Đorđeska: General Principles of Law Recognized by Civilized Nations (1922-2018)

Marija Đorđeska has published General Principles of Law Recognized by Civilized Nations (1922-2018): The Evolution of the Third Source of International Law Through the Jurisprudence of the Permanent Court of International Justice and the International Court of Justice (Brill | Nijhoff 2020). Here's the abstract:

In General Principles of Law Recognized by Civilized Nations (1922-2018) Marija Đorđeska offers an account of the origins, theory and practical application of the general principles in the jurisprudence of the Permanent Court of International Justice and International Court of Justice between 1922 and 2018. Are general principles rules of international law? What is their relationship to custom and treaties? What are the types of general principles and where do international courts find them? This monograph answers these and other questions and offers a detailed overview of over 150 general principles identified in the jurisprudence of the Permanent Court of International Justice and the International Court of Justice.

Vandenhole, Erdem Türkelli, & Lembrechts: Children’s Rights: A Commentary on the Convention on the Rights of the Child and its Protocols

Wouter Vandenhole (Univ. of Antwerp), Gamze Erdem Türkelli (Research Foundation Flanders), & Sara Lembrechts (Children's Rights Knowledge) have published Children’s Rights: A Commentary on the Convention on the Rights of the Child and its Protocols (Edward Elgar Publishing 2019). Here's the abstract:

This comprehensive Commentary presents a contemporary legal perspective on the inherently interdisciplinary field of children’s rights. Chapters analyse each article of the Convention on the Rights of the Child, along with its Optional Protocols, providing contextualised information on the interpretation and implementation of the children’s rights provisions therein. A detailed introduction examines the history of the Convention and places it within the wider landscape of human rights and other disciplinary approaches such as the sociology of childhood.

The Commentary critically engages with the text of the Convention, exploring commonly used concepts and defining pertinent terminology. The authors draw on multiple perspectives and refer to disciplines outside of law to enrich the analysis of the articles, their interpretation and the study of children’s rights as a discipline. Featuring examples of case law from regional human rights systems this Commentary provides a well-rounded insight into the status of children's rights on a global scale.

Harwood: The Roles and Functions of Atrocity-Related United Nations Commissions of Inquiry in the International Legal Order

Catherine Harwood (United Nations - Office of Legal Affairs) has published The Roles and Functions of Atrocity-Related United Nations Commissions of Inquiry in the International Legal Order: Navigating between Principle and Pragmatism (Brill | Nijhoff 2020). Here's the abstract:

In The Roles and Functions of Atrocity-Related United Nations Commissions of Inquiry in the International Legal Order, Catherine Harwood explores the turn to international law in atrocity-related United Nations commissions of inquiry and their navigation of considerations of principle (the legal) and pragmatism (the political), to discern their identity in the international legal order. The book traces the inquiry process from establishment and interpretation of the mandate to legal analysis, production of findings and recommendations. The research finds that the turn to international law fundamentally shapes the roles and functions of UN atrocity inquiries. Inquiries continuously navigate between realms of law and politics, with the equilibrium shifting in different moments and contexts.

Tanaka: The South China Sea Arbitration: Toward an International Legal Order in the Oceans

Yoshifumi Tanaka (Univ. of Copenhagen - Law) has published The South China Sea Arbitration: Toward an International Legal Order in the Oceans (Hart Publishing 2019). Here's the abstract:

Beyond the scope of the dispute settlement between the Philippines and China, the South China Sea arbitral award can be thought to significantly influence the development of international law and the law of the sea. Accordingly, this book seeks to examine the South China Sea arbitration from the perspective of the development of public international law and its limitations. Specifically it addresses the issues of jurisdiction of the Annex VII Arbitral Tribunal, the historic rights, the legal status of maritime features, the lawfulness of various activities of China, and the role of the South China Sea arbitration in the international dispute settlement. In considering these issues, this book examines the South China Sea arbitration in three respects: (i) the clarification of relevant rules and obligations under the UN Convention on the Law of the Sea as well as international law, (ii) the protection of community interests at sea, and (iii) considerations of time elements in international law.

Symposium: One Hundred Years of Mandates

The latest issue of the American Historical Review (Vol. 124, no. 5, December 2019) contains of symposium on "One Hundred Years of Mandates." Contents include:

• Alex Lichtenstein & Michelle Moyd, Introduction: The League of Nations Mandates and the Temporality of Deferral
• Susan Pedersen, An International Regime in an Age of Empire
• Sherene Seikaly, The Matter of Time
• Carol Hakim, The French Mandate in Lebanon
• Yiğit Akın, The Ottoman Empire: The Mandate That Never Was
• Tze M. Loo, Islands for an Anxious Empire: Japan’s Pacific Island Mandate
• Molly McCullers, Betwixt and Between Colony and Nation-State: Liminality, Decolonization, and the South West Africa Mandate
• Meredith Terretta & Benjamin N. Lawrance, “Sons of the Soil”: Cause Lawyers, the Togo-Cameroun Mandates, and the Origins of Decolonization
• George N. Njung, The British Cameroons Mandate Regime: The Roots of the Twenty-First-Century Political Crisis in Cameroon
• Sean Andrew Wempe, A League to Preserve Empires: Understanding the Mandates System and Avenues for Further Scholarly Inquiry

Fanø: Enforcing International Maritime Legislation on Air Pollution through UNCLOS

Jesper Jarl Fanø has published Enforcing International Maritime Legislation on Air Pollution through UNCLOS (Hart Publishing 2019). Here's the abstract:

This book explores the scope and applicability of the United Nations Convention on the Law of the Sea (UNCLOS), relating to the enforcement of international maritime legislation on air pollution. It focuses on enforcement of Annex VI of the International Convention for the Prevention of Pollution from Ships (MARPOL Annex VI) and the strengthened global sulphur limit which comes into force in 2020. The first chapters in Part I provide an overall introduction to relevant regulations of MARPOL Annex VI, UNCLOS, Port State Control (PSC), the EU Sulphur Directive and basic jurisdictional principles of international law. Part II analyses the amplified enforcement and notifying obligations of UNCLOS chapter XII placed on flag States and the broadened jurisdictions for port and coastal States to enforce. This includes extraterritorial enforcement by port States on the high seas and how overlapping jurisdictions are resolved. These theoretical discussions on jurisdiction are tied to practical applications pertaining to PSC and sanctioning. Part III builds upon the conclusions of Part II in relation to the enforcement of other legislation adopted by the International Maritime Organization (IMO), including regulations on Greenhouse Gases (GHG) which the IMO is set to adopt through its GHG Strategy. Finally, with the increased environmental challenges relating to global warming, and given the special legal status of ships, Part IV offers an analysis of whether specific IMO regulations on GHG could, in the future, be considered peremptory norms of a 'jus cogens' character, and addresses the potential legal implications.

d'Aspremont: International Legal Methods: Working for a Tragic and Cynical Routine

Jean d'Aspremont (Sciences Po - Law; Univ. of Manchester - Law) has posted International Legal Methods: Working for a Tragic and Cynical Routine (in Handbook on Research Methods in International Law, Rossana Deplano & Nicholas Tsagourias eds., forthcoming). Here's the abstract:

This essay argues that international legal discourses function as a deeply entrenched routine composed of a great variety of professional habits. This essay grapples with one of these shared habits constitutive of the routine of international lawyers, namely what international lawyers refer to as ‘methods’. Methods, it is argued here, are among the most central of all the habits constitutive of the routine of international lawyers, in that methods help the routine to conceal what it does. More specifically, this essay claims that the methods deployed by international lawyers enshroud international legal discourses with both novelty and vulnerability, thereby camouflaging the tragedy and cynicism of the routine of international lawyers.

New Issue: Global Trade and Customs Journal

The latest issue of Global Trade and Customs Journal (Vol. 14, nos. 11-12, 2019) is out. Contents include:

• Michael R. Smiszek, Twenty-Five Years of Reasonable Care Under US Customs Law
• Giani Pandey, Davide Rovetta, & Agnieszka Smiatacz, When There Is No Line Between Your Data Protection and Data of Your Company: The Application of GDPR to Customs Law in C-496/17 Deutsche Post AG v. Hauptzollamt Köln Case
• Jan A. Micallef, An EU-US Trade Agreement on Industrial Goods: A Preliminary Evaluation From an EU Perspective
• Sebastian Beckerle, Stare Decisis in the WTO Dispute Settlement Procedure: A Response to the Trump Administration’s Criticism
• Amrita Bahri, Measuring the Gender-Responsiveness of Free Trade Agreements: Using a Self-Evaluation Maturity Framework
• Frank Altemöller, China and the Emerging Powers in International Trade Relations: The Future of the Multilateral Trade System, the Role of Free Trade Agreements and New Unilateralism
• Pallavi Kishore, The Role of Consumer Protection in the Relations Between Asia and the European Union
• Mohsen Abdollahi & Shahriar Kazemi Azar, Trade in Nanotechnology: Can the WTO Provide an Objective Balance Between the Risks and Benefits?

New Issue: Transnational Legal Theory

The latest issue of Transnational Legal Theory (Vol. 10, nos. 3-4, 2019) is out. Contents include:

• Symposium: International Institutional Bypasses
• Mariana Mota Prado & Steven J. Hoffman, The promises and perils of international institutional bypasses: defining a new concept and its policy implications for global governance
• Victor V. Ramraj, International institutional bypasses and transnational non-state regulation
• Rohinton Medhora, Bypasses to the International Monetary Fund
• Edefe Ojomo, Regional institutions as international bypasses in West Africa
• Oonagh Fitzgerald, Addressing the human rights conduct of transnational corporations through international institutional bypasses
• Article
• Odile Ammann, How do and should domestic courts interpret international law? Insights from the jurisprudence of HLA Hart and Duncan Kennedy
• Trajectories
• Michiel Bot, The right to boycott: BDS, law, and politics in a global context
• David Birchall, Human rights on the altar of the market: the Blackstone letters and the financialisation of housing

Inaugural Volume: Yearbook of International Disaster Law

The inaugural volume of the Yearbook of International Disaster Law (Vol. 1, 2018) is out. Contents include:

• Giulio Bartolini, Charting an Emerging Subject: The Role of the Yearbook of International Disaster Law
• Eduardo Valencia-Ospina, The Work of the International Law Commission on the ‘Protection of Persons in the Event of Disasters’
• Walter Kälin, Protection of Victims of Disasters: The “Vertical” Dimension of the Draft Articles on the Protection of Persons in the Event of Disasters
• Marie Aronsson-Storrier, Beyond Early Warning Systems: Querying the Relationship between International Law and Disaster Risk (Reduction)
• René Urueña & Maria Angelica Prada-Uribe, Disasters, Inter-State Legal Obligations, and the Risk Society: The Contribution of the ilc’s Draft Articles
• David Fisher, A Glass Half Full: The International Law Commission’s Draft Articles and the Operational Challenges of International Disaster Response
• Elena Evangelidis & Thérèse O’Donnell, NGOs and the International Law Commission Draft Articles on the Protection of Persons in the Event of Disasters: A Relationship of Mutual or Grudging Respect?
• Arnold N. Pronto, Codification and Progressive Development in Contemporary International Law-Making: Locating the Draft Articles on the Protection of Persons in the Event of Disasters
• Jan McDonald & Anastasia Telesetsky, Disaster by Degrees: The Implications of the ipcc 1.5°C Report for Disaster Law
• Silvia Venier, A Right to Information Relevant to Disaster Situations: Broadening the Concept beyond Early Warning and Addressing the Challenges Posed by Information and Communication Technologies
• Monika Mayrhofer, Gender (In)equality, Disaster and Human Rights – the cedaw Committee and General Recommendation No. 37
• Iheanyi Samuel Nwankwo, Kai Wendt & Jeanne Pia Mifsud Bonnici, Addressing Cultural Rights in Disaster Management: A Checklist for Disaster Managers
• Luigimaria Riccardi, Disasters and Climate Change in the Overseas Countries and Territories and Outermost Regions: The Role of EU’s Disaster Management Tools
• International Disaster Law in Practice
• Emanuele Sommario, United Nations Bodies (2018)
• Marie Aronsson-Storrier, UN Office for Disaster Risk Reduction (2018)
• Karen Da Costa, Global Non-State Actors (2018)
• Nicholas Wasonga Orago, Africa and MENA Region (2018)
• Emika Tokunaga, Asia (2018)
• Federico Casolari, Europe (2018)
• Kirsten Nakjavani Bookmiller, North America, Central America and Caribbean (2018)
• W. John Hopkins, Pacific (2018)
• Stefan Kirchner, Polar Regions (2018)
• Marcos Nelio Mollar, South America (2018)
• Rosemary Lyster, Climate Change Law (2018)
• Marlies Hesselman, Human Rights Law (2018)
• Dug Cubie, Humanitarian Assistance and International Law (2018)
• Flavia Zorzi Giustiniani, International Cultural Heritage Law (2018)
• Giovanna Adinolfi, International Economic Law (2018)
• Marlies Hesselman, International Environmental Law (2018)
• Stefania Negri, International Health Law (2018)
• Anastasia Telesetsky, Law of the Sea (2018)
• Matthew Scott, Migration/Refugee Law (2018)

Canefe: Transitional Justice and Forced Migration: Critical Perspectives from the Global South

Nergis Canefe (York Univ.) has published Transitional Justice and Forced Migration: Critical Perspectives from the Global South (Cambridge Univ. Press 2019). The table of contents is here. Here's the abstract:

This volume brings together critical legal scholarship and theories of forced migration that draw attention to the dual role of law as it pertains to transitional justice and mass violence resulting in forced population movements. Contributors to the volume analyze how forced migration in the Global South have impacted contemporary realities. While there has been considerable focus on refugees and asylum seekers from conflict zones, there is less attention paid to the far more numerous internally displaced peoples (IDPs), stateless people, warehoused refugees, non-status displaced and returnees in the Global South. In this volume, a multidisciplinary group of scholars question the reasons behind the restrictive choices that lock us into area studies modalities instead of genuine interdisciplinary analysis by linking the traditional subject matter of transitional justice with the realities of forced migration in the Global South.

New Issue: International Human Rights Law Review

The latest issue of the International Human Rights Law Review (Vol. 8, no. 2, 2019) is out. Contents include:

• Christine Bicknell, Uncertain Certainty?: Making Sense of the European Court of Human Rights’ Standard of Proof
• Ciarán Burke & Alexandra Molitorisová, Reservations/Declarations under the Council of Europe Convention on Preventing and Combating Violence against Women and Domestic Violence (Istanbul Convention) and Convention on the Elimination of All Forms of Discrimination against Women (CEDAW) in Light of Sex/Gender Constitutional Debates
• Jamil Ddamulira Mujuzi, The Right to Compensation for Wrongful Conviction/Miscarriage of Justice in International Law
• Neil Graffin & Juan J. Garcia Blesa, Racial Profiling in Immigration Control: The Problem with the Northern Irish Border

New Issue: Human Rights Review

The latest issue of the Human Rights Review (Vol. 20, no. 4, December 2019) is out. Contents include:

• M. Joel Voss, The Use (or Misuse) of Amendments to Contest Human Rights Norms at the UN Human Rights Council
• Spasimir Domaradzki, Margaryta Khvostova, & David Pupovac, Karel Vasak’s Generations of Rights and the Contemporary Human Rights Discourse
• Leanid Kazyrytski, Crime Policy in Ukraine: Toward Condemnation of Communism and Political Rehabilitation and Heroization of Nazism
• Hamid Andishan, Honour or Dignity? An Oversimplification in Islamic Human Rights

Call for Papers: Custom and International Investment Law

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

New Issue: Human Rights Law Review

The latest issue of the Human Rights Law Review (Vol. 19, no. 3, November 2019) is out. Contents include:

• Conor O’Mahony, Constitutional Protection of Children’s Rights: Visibility, Agency and Enforceability
• Azadeh Dastyari & Asher Hirsch, The Ring of Steel: Extraterritorial Migration Controls in Indonesia and Libya and the Complicity of Australia and Italy
• Ben T C Warwick, Unwinding Retrogression: Examining the Practice of the Committee on Economic, Social and Cultural Rights
• Gilles Giacca & Ellen Nohle, Positive Obligations of the Occupying Power: Economic, Social and Cultural Rights in the Occupied Palestinian Territories
• Christophe Deprez, The Admissibility of Multiple Human Rights Complaints: Strasbourg and Geneva Compared
• Christos Giannopoulos, The Reception by Domestic Courts of the Res Interpretata Effect of Jurisprudence of the European Court of Human Rights
• Bríd Ní Ghráinne & Aisling McMahon, Access to Abortion in Cases of Fatal Foetal Abnormality: A New Direction for the European Court of Human Rights?
• Ignacio de la Rasilla, The World Court of Human Rights: Rise, Fall and Revival?

Conference: ILA British Branch Spring Conference 2020

The International Law Association British Branch's Spring Conference will take place April 17-18, 2020, at Queen Mary, University of London. The theme is: "Synergy between the Law of Treaties and the Law of International Responsibility: So Far Apart but Still So Close." The program is here.

Garcia & Chan-Tung: La Convention de Vienne sur le droit des traités : bilan et perspectives 50 ans après son adoption

Thierry Garcia & Ludovic Chan-Tung have published La Convention de Vienne sur le droit des traités : bilan et perspectives 50 ans après son adoption (Pedone 2019). The table of contents is here. Here's the abstract:

Habituellement, la célébration de l’anniversaire d’un grand texte juridique est marquée par des compliments sur sa nécessaire utilité et son incontestable effectivité. A rebours de ce paradigme, l’axe de ce colloque international, tenu à Grenoble le 15 mars 2019, concerne le bilan et les perspectives de l’ineffectivité partielle ou totale de certaines dispositions de la Convention de Vienne de 1969 (CV) sur le droit des traités, texte au surplus supplétif.

Une approche strictement théorique s’avèrerait insuffisante pour appréhender l’ineffectivité de telle ou telle disposition de la CV, en raison de son indifférence à l’égard de la pratique. En revanche, la démarche pragmatique retenue permet bien de saisir la pratique étatique et la jurisprudence pertinente en la matière.

L’originalité de cette thématique est indéniable parce qu’aucune recherche n’a jusqu’à présent été faite sur la « mauvaise » application de cette CV, les travaux existant se focalisant a contrario sur la « bonne application » de ce traité.

Afin d’établir le bilan et envisager les perspectives de l’ineffectivité relative ou intégrale de dispositions de la CV, il convient de faire une distinction entre ce qui relève des domaines de l’inapplication et de la modification. Les raisons de cette inapplication peuvent être soit d’ordre temporel – la désuétude –, soit d’ordre structurel – les mécanismes verticaux et hiérarchisés inhérents à la nullité absolue étant inadaptés au caractère horizontal de l’ordre juridique international, caractérisé par l’égale souveraineté des Etats. Quant à la modification de dispositions de la CV, d’une part la pratique des Etats et la jurisprudence pertinente permettent de constater ces changements et, d’autre part, la nécessité d’une adéquation entre les faits et le droit laisse envisager certaines innovations textuelles.

Megiddo & Benvenisti: Inclusion and Representation in the Settlement of Property Claims in the Aftermath of Armed Conflict

Tamar Megiddo (Univ. of Haifa) & Eyal Benvenisti (Univ. of Cambridge) have posted Inclusion and Representation in the Settlement of Property Claims in the Aftermath of Armed Conflict (Theoretical Inquiries in Law, forthcoming). Here's the abstract:

This article examines the authority of states to settle individual private property claims in post-conflict negotiations towards settlement. We analyze this question by exploring the limits of states’ authority to take or limit private property rights for the public good. We argue that this authority rests on two cumulative justifications: the inclusion of the property owners among the public that stands to benefit from the public good, and their representation by the government that decides on the taking of the property. In post-conflict settlement, the negotiating states may redistribute both private property and the public good between and within their respective communities. Their authority to redistribute continues to rests on the same justifications of inclusiveness and representation. Hence, their authority extends only to the redistribution of property of owners who are members of the respective communities that negotiate the agreement, and who are represented by a negotiating government.

Call for Contributions: City Reports on International Law (Reminder)

The International Law Association study group on "The Role of Cities in International Law," the T.M.C. Asser Institute, and the Freie Universität Berlin invite researchers to submit abstracts for reports on city practices in relation to international law. The call is here.

Ablavsky: Species of Sovereignty: Native Nationhood, the United States, and International Law, 1783–1795

Gregory Ablavsky (Stanford Univ. - Law) has published Species of Sovereignty: Native Nationhood, the United States, and International Law, 1783–1795 (Journal of American History, Vol. 106, no. 3, pp. 591–613, December 2019). Here's the abstract:

In recent years, historians have demonstrated how thoroughly the European law of nations shaped the creation of the United States, including by justifying the subordination of Native peoples. But they have largely portrayed Natives as the subjects of, rather than participants in, these debates. Gregory Ablavsky examines the other side of this legal contest: how some Creek and Haudenosaunee leaders resisted U.S. legal arguments by deploying international-law concepts to vindicate Native nationhood. Born of constraint, this resistance confronted important limits, especially as the United States manipulated concepts of territorial sovereignty. Nonetheless, this essay argues, Native international-law claims helped write Native sovereignty into U.S. law, tracing their early influence through to the U.S. Supreme Court’s seminal Cherokee decisions of the 1830s.

Workshop: The Role of Cities in International Law

I'm delighted to be in Berlin today for a workshop on "The Role of Cities in International Law" at Freie Universität Berlin. The program is here.

New Issue: Revista romana de drept international

The latest issue of Revista romana de drept international (No. 21, January-June 2019) is out. Contents include:

• Articole
• Shreya Gupta, Obiecțiile preliminare în cauza Bosnia și Herțegovina contra Iugoslaviei
• Sandra Stoica, Admisibilitatea pretențiilor în fața CIJ: „caducitatea” și Cauza privind testele nucleare

Job Opening: Univ. of Copenhagen (Professor MSO/Senior Researcher at the Centre for Military Studies)

The Department of Political Science, in collaboration with the Faculty of Law, at the University of Copenhagen invites applications for a position as Professor MSO or Senior Researcher in international law and security at the Centre for Military Studies, Department of Political Science, Faculty of Social Sciences, University of Copenhagen. The advertisement is here.

New Issue: Netherlands International Law Review

The latest issue of the Netherlands International Law Review (Vol. 66, no. 3, December 2019) is out. Contents include:

• Aslan Abashidze & Aleksandra Koneva, The Process of Strengthening the Human Rights Treaty Body System: The Road towards Effectiveness or Inefficiency?
• John-Mark Iyi, Re-thinking the Authority of the UN Security Council to Refer Nationals of Non-party States to the ICC
• Konstantinos D. Magliveras, The Withdrawal of African States from the ICC: Good, Bad or Irrelevant?
• Justin Rose, Margaretha Wewerinke-Singh, & Jessica Miranda, Primal Scene to Anthropocene: Narrative and Myth in International Environmental Law
• Morsen Mosses, Revisiting the Matthew and Hunter Islands Dispute in Light of the Recent Chagos Advisory Opinion and Some Other Relevant Cases: An Evaluation of Vanuatu’s Claims relating to the Right to Self-Determination, Territorial Integrity, Unlawful Occupation and State Responsibility Under International Law
• Mariusz Fras, The Group Insurance Contract in Private International Law

Margaria: The Construction of Fatherhood: The Jurisprudence of the European Court of Human Rights

Alice Margaria (Max-Planck-Institut für ethnologische Forschung) has published The Construction of Fatherhood: The Jurisprudence of the European Court of Human Rights (Cambridge Univ. Press 2019). Here's the abstract:

The book tackles one of the most topical socio-legal issues of today: how the European Court of Human Rights is responding to shifting practices and ideas of fatherhood. The jurisprudential analysis is situated in a context of social change that offers radical possibilities for the fragmentation of the conventional father figure and therefore urges decisions upon what kind of characteristics makes someone a legal father. In a range of paradigmatic domains, this book explores the Court's understanding of what it means to be a father today, and whether care is valued at all. It also reflects on the genesis of the Court’s (re-)construction of fatherhood, thus shedding light on the roles played by doctrines of interpretation.