely the role of diplomats at the Council, the Council’s reliance on third parties and the Council’s resort to precedent. The volume documents that the Council authorized international criminal investigations only into the handful of mass atrocities for which the Council’s deliberations successfully completed each of these three steps.

Written for both scholars and practitioners, the book combines insights from the fields of international relations, international law and human rights. Through archival research and interviews with UNSC diplomats who took part in deliberations on atrocities, the volume presents evidence that supports its argument across cases and across time. In doing so, the book avoids the yes/no (or 0 vs 1) tendency of many social science projects, thereby acknowledging that there is no silver bullet to explain the work of the Council’s five permanent and ten elected members.

Telesetsky: International Governance of Global Health Pandemics

Anastasia Telesetsky (Univ. of Idaho - Law) has posted an ASIL Insight on International Governance of Global Health Pandemics.

New Volume: Anuario Colombiano de Derecho Internacional

The latest volume of the Anuario Colombiano de Derecho Internacional (Vol. 13, 2020) is out. Contents include:

• Alvaro Paúl, El Relato de los contextos históricos, sociales y políticos en las sentencias de la Corte Interamericana
• Shirley Vanessa Méndez Romero & Norberto Hernández Jiménez, Justicia restaurativa y Sistema Interamericano de Derechos Humanos
• Andres Téllez Núñez, Aproximación multidimensional al régimen de responsabilidad internacional y al principio de no intervención. El problema hermenéutico
• Laura Movilla Pateiro & Francesco Sindico, El valor jurídico y práctico del proyecto de artículos de la CDI sobre el derecho de los acuíferos transfronterizos
• Juan Felipe Solórzano Quintero, La garantía de los DESCA a través del dialogo judicial y arbitral
• Rodrigo Corredor Castellanos, The Pacific Alliance Towards a Strategy on Digital Economy?
• Wendolyne Nava González, Los mecanismos extrajudiciales de resolución de conflictos en línea: su problemática en el derecho internacional privado
• María Mayela Celis, El papel controversial del TEDH en la interpretación del Convenio de La Haya del 25 de octubre de 1980 sobre los Aspectos Civiles de la Sustracción Internacional de Menores: Especial referencia a los casos Neulinger y Shuruk c. Suiza y X c. Letonia
• Angélica María Anichiarico González & Cástulo Cisneros Trujillo, Las garantías procesales de las víctimas en la normatividad de la Unión Europea

Call for Papers: Custom and International Investment Law (Reminder)

A call for papers has been issued for a conference on "Custom and International Investment Law," which will be held at the American University Washington College of Law, on September 23-24, 2020. The call is here. The deadline is April 1, 2020.

Lo, Nakagawa, & Chen: The Appellate Body of the WTO and Its Reform

Chang-fa Lo, Junji Nakagawa, & Tsai-Fang Chen have published The Appellate Body of the WTO and Its Reform (Springer 2020). The table of contents is here. Here's the abstract:

This is the first book that critically examines the reform of the Appellate Body (AB) of the World Trade Organization (WTO) in light of the current crisis resulting from the U.S. blocking of the appointment of its members. The reform of the AB is critical, as the appointment crisis could lead to the demise of “the jewel in the crown,” which may even cause the dismantling of the WTO as a whole. This book covers various aspects of the crisis and its reform. Specifically, as the crisis cannot be fully understood without reviewing the role of the AB from the broader perspectives of the other functions of the WTO, the book examines the reform of the AB from the broader perspectives of the WTO governance. Additional focus is on the reform of the AB in relation to its specific functions. Available options are provided to address the AB crisis, as well as discussion of wider implications beyond the WTO. Contributed by world-renowned academics, experts, and practitioners in the field of international economic law, this volume provides a comprehensive analysis of the AB crisis and its solutions.

Young, Berkman, & Vylegzhanin: Governing Arctic Seas: Regional Lessons from the Bering Strait and Barents Sea Volume 1

Oran R. Young (Univ. of California, Santa Barbara - School of Environmental Science and Management), Paul Arthur Berkman (Tufts Univ. - Fletcher School of Law and Diplomacy), & Alexander N. Vylegzhanin (MGIMO Univ. - Law) have published Governing Arctic Seas: Regional Lessons from the Bering Strait and Barents Sea: Volume 1 (Springer 2020). The table of contents is here. Here's the abstract:

Governing Arctic Seas introduces the concept of ecopolitical regions, using in-depth analyses of the Bering Strait and Barents Sea Regions to demonstrate how integrating the natural sciences, social sciences and Indigenous knowledge can reveal patterns, trends and processes as the basis for informed decisionmaking. This book draws on international, interdisciplinary and inclusive (holistic) perspectives to analyze governance mechanisms, built infrastructure and their coupling to achieve sustainability in biophysical regions subject to shared authority. Governing Arctic Seas is the first volume in a series of books on Informed Decisionmaking for Sustainability that apply, train and refine science diplomacy to address transboundary issues at scales ranging from local to global. For nations and peoples as well as those dealing with global concerns, this holistic process operates across a ‘continuum of urgencies’ from security time scales (mitigating risks of political, economic and cultural instabilities that are immediate) to sustainability time scales (balancing economic prosperity, environmental protection and societal well-being across generations). Informed decisionmaking is the apex goal, starting with questions that generate data as stages of research, integrating decisionmaking institutions to employ evidence to reveal options (without advocacy) that contribute to informed decisions. The first volumes in the series focus on the Arctic, revealing legal, economic, environmental and societal lessons with accelerating knowledge co-production to achieve progress with sustainability in this globally-relevant region that is undergoing an environmental state change in the sea and on land. Across all volumes, there is triangulation to integrate research, education and leadership as well as science, technology and innovation to elaborate the theory, methods and skills of informed decisionmaking to build common interests for the benefit of all on Earth.

Mantilla Blanco & Pehl: National Security Exceptions in International Trade and Investment Agreements: Justiciability and Standards of Review

Sebastián Mantilla Blanco & Alexander Pehl have published National Security Exceptions in International Trade and Investment Agreements: Justiciability and Standards of Review (Springer 2020). Here's the abstract:

This book provides a comprehensive analysis of national security exceptions in international trade and investment agreements. The subject has gained particular relevance in the past few years, as both the United States and the Russian Federation have invoked national security as justification for trade-restrictive measures in the context of WTO dispute settlement proceedings. The book describes the evolution of security exceptions in international economic law, from the GATT 1947 to the most recent economic treaties, such as the 2017 Buenos Aires Protocol for Intra-Mercosur Investment and the 2018 USMCA. Further, it presents an overview of the rich array of adjudicatory practices addressing national security clauses, covering the decisions of WTO dispute settlement bodies, the ICJ, and numerous investment arbitral tribunals. To this end, the book addresses the debates surrounding the alleged self-judging character of security exceptions and the standards of review applicable where the exception is considered to be justiciable.

Knox: Constructing the Human Right to a Healthy Environment

John H. Knox (Wake Forest Univ. - Law) has posted Constructing the Human Right to a Healthy Environment (Annual Review of Law and Social Science, forthcoming). Here's the abstract:

For decades, the right to a healthy environment has been the missing human right, never recognized by the United Nations despite its approval by most countries at the national and regional levels. In the absence of UN recognition, human rights bodies have "greened" other human rights, such as the rights to life and health, by explaining how states have duties to protect them from environmental harm. The importance of this growing body of law was illustrated recently by the decision of the Dutch Supreme Court in the Urgenda case, which held that the Netherlands had to reduce its greenhouse gas emissions in order to comply with its obligations under the European Convention of Human Rights.

In recent years, there have been renewed calls for the UN General Assembly to finally recognize the right to a healthy environment. Has the evolution of environmental human rights law obviated the need for UN recognition? If not, what would such recognition add? This review of recent scholarship describes the evolution of environmental human rights law and assesses possible effects of UN recognition of the right to a healthy environment, both on environmental protection and on human rights law itself.

Bhatt: Concessionaires, Financiers and Communities: Implementing Indigenous Peoples' Rights to Land in Transnational Development Projects

Kinnari I. Bhatt (Erasmus Universiteit Rotterdam) has published Concessionaires, Financiers and Communities: Implementing Indigenous Peoples' Rights to Land in Transnational Development Projects (Cambridge Univ. Press 2020). Here's the abstract:

Unrelenting demands for energy, infrastructure and natural resources, and the need for developing states to augment income and signal an 'enterprise-ready' attitude mean that transnational development projects remain a common tool for economic development. Yet little is known about the fragmented legal framework of private financial mechanisms, contractual clauses and discretionary behaviours that shape modern development projects. How do gaps and biases in formal laws cope with the might of concessionaires and financiers and their algorithmic contractual and policy technicalities negotiated in private offices? What impacts do private legal devices have for the visibility and implementation of Indigenous peoples' rights to land? This original perspective on transnational development projects explains how the patterns of poor rights recognition and implementation, power(lessness), vulnerability and, ultimately, conflict routinely seen in development projects will only be fully appreciated by acknowledging and remedying the pivotal role and priority enjoyed by private mechanisms, documentation and expertise.