Clara Chapdelaine-Feliciati offers the first comprehensive study of the status of the girl child under international law. This book significantly contributes to bridging two fields usually studied separately: law and semiotics. The author engages in the novel legal semiotics theory to decode the meaning of international treaties (mainly the Convention on the Rights of the Child, Convention on the Elimination of All Forms of Discrimination Against Women, and International Covenants) and assess whether the provisions, as formulated, clearly identify the girl child and take into account the obstacles she faces as a result of sexism, childism, and intersectional discrimination. This is also the first book to apply The Significs Meaning Triad – Sense, Meaning, Significance – in international law, and Semioethics for both a diagnosis and prognosis of problematic signs in view of modifying the wording of relevant treaties.
The latest issue of the International Journal of Human Rights (Vol. 29, no. 3, 2025) is out. Contents include:
The general course on public international law delivered by Professor Alain Pellet at The Hague Academy of International Law deviates from the recent tendency indulged in by many general courses to approach the discipline from the angle of a particular theme. His is a course taking the phrase ‘general course on public international law’ quite literally. Despite the generalist outlook of the course, however, there is a guiding thread animating it – namely, Pellet’s vision of how the reality of international law should be approached by international lawyers – in particular, by international law academics. After a brief general presentation of the course, this review essay focuses on Pellet’s theory of the theory and reality of international law and attempts to offer some general observations about what such a theory means against the backdrop of the current state of the discipline.
The latest issue of the International Journal of Marine and Coastal Law (Vol. 40, no. 1, 2025) is out. Contents include:
This volume offers a comprehensive examination of Hans Kelsen's legal and political philosophy, focusing on four central themes. The first part analyses Kelsen's theory of norms, including its periodisation and concepts of validity and coercion. The second part explores his perspectives on international law, addressing its structural analysis, primitive law characterisation, and teleology. The third part examines Kelsen's theory of democracy, its relationship with the pure theory of law, collective will, and democratisation of the administration. The final part discusses Kelsen's influence on the Vienna School of Legal Theory and its impact on case law and jurisprudence beyond Europe. This collection is essential for scholars and practitioners seeking to understand Kelsen's legacy.
The latest issue of the Nordic Journal of Human Rights (Vol. 43, no. 1, 2025) is out. Contents include:
The latest issue of Global Constitutionalism (Vol. 14, no. 1, March 2025) is out. Contents include:
Sun analyses the important and understudied subject of jurisdiction in the exclusive economic zone (EEZ) over five groups of activities. It explores whether the basic premises and essential compromises of the EEZ regime established by the United Nations Convention on the Law of the Sea still hold true or whether there has been evolution in the regime in terms of accommodating the EEZ regulatory scheme to meet new needs and challenges. Significantly, the analysis of State practice indicates that coastal States have progressively asserted greater authority in defending their rights and jurisdiction in the EEZ, which have been broadly tolerated by the legal regime, and other user States. The stability of the EEZ regime is maintained by two legal doctrines that guide the attribution and exercise of the rights and freedoms of different States.
The human right to resist is a contemporary legal concept with an ancient pedigree. Although it has received recognition in constitutions, customary international law and human rights treaties, and acknowledgment by leading publicists of international law, it remains obscure compared to other human rights. In this innovative and comprehensive book, Shannonbrooke Murphy addresses the perennial question of who has a 'right' to resist – and what, when, why, and how, from a legal perspective. Using a systematic and comparative approach to analyzing both the theoretical concept and the provisions in positive law, this study aims to establish that a 'right to resist' can be recognized and codified as an enforceable 'human right', proposing a common conceptual language and an analytical framework for evaluating the legal basis of claims. Murphy makes a strong and detailed case for a firmer place for the 'right to resist' in the human rights lexicon.
In determining the right to life under international human rights law (IHRL) during the conduct of hostilities, the traditional approach defers to the relevant rules of international humanitarian law (IHL) as ‘lex specialis’, while the ‘normative’ approach adopts an open-ended ‘contextual application’ of ‘systemic integration’. Neither approach provides a theoretical account that speaks to the heart of the matter – the just assignment of legal responsibility for the deprivation of life in war-fighting, where ‘responsibility’ implies the correct location of a ‘cause’ that is answerable, or ‘able’ to provide a ‘response’, for such deprivation. The invocation of causality in the social world in turn requires an account of social ontology, the study of what exists in society to cause anything at all. This article outlines a social ontological approach that reconnects the relevant norms under IHL and IHRL with different types of causes of deprivation of life in war-fighting in order to demystify the right to life in hostilities theoretically. It then demonstrates the proper use of systemic integration together with the legally prescribed ‘context’ and analyses concrete scenarios of deprivation of life in war-fighting in order to demystify the right to life in hostilities methodologically and practically.
The latest issue of the International Journal of Transitional Justice (Vol. 19, no. 1, March 2025) is out. Contents include:
