New Issue: International Journal of Transitional Justice

The latest issue of the International Journal of Transitional Justice (Vol. 14, no. 2, July 2020) is out. Contents include:

• Editorial
• Pablo de Greiff, The Future of the Past: Reflections on the Present State and Prospects of Transitional Justice
• Articles
• Augustine S J Park, Settler Colonialism, Decolonization and Radicalizing Transitional Justice
• Paul Gready & Simon Robins, Transitional Justice and Theories of Change: Towards evaluation as understanding
• Anne Menzel, The pressures of getting it right: Expertise and victims’ voices in the work of the Sierra Leone Truth and Reconciliation Commission (TRC)
• Bill Rolston, Ambushed by Memory: Post-Conflict Popular Memorialisation in Northern Ireland
• Gene Carolan, Transition Without Transformation: The Legacy of Sudan’s Comprehensive Peace Agreement
• Camilla Orjuela, Passing on the torch of memory: Transitional justice and the transfer of diaspora identity across generations
• Claire Greenstein, Patterned Payments: Explaining Victim Group Variation in West German Reparations Policy
• Review Essay
• Maxine Rubin, Politicized Justice: Africa and the International Criminal Court

New Issue: International Relations

The latest issue of International Relations (Vol. 34, no. 2, June 2020) is out. Contents include:

• Kai Oppermann, Ryan Beasley, & Juliet Kaarbo, British foreign policy after Brexit: losing Europe and finding a role
• Philip R Conway, On the way to planet politics: from disciplinary demise to cosmopolitical coordination
• A Burcu Bayram & Vivian Ta, Measuring common knowledge: latent semantic analysis, linguistic synchrony, and common knowledge in international relations
• André Saramago, Reality-congruence, emancipatory politics and situated knowledge in International Relations: a process sociological perspective
• May Darwich & Juliet Kaarbo, IR in the Middle East: foreign policy analysis in theoretical approaches
• Richard Shapcott, Human rights, extraterritoriality and the good international citizen: a cosmopolitan perspective

New Additions to the UN Audiovisual Library of International Law

The Codification Division of the UN Office of Legal Affairs recently added lectures to the UN Audiovisual Library of International Law Podcast Channel. Due to current circumstances, the AVL team can post these only to the podcast channel and not the website. The lectures were given by Frida María Armas Pfirter on “La Zona y sus recursos” and “Desafios de la Autoridad Internacional de los Fondos Marinos.”

Quintana & Uriburu: Modest International Law: COVID-19, International Legal Responses, and Depoliticization

Francisco-José Quintana (Univ. of Cambridge - Law) & Justina Uriburu (Graduate Institute of International and Development Studies) have posted Modest International Law: COVID-19, International Legal Responses, and Depoliticization (American Journal of International Law, forthcoming). Here's the abstract:

In this essay, we analyze two sets of international legal responses to the COVID- 19 pandemic: the academic discussion on state responsibility and the deployment of international law as a tool for resistance. We argue that both approaches made significant contributions but concealed the role of the discipline in the production of the conditions that led to the pandemic and its unequal impact. These interventions reflect a “modest international law”; an understanding of the discipline that hinders change and is ethically weak. We contend that repoliticization can help reclaim international law’s ambition and responsibility.

Ruiz Fabri, Nunes Chaib, Venzke, & von Bogdandy: International Judicial Legitimacy: New Voices and Approaches

Hélène Ruiz Fabri (Max Planck Institute Luxembourg for Procedural Law; Univ. Paris 1 Panthéon-Sorbonne), André Nunes Chaib (Maastricht Univ.), Ingo Venzke (Univ. of Amsterdam - Law), & Armin von Bogdandy (Max Planck Institute for Comparative Public Law and International Law; Goethe Univ. Frankfurt) have published International Judicial Legitimacy: New Voices and Approaches (Nomos 2020). This volume is open-access. Contents include:

• Hélène Ruiz Fabri & André Nunes Chaib, Introduction
• Alain Zamaria, Democratic Legitimacy and Non-Majoritarian Institutions: Reflections on the Functional and Democratic Legitimacy of International Adjudicative Bodies and Independent Regulatory Agencies
• Aida Torres Pérez, In Nobody's Name: A Checks and Balances Approach to International Judicial Independence
• Parvathi Menon, Not in the Name of the “Other”: The Democratic Concept of International Adjudication through the Looking Glass
• Lorenzo Gasbarri, Courtspeak: A Method to Read the Argumentative Structure Employed by the International Court of Justice in its Judgments and Advisory Opinions
• André Nunes Chaib, International Public Authority in Perspective: Comparing the Roles of Courts and International Organizations in Democratizing International Law
• Cecily Rose, The Dispute Settlement Function of the International Court of Justice in Croatia v. Serbia
• Lan Ngoc Nguyen, The Public Authority of the International Tribunal for the Law of the Sea
• Antoine Duval, Not in My Name! Claudia Pechstein and the Post-Consensual Foundations of the Court of Arbitration for Sport
• Geraldo Vidigal, Re-Imagined Communities: The WTO Appellate Body and the Communitization of WTO Law
• Rene Urueña, The Democracy We Want: Standards of Review and Democratic Embeddedness at the Inter-American Court of Human Rights
• Freya Clausen, In the name of the European Union, the Member States and/or the European citizens?
• Armin von Bogdandy & Laura Hering, In the Name of the European Club of Liberal Democracies: On the Identity, Mandate and National Buffering of the ECtHR's Case Law

Call for Applications: Doctoral Program in International and Public Law, Ethics and Economics for Sustainable Development

The Universities of Milan, Rijeka and Maastricht have issued a call for applications for a Doctoral Program in International and Public Law, Ethics and Economics for Sustainable Development. Here's the call:

The Universities of Milan, Rijeka and Maastricht are seeking six outstanding and committed students to carry out a three-year multidisciplinary research project, based at more than one participating university. The three universities organize LEES, a new doctoral programme in International and Public Law, Ethics and Economics for Sustainable Development. With courses, seminars and scientific research activities entirely in English, it addresses the complexities involved in sustainable development, and uses an innovative multidisciplinary approach that combines the contributions of law, ethics, and economics. Application deadline, September 14, 2020. Further information can be found here.

New Issue: Virginia Journal of International Law

The latest issue of the Virginia Journal of International Law (Vol. 60, no. 2, Winter 2020) is out. Contents include:

• Articles
• Matthew S. Erie, The New Legal Hubs: The Emergent Landscape of International Commercial Dispute Resolution
• Odette Lienau, Sovereign Debt, Private Wealth, and Market Failure
• Molly K. Land, Against Privatized Censorship: Proposals for Responsible Delegation
• Daniel Franchini, State Immunity as a Tool of Foreign Policy: The Unanswered Questions of Certain Iranian Assets

New Issue: Journal du Droit International

The latest issue of the Journal du Droit International ("Clunet") (Vol. 147, no. 3, Juillet-Août-Septembre 2020) is out. Contents include:

• Doctrine
• Isabelle Pingel, Les valeurs dans les traités européens. Consécration, contestations
• Julien Cazala, Fin de partie pour les traités bilatéraux d’investissement intra-européens ? À propos de l’accord du 5 mai 2020
• Caroline Devaux, Entrée en vigueur de la Convention de Singapour : de nouveaux horizons pour la médiation commerciale internationale
• Étienne Thomas, La procédure de retour de l’enfant à l’aune du règlement Bruxelles 2 ter
• Variétés
• Élodie Kleider, Travailler en Suisse et divorcer en France : le partage du deuxième pilier, compétence exclusive des juridictions suisses

New Issue: European Journal of International Relations

The latest issue of the European Journal of International Relations (Vol. 26, no. 3, September 2020) is out. Contents include:

• Alexandria J Nylen, Frontier justice: international law and ‘lawless’ spaces in the “War on Terror”
• Eglantine Staunton & Jason Ralph, The Responsibility to Protect norm cluster and the challenge of atrocity prevention: an analysis of the European Union’s strategy in Myanmar
• Lama Mourad & Kelsey P Norman, Transforming refugees into migrants: institutional change and the politics of international protection
• Klaus Dingwerth, Henning Schmidtke, & Tobias Weise, The rise of democratic legitimation: why international organizations speak the language of democracy
• Erik O Eriksen, Banishing dominance in Europe: The case for regional cosmopolitanism
• Elena V McLean & Taehee Whang, Do sanctions spell disaster? Economic sanctions, political institutions, and technological safety
• Alexander De Juan, Kristóf Gosztonyi, & Jan Koehler, Conditional effects of development aid on political perceptions: mixed-methods evidence from North-East Afghanistan
• A. Burcu Bayram & Marcus Holmes, Feeling their pain: affective empathy and public preferences for foreign development aid
• Stephan Klose, Interactionist role theory meets ontological security studies: an exploration of synergies between socio-psychological approaches to the study of international relations
• Karl Gustafsson & Nina C. Krickel-Choi, Returning to the roots of ontological security: insights from the existentialist anxiety literature
• Heather Elko McKibben, What do I get? How do states’ negotiation alternatives influence the concessions they receive in multilateral negotiations?
• Olivier Schmitt, How to challenge an international order: Russian diplomatic practices in multilateral security organisations

Patel: National Security of India and International Law

Bimal N. Patel (Raksha Shakti Univ.) has published National Security of India and International Law (Brill | Nijhoff 2020). Here's the abstract:

National Security of India and International Law is a pioneering inter-disciplinary scholarly exercise in the context of India. It offers first-of-its kind perspective on interplay between the needs, concerns and interests of the national security actors, means and institutions and inherent limitations and prospects of international law to achieve the national security objectives of India. The work analyses traditional and contemporary issues and challenges – water, natural resources, refugee management, use of force, nuclear doctrine, space developments, defense procurement and manufacturing and private players, among others. It aims to generate inter-disciplinary debate, teaching and research in this emerging field of national security.

Steinberg: The International Criminal Court: Contemporary Challenges and Reform Proposals

Richard H. Steinberg (Univ. of California, Los Angeles - Law and Political Science) has published The International Criminal Court: Contemporary Challenges and Reform Proposals (Brill | Nijhoff 2020). The table of contents is here. Here's the abstract:

The International Criminal Court: Contemporary Challenges and Reform Proposals is a collection of essays by prominent international criminal law commentators, responsive to questions of interest to the Office of the Prosecutor of the International Criminal Court.

Topics include:

• Sexual and Gender-Based Violence: Obtaining Evidence
• Outreach: Challenges Communicating with Victims, Witnesses, and Others
• ICC State Party Withdrawals
• Measuring the ICC’s Performance
• The Crime of Aggression: Scope and Anticipated Difficulties
• The Rome Statute at Twenty: Reform Proposals

Call for Submissions: Premio Jurista Global

A call for submissions has been issued for the inaugural Premio Jurista Global. The topic is: "2030: ¿Un nuevo horizonte para el Derecho Económico Internacional?" Following a review process, selected contributions will be published in a special issue of Revista Con-texto: Revista de Derecho y Economía. One of the contributions will win the Premio Jurista Global. The call is here.

New Issue: International Theory

The latest issue of International Theory (Vol. 12, no. 2, July 2020) is out. Contents include:

• Articles
• Jack L. Amoureux, Is faster better? Political and ethical framings of pace and space
• Earl Gammon, Affective neuroscience, emotional regulation, and international relations
• Miles M. Evers, Just the facts: why norms remain relevant in an age of practice
• Simon Frankel Pratt, Reification, practice, and the ontological status of social facts
• Symposium: Anxiety, Fear, and Ontological Security in World Politics
• Catarina Kinnvall & Jennifer Mitzen, Anxiety, fear, and ontological security in world politics: thinking with and beyond Giddens
• Bahar Rumelili, Integrating anxiety into international relations theory: Hobbes, existentialism, and ontological security
• Felix Berenskötter, Anxiety, time, and agency
• Badredine Arfi, Security qua existential surviving (while becoming otherwise) through performative leaps of faith
• John Cash, Psychoanalysis, cultures of anarchy, and ontological insecurity
• Andrew R. Hom & Brent J. Steele, Anxiety, time, and ontological security's third-image potential

Call for Contributions: Labour Migration in the time of COVID-19: Inequalities and Perspectives for Change

A call for contributions has been issued for a volume on "Labour Migration in the time of COVID-19: Inequalities and Perspectives for Change," to be edited by Giulia Ciliberto (Univ. of Naples Federico II) and Fulvia Staiano (Giustino Fortunato Univ. and National Research Council of Italy). The call is here.

de Melo: International Trade Dispute Settlement: Ready to Blossom Again?

Murilo Lubambo de Melo (New College at Northeastern Univ.) has posted an ASIL Insight on International Trade Dispute Settlement: Ready to Blossom Again?

New Issue: World Politics

The latest issue of World Politics (Vol. 72, no. 3, July 2020) is out. Contents include:

• Annette Idler, The Logic of Illicit Flows in Armed Conflict: Explaining Variation in Violent Nonstate Group Interactions in Colombia
• Juan Fernando Tellez, Erik Wibbels, & Anirudh Krishna, Local Order, Policing, and Bribes: Evidence from India
• Adam E. Casey, The Durability of Client Regimes: Foreign Sponsorship and Military Loyalty, 1946–2010
• Marius R. Busemeyer & Kathleen Thelen, Institutional Sources of Business Power
• Kevin Mazur, Networks, Informal Governance, and Ethnic Violence in a Syrian City

New Issue: Journal of World Intellectual Property

The latest issue of the Journal of World Intellectual Property (Vol. 23, nos. 3-4, July 2020) is out. Contents include:

• Caroline B. Ncube, Blake E. Reid, & Desmond O. Oriakhogba, Beyond the Marrakesh VIP Treaty: Typology of copyright access‐enabling provisions for persons with disabilities
• Pamela J. Smith & Andrew R. Tilman, Patents for self‐replicating technologies: Game theoretic analysis of genetically modified seed
• Muhammad Z. Abbas, Plant Breeders’ Rights Act 2016: Prospects and challenges for Pakistan as an agricultural country
• Noppanun Supasiripongchai, The legal protection of breeder's rights for new plant varieties in Thailand: The need for law reform considering the International Convention for the Protection of New Varieties of Plants 1991
• Klaus D. Beiter, Extraterritorial human rights obligations to “civilize” intellectual property law: Access to textbooks in Africa, copyright, and the right to education
• Stuart J. Smyth, Diego M. Macall, Peter W. B. Phillips, & Jeremy de Beer, Implications of biological information digitization: Access and benefit sharing of plant genetic resources
• Hans Morten Haugen, The UN Declaration on Peasants' Rights (UNDROP): Is Article 19 on seed rights adequately balancing intellectual property rights and the right to food?
• Ashish Bharadwaj & Srajan Jain, A comparative study of the evolving jurisprudence on standard essential patent licensing
• Delphine Marie‐Vivien, Protection of Geographical Indications in ASEAN countries: Convergences and challenges to awakening sleeping Geographical Indications
• Bzhar A. Ahmed & Kameran H. Al‐Salihi, Analysis of the proposed solutions for the use of orphan works across the world
• Andie Bain, “DANK” customs, bootlegs, and reworked pieces: For an expressive use defence of secondary trademark works
• Omotayo F. Awomolo‐Enujiugha, Piracy and its burden on copyright in Nigeria: Challenges and solutions
• João Paulo Hernandes Teodoro, The impacts of trade‐related international intellectual property rights on domestic legislative debates: Evidence from the 104th to the 112th U.S. Congresses
• Manuchehr Tavassoli Naini, Naser Allahvakil, & Rasoul Mazaheri, Preparing mechanisms for protecting traditional knowledge in Iran utilizing the experiences of India
• Jennifer H. M. Mike, Access to essential medicines to guarantee women's rights to health: The pharmaceutical patents connection
• Chidi Oguamanam, Nollywood phenomenon: “The Nollywood phenomenon: Innovation, openness, and technological opportunism in the modeling of successful African entrepreneurship”
• Elyse Kneller, EU‐Australia FTA: Challenges and potential points of convergence for negotiations in geographical indications
• A. Vijayalakshmi Venugopal, Copyright concerns of digital images in social media
• Mary W. Warui, John Mburu, Geoffrey Kironchi, & Mary Gikungu, Existing value addition initiatives enhancing recognition of territorial traits of three Kenyan honey

New Issue: International Security

The latest issue of International Security (Vol. 45, no. 1, Summer 2020) is out. Contents include:

• Christopher Lawrence, Normalization by Other Means—Technological Infrastructure and Political Commitment in the North Korean Nuclear Crisis
• Målfrid Braut-Hegghammer, Cheater's Dilemma: Iraq, Weapons of Mass Destruction, and the Path to War
• Joshua R. Itzkowitz Shifrinson, Partnership or Predation? How Rising States Contend with Declining Great Powers
• Shahin Berenji, Sadat and the Road to Jerusalem: Bold Gestures and Risk Acceptance in the Search for Peace
• Avery Goldstein, China's Grand Strategy under Xi Jinping: Reassurance, Reform, and Resistance

AJIL Unbound Symposium: Global Plastic Pollution

AJIL Unbound has posted a symposium on "Global Plastic Pollution." The symposium includes an introduction by Donald McRae and contributions by Leslie-Anne Duvic-Paoli, Sabaa Ahmad Khan, Sandrine Maljean-Dubois and Benoît Mayer, and Elizabeth A. Kirk.

Ní Aoláin: The Limits of Equality and Gender Discourses in Counter Terrorism: The Case of Women and Children in Syria and Iraq

Fionnuala D. Ní Aoláin (Univ. of Minnesota - Law; Queen's Univ. of Belfast - Law) has posted The Limits of Equality and Gender Discourses in Counter Terrorism: The Case of Women and Children in Syria and Iraq (Minnesota Journal of International Law, forthcoming). Here's the abstract:

This article is focused on the position for women and children in the Northern Syrian Arab Republic and Iraq being held (for now) in detention camps controlled by the Syrian Democratic Forces or being held in Iraqi prisons pending trial for a variety of offences premised on or related to Islamic State proximity. The article sets out the conditions in which women and children are being held and reviews the international human rights and humanitarian obligations owed by States to citizens held in these abhorrent conditions. The article further addresses a number of broader concerns through a feminist theory lens. This includes the nomenclature used to describe these women and children de facto relegating them to lesser international political and legal protection; understanding the nuanced and complex ways in which such women came to be associated with ISIS; and addressing the unique challenges experienced by women who have given birth to children as a result of rape by non-State (ISIS and other) actors. The analysis underscores that while addressing the needs of children born of rape in conflict is, in general, a scarce commodity correlated with structural gender discrimination in patriarchal and patrilineal societies, the potential for transformative approaches are even more limited in Iraq and Syria.

New Issue: Air & Space Law

The latest issue of Air & Space Law (Vol. 45, no. 3, 2020) is out. Contents include:

• Magdalena Kucko, The EU-Qatar Air Transport Agreement: Bound to Succeed?
• Damian M. Bielicki, Legal Aspects of Satellite Constellations
• Robert Lawson, The Montreal Convention 1999 at 21: Has It Come of Age or Passed Its Sell-by Date?
• Rutwik Navalgund, Reduce, Reuse and Recycle: An Environmental Law Approach to Long-term Sustainability of Outer Space
• Vincent Correia, Certification Issues Revealed by the 737 Max Crisis: A Comparative Approach from a European Perspective
• Jan Frohloff, Collisions of Artificial Satellites: The Liability of States and Private Entities
• Ankush Chauhan, James Cooper, & Olivia Puchalski, Thirsty for a Verdict: Australian Court Confirms That Dehydration Is Not an Accident Under Montreal Convention 1999

Perrone: Speed, Law and the Global Economy: How Economic Acceleration Contributes to Inequality and Precarity

Nicolás M. Perrone (Universidad Andrés Bello) has posted Speed, Law and the Global Economy: How Economic Acceleration Contributes to Inequality and Precarity (Leiden Journal of International Law, forthcoming). Here's the abstract:

The law is implicated in many of the relations that produce inequality and precarity in the global economy. It contributes in different ways to the unequal bargaining power between states, capital and labour. One way that has attracted less attention so far relates to how the law accelerates economic relations. This article examines the role of law in the global economy by focusing not on the international economic institutions, such as the WTO, the EU or the IMF, but on the transactions that plug maquila workers and freelancers into the global economy. The argument is that the speed of these economic relations favours those who command international production, creating what Hartmut Rosa calls a ‘frenetic standstill.’ Importantly, the law can also contribute to changing these bargaining dynamics by slowing down some of these transactions and facilitating their territorial re-embedding. This strategy, however, requires a better understanding of the role of law in transnational networks of contracts as well as more state and non-state international coordination. The opposite of nationalist attitudes, such as Brexit and Trump's trade policy.

Shany: Co-application and Harmonization of IHL and IHRL: Are Rumours about the Death of Lex Specialis Premature?

Yuval Shany (Hebrew Univ. of Jerusalem - Law) has posted Co-application and Harmonization of IHL and IHRL: Are Rumours about the Death of Lex Specialis Premature? (in Research Handbook on Human Rights and Humanitarian Law: Further Reflections and Perspectives, Robert Kolb, Gloria Gaggioli & Pavle Kilibarda eds., forthcoming). Here's the abstract:

This Chapter presents some of the reasons for the emergence of the law of co-application of IHL and IHRL and discusses the principal difficulties encountered in their harmonization. Beyond questions relating to the method of applying the lex specialis rule, and the propensity of IHL bodies to resort to IHL and IHRL bodies to IHRL, each branch of law also carries with it certain ethoi, normative assumptions and institutional considerations. As a result, harmonization requires engagement with difficult, yet imperceptible value choices. Part Two reviews the road to the introduction of the lex specialis rule by the ICJ. Part Three discusses the significance of the Nuclear Weapons opinion and Part Four describes the slide from lex specialis to cumulative application of IHL and IHRL. Parts Five discusses recent trends in co-application and harmonization, including a cautious return to the lex specialis rule and developing hybrid norms. Part Six concludes.

New Issue: Journal of International Arbitration

The latest issue of the Journal of International Arbitration (Vol. 37, no. 4, 2020) is out. Contents include:

• Maxi Scherer, Remote Hearings in International Arbitration: An Analytical Framework
• Stephan Madaus, The (Underdeveloped) Use of Arbitration in International Insolvency Proceedings
• Gerome Goh Teng Jun, An Arbitral Tribunal’s Dilemma: The Plea of Financially Impecunious Parties
• Beibei Zhang, Revisiting Disqualification of Arbitrators During Arbitral Proceedings: A Critique of Toyoshima & Co., Ltd. v. Gaomi Luyuan Textile Co., Ltd.
• Nduka Ikeyi & Emmanuel Onyeabor, Ravelli v. Digitsteel Integrated Services Ltd.: Does the Arbitration and Conciliation Act Preclude the Arbitration of Employment Disputes in Nigeria?

New Issue: Asian International Arbitration Journal

The latest issue of the Asian International Arbitration Journal (Vol. 16, no. 1, 2020) is out. Contents include:

• Luke Nottage, Confidentiality and Transparency in International Arbitration: Asia-Pacific Tensions and Expectations
• Elizabeth Chan & Chiann Bao, Forecasting Energy Disputes in Asia
• Olivier Marquais & Alain Grec, Do’s and Dont’s of Regulating Third-Party Litigation Funding: Singapore Vs. France
• Gracious Timothy Dunna, Waiver of the Right to Set-Aside and Resist the Enforcement of an Arbitral Award: An Indian Perspective

Ng’ambi & Chisanga: International Investment Law and Gender Equality: Stabilization Clauses and Foreign Investment

Sangwani Patrick Ng’ambi (Univ. of Zambia - Law) & Kangwa-Musole George Chisanga (National Institute for Public Administration, Zambia) have published International Investment Law and Gender Equality: Stabilization Clauses and Foreign Investment (Routledge 2020). Here's the abstract:

This book analyses the impact that stabilization clauses have on the development of human rights and gender laws in resource rich nations. Given the fact that stabilization clauses freeze the law for as long as the contract subsists there has been debate on the negative impact stabilization clauses have on the progressive development of human rights in the host State. Firstly, the book examines the mechanisms investors utilise in protecting themselves from host State prerogatives. It then explores the theoretical basis on which stabilization clauses are applied and upheld by arbitral tribunals, and assesses how they can be drafted in a way that protects human rights, particularly in relation to gender discrimination, without forcing the resource rich nations to lose momentum in attracting foreign direct investment. Using Zambia and the Gender Equity and Equality Act of 2015 as a case study, the book explores the compatibility of the legislation with the stabilization clauses contained in the country’s Development Agreements.

New Issue: Melbourne Journal of International Law

The latest issue of the Melbourne Journal of International Law (Vol. 20, no. 2, 2019) is out. Contents include:

• John Bennett, Reaping the Whirlwind: The Norm of Reciprocity and the Law of Aerial Bombardment during World War II
• Luke Chircop, Territorial Sovereignty in Cyberspace after Tallinn Manual 2.0
• Matilda Gillis, Shell Companies and Exposing Beneficial Ownership: Testing the Boundaries of the International Commitment to Fight Corruption
• Douglas Guilfoyle, Lacking Conviction: Is the International Criminal Court Broken? An Organisational Failure Analysis
• Benoit Mayer, A Review of the International Law Commission's Guidelines on the Protection of the Atmosphere
• Rowan Nicholson, Was the Colonisation of Australia an Invasion of Sovereign Territory?
• Alberto Pecoraro, Law of the Sea and Investment Protection in Deep Seabed Mining
• Nicola Strain, Regulating Collective Resource Management under Multilateral Treaties: The Decision in Whaling in the Antarctic (Australia v Japan)
• Stephen Young, The Material Costs of Claiming International Human Rights: Australia, Adani and the Wangan and Jagalingou

Alter: The ICJ In Comparison: Understanding the ICJ’s Limited Influence

Karen J. Alter (Northwestern Univ. - Political Science; Univ. of Copenhagen - iCourts) has posted The ICJ In Comparison: Understanding the ICJ’s Limited Influence (Melbourne Journal of International Law, forthcoming). Here's the abstract:

The ICJ is the oldest international court in operation, with the authority to adjudicate cases raised by any UN member country (51 at its founding, and 193 today), and the ICJ has the broadest jurisdiction of any international court since it can be designated or seized to resolve disputes involving a broad range of inter-state or international agreements. The ICJ also has an advisory role, which could be used to clarify questions about international law in general, or as it pertains to specific issues. The potential for the ICJ to hear cases involving so many countries, treaties and issues means that the relatively paucity of cases adjudicated across the ICJ’s nearly 75 years in operation is noteworthy. The simple explanation for this paucity is that ICJ lacks compulsory jurisdiction and only states can initiate binding litigation. This paper argues instead that the greatest limitation of the ICJ is its inter-state nature. Part I empirically compares the ICJ’s docket to other international courts, explaining why the dearth of ICJ litigation is consequential. Part II describes how many pathways to adjudication and compliance — present in other international adjudicatory systems — have been foreclosed with respect to the ICJ, and how this foreclosure limits the role the ICJ can play in the international legal and political system. Part III explains how the findings of Parts I and II limit the ICJ’s authority vis-à-vis different audiences. Despite these limitations, the ICJ is an indispensable international adjudicatory body, meaning if it did not exist today, we would probably want to recreate it anew.

This essay considers the International Court of Justice (ICJ) in comparison to the most active and influential international courts. My research uses variation in the design, activation and influence of the world’s permanent international courts (IC) to understand when and how international courts influence domestic politics, state behavior, and international relations. A typical legal analysis focuses on formal competences and legal possibilities, examining constitutional texts, the larger organizational architecture, or a small number of rulings. I take an empirical approach informed by social science understandings of when and how international law influences international and domestic policy and politics. I am therefore interested in trends rather than particular cases, what is actually happening rather than what is possible and what happens outside rather than inside judicial chambers and bodies of jurisprudence. As a political scientist, I approach the ICJ as a judicial actor embedded in a larger political context. I see international judges as legal strategists thinking about what the law requires as well as how they can constructively engage compliance constituencies to help realize international law’s objectives.

Part I of this essay examines litigation trends in front of the ICJ, explaining how the ICJ differs in design and activation compared to other international courts. The data suggests a dearth of ICJ litigation. This part also explains why this dearth of litigation matters. The essay then reflects on the ICJ through two different lenses that one might use to assess an international court’s influence, and its legal and political power. Part II considers the ICJ through the lens of influencing state behavior. Part III moves beyond a state-centric focus to consider how ICs build authority vis-à-vis different audiences, including potential future litigants, the larger legal field, and the public.

The larger argument in this short essay is that the ICJ is a unique although not unrivaled body when it comes to inter-state dispute settlement. Yet its ability to help enforce international law, to adjudicate the larger constitution of international law, or to be a review body for United Nations actions is hampered by its inter-state nature. One might say that the ICJ is hobbled by design, since many governments mostly want the ICJ to resolve inter-state disputes when so requested. But for a body often called the “World Court,” one can ask why the preferences of governments should determine the extent of the ICJ’s authority and influence? Indeed, neither ICJ judges, nor the ICJ’s larger audiences are satisfied with this narrow perspective. What does it mean for international law that the ICJ seems to be hampered by design?

New Issue: Global Trade and Customs Journal

The latest issue of Global Trade and Customs Journal (Vol. 15, no. 8, 2020) is out. Contents include:

• Nicolaj Kuplewatzky, Balancing Disclosure and Access to Documents in EU Trade Defence Investigations
• George Zaharatos, Pierfilippo M. Natta, Donald C. Hok, & Olivia Acuff, Eradicating Forced Labour in Global Supply Chains
• Alessandro Fruscione, Italian Customs Penalties: Between Risks, Paradoxes, with Reform in Sight
• Garima Srivastava & Siddhant Indrajit, The Solace of the Residuary Category: The Need to Change an Age-Old Classification Regime in India

d'Aspremont: The Custom-Making Moment in Customary International Law

Jean d'Aspremont (Sciences Po - Law; Univ. of Manchester - Law) has posted The Custom-Making Moment in Customary International Law (in The Theory and Philosophy of Customary International Law and Its Interpretation, Panos Merkouris, Jörg Kammerhofer, & Noora Arajärvi eds., forthcoming). Here's the abstract:

This short chapter argues that, in international legal practice and literature, the actual moment where social reality has engendered a customary norm is never established or traced, but, rather, is always presupposed. According to the argument developed here, the moment custom is made is located neither in time nor in space. Custom is always presupposed to have been made through actors’ behaviors at some given point in the past and in a given place but neither the moment nor the place of such behaviors can be found or traced. In other words, there is never any concrete moment where all practices and opinio juris coalesce into the formation of a rule and which could ever be “discovered”. This means that the behaviors actually generating the customary rule at stake are out of time and out of space. Because the custom-making moment is out of time and space, it cannot be located, found, or traced, and it must, as a result, be presumed.

This brief chapter first sketches out some of the main manifestations of this presumption of a custom-making moment. It then sheds light on some of the discursive consequences of presuming a custom-making moment, including those consequences for the interpretation of customary international law.

Tomuschat & Kohen: Flexibility in International Dispute Settlement: Conciliation Revisited

Christian Tomuschat & Marcelo Kohen have published Flexibility in International Dispute Settlement: Conciliation Revisited (Brill | Nijhoff 2020). The table of contents is here. Here's the abstract:

In recent years, the tendency has been to settle international disputes by informal methods. Among those methods conciliation has seen a successful revival, after many years of decline, in the case of Timor Leste v. Australia while inter-State complaint proceedings under the UN-sponsored human rights treaties have unexpectedly reached their merits stage of conciliation. The present book takes stock of these developments by portraying, at the same time, the potential of the OSCE Court of Conciliation and Arbitration which still remains to be fully activated. Additionally, the contributions reach out to geographical areas in Africa and Asia. An analysis of the relevant procedural mechanisms completes the study to which 14 authors from nine different countries have contributed.

New Issue: Journal of World Trade

The latest issue of the Journal of World Trade (Vol. 54, no. 4, 2020) is out. Contents include:

• Pierre Sauvé, Gendered Perspectives on Services Trade and Investment
• Ram Singh & Surendar Singh, Domestic Sources of India’s Trade Policy Preferences in RCEP Negotiations
• Jacob Wood & Jie Wu, The Sustainability of the WTO Dispute Settlement System: Does It Work for Developing Countries?
• Neha Mishra, The Trade: (Cyber)Security Dilemma and Its Impact on Global Cybersecurity Governance
• James M. Claxton, Litigating, Arbitrating and Mediating Japan–Korea Trade and Investment Tensions
• Kalpana Tyagi, China’s Pursuit of Industrial Policy Objectives: Does the WTO (Really) Have an Answer?
• Prabhash Ranjan, National Security Exception in the General Agreement on Tariffs and Trade (GATT) and India–Pakistan Trade

New Issue: Cooperation and Conflict

The latest issue of Cooperation and Conflict (Vol. 55, no. 3, September 2020) is out. Contents include:

• Dylan MH Loh & Jaakko Heiskanen, Liminal sovereignty practices: Rethinking the inside/outside dichotomy
• Maria Mälksoo, Review of ‘Liminal sovereignty practices: Rethinking the inside/outside dichotomy’
• Sergei Prozorov, Review of ‘Liminal sovereignty practices’
• Gearoid Millar, Preserving the everyday: Pre-political agency in peacebuilding theory
• Marina Vulović, Performing statehood in Northern Kosovo: Discursive struggle over contested space
• Sandra Pogodda, Revolutions and the liberal peace: Peacebuilding as counterrevolutionary practice?
• Benjamin Acosta & Melissa Ziegler Rogers, When militant organizations lose militarily but win politically
• Aniseh Bassiri Tabrizi & Benjamin Kienzle, Legitimation strategies of informal groups of states: The case of the E3 directoire in the nuclear negotiations with Iran

Villiger: Handbuch der Europäischen Menschenrechtskonvention (EMRK)

Mark E. Villiger (formerly, Judge, European Court of Human Rights) has published Handbuch der Europäischen Menschenrechtskonvention (EMRK) (Schulthess 2020). Here's the abstract:

Die völlig überarbeitete dritte Auflage dieses Handbuchs bietet eine umfassende Darstellung der EMRK und des Europäischen Gerichtshofs für Menschenrechte. Aus einer Hand verfasst, ermöglicht das Werk, sich rasch zu einer bestimmten Frage zu informieren. Querverweise zeigen Zusammenhänge auf. Immer wieder finden sich Übersichten zu den zahlreichen Grundsätzen der Strassburger Rechtsprechung. Der Autor amtete neun Jahre lang als Richter am Gerichtshof, drei davon als Sektionspräsident.

He, Zhang, & Zahar: Climate Change Law in China in Global Context

Xiangbai He (Zhejiang Univ.), Hao Zhang (Chinese Univ. of Hong Kong), & Alexander Zahar (Wuhan Univ.) have published Climate Change Law in China in Global Context (Routledge 2020). The table of contents is here. Here's the abstract:

In Climate Change Law in China in Global Context, seven climate change law scholars explain how the country’s legal system is gradually being mobilized to support the reduction of greenhouse gas emissions in China and achieve adaptation to climate change. There has been little English scholarship on the legal regime for climate change in China. This volume addresses this gap in the literature and focuses on recent attempts by the country to build defences against the impacts of climate change and to meet the country’s international obligations on mitigation. The authors are not only interested in China’s laws on paper; rather, the book explains how these laws are implemented and integrated in practice and sheds light on China’s current laws, laws in preparation, the changing standing of law relative to policy, and the further reforms that will be necessary in response to the 2015 Paris Agreement on Climate Change.