José Ovalle Favela: La influencia de la jurisprudencia de la Corte Interamericana de Derechos Humanos: En el derecho interno de los estados latinoamericanos

Boletín Mexicano de Derecho Comparado, nueva serie, año XLV, núm. 134, mayo agosto de 2012, pp. 595-623.
Resumen: En este trabajo el autor analiza la influencia de la jurisprudencia de la Corte Interamericana de Derechos Humanos en la evolución reciente del derecho interno de los Estados latinoamericanos. Para este fin se ocupa de la creación y funciones de la Comisión Interamericana y la Corte Interamericana de Derechos Humanos. De esta última, estudia su integración y su competencia, tanto consultiva como contenciosa, así como las características de su jurisprudencia. También aborda el tema del control de la convencionalidad tanto en sede internacional, que ejerce la Corte Interamericana, cuanto a la que en sede nacional o interna compete a los poderes internos de cada Estado, particularmente a los jueces. Por último, el autor analiza cinco casos específicos.

Fuente: Biblioteca Jurídica Virtual

Gaines, Olsen, & Sørensen: Liberalising Trade in the EU and the WTO: A Legal Comparison

Sanford E. Gaines (Aarhus Universitet), Birgitte Egelund Olsen (Aarhus Universitet), & Karsten Engsig Sørensen (Aarhus Universitet) have published Liberalising Trade in the EU and the WTO: A Legal Comparison (Cambridge Univ. Press 2012). The table of contents is here. Here's the abstract:

This comparison of EU and WTO approaches to common trade-liberalisation challenges brings together eighteen authors from Europe and America. Together they explore fundamental legal issues, such as the role of general principles of law, the role of the judiciary in the development of law, the effect of the principle of non-discrimination and the elimination of non-discriminatory barriers to trade. The contributions also examine the most recent developments in trade law across a full range of trade issues, including TBT and SPS, services, intellectual property, customs rules, safeguards, anti-dumping and government procurement. Adopting a comparative perspective throughout, this volume sheds light on today's trade law and suggests paths forward for each system through the perennial tensions between open, non-discriminatory trade and strongly held national values and objectives.

Source: International Law Reporter

Cohen: Globalization and Sovereignty: Rethinking Legality, Legitimacy, and Constitutionalism

Jean L. Cohen (Columbia Univ. - Political Science) has published Globalization and Sovereignty: Rethinking Legality, Legitimacy, and Constitutionalism (Cambridge Univ. Press 2012). Here's the abstract:

Sovereignty and the sovereign state are often seen as anachronisms; Globalization and Sovereignty challenges this view. Jean L. Cohen analyzes the new sovereignty regime emergent since the 1990s evidenced by the discourses and practice of human rights, humanitarian intervention, transformative occupation, and the UN targeted sanctions regime that blacklists alleged terrorists. Presenting a systematic theory of sovereignty and its transformation in international law and politics, Cohen argues for the continued importance of sovereign equality. She offers a theory of a dualistic world order comprised of an international society of states, and a global political community in which human rights and global governance institutions affect the law, policies, and political culture of sovereign states. She advocates the constitutionalization of these institutions, within the framework of constitutional pluralism. This book will appeal to students of international political theory and law, political scientists, sociologists, legal historians, and theorists of constitutionalism.

Source: International Law Reporter

Evans: The Right to Reparation in International Law for Victims of Armed Conflict

Christine Evans (Office of the United Nations High Commissioner for Human Rights) has published The Right to Reparation in International Law for Victims of Armed Conflict (Cambridge Univ. Press 2012).

Here's the abstract:
In this evaluation of the international legal standing of the right to reparation and its practical implementation at the national level, Christine Evans outlines State responsibility and examines the jurisprudence of the International Court of Justice, the Articles on State Responsibility of the International Law Commission and the convergence of norms in different branches of international law, notably human rights law, humanitarian law and international criminal law. Case studies of countries in which the United Nations has played a significant role in peace negotiations and post-conflict processes allow her to analyse to what extent transitional justice measures have promoted State responsibility for reparations, interacted with human rights mechanisms and prompted subsequent elaboration of domestic legislation and reparations policies. In conclusion, she argues for an emerging customary right for individuals to receive reparations for serious violations of human rights and a corresponding responsibility of States.


Source: International Law Reporter

Benvenisti & Downs: Prospects for the Increased Independence of International Tribunals

Eyal Benvenisti (Tel Aviv Univ. - Law) & George W. Downs (New York Univ. - Politics) have posted Prospects for the Increased Independence of International Tribunals (German Law Journal, Vol. 12, No. 5, 2011). Here's the abstract:

In this essay we draw upon the theoretical and empirical literatures on the evolution of court independence within modern democratic states to identify aspects of their political environments that have fostered judicial independence at the domestic level. We then extend that analysis to examine the role that these or similar factors are likely to play in facilitating the independence and legitimacy of international tribunals at the global level. We focus on two such broad aspects of the global environment not normally associated with the independence of international tribunals: the extent of political division between states that are parties to an international tribunal (interstate competition), and the extent of political division within states between state executives and national courts (inter-branch competition). We suggest further that the conditions that facilitate independence have increased in recent years and are likely to continue to do so.

Source: International Law Reporter

Raustiala: Institutional Proliferation and the International Legal Order

Kal Raustiala (Univ. of California, Los Angeles - Law) has posted Institutional Proliferation and the International Legal Order (in Interdisciplinary Perspectives on International Law and International Relations:
 The State of the Art, Jeffrey L. Dunoff & Mark A. Pollack eds., forthcoming). Here's the abstract:

Since the cataclysm of World War II, the international order has grown increasingly institutionalized. Hundreds of international organizations and tens of thousands of treaties now exist, many with widespread – and in some cases nearly universal – membership. Compared to earlier eras, the international system today is far more densely populated by rules and institutions.

Kulick: Global Public Interest in International Investment Law

Andreas Kulick has published Global Public Interest in International Investment Law (Cambridge Univ. Press 2012). Here's the abstract:

The strengths of international investment law – above all, a strong focus on investor interests and an effective adjudication and enforcement system – also entail its weaknesses: it runs the danger of impeding or even sanctioning the host states' legitimate regulatory interests and ignoring other fields of public international law. How does it cope with public interest concerns such as human rights, the environment or the fight against corruption? At the heart of this book lies a fresh approach towards a general theory of such global public interest considerations in the investment realm. Delineating how and why those considerations matter, and why the current system does not accommodate them properly, Andreas Kulick fleshes out general principles and customary international law as defences the host state may raise against alleged investor rights infringements and promotes proportionality as the appropriate balancing mechanism.

Source: International Law Reporter

Dinniss: Cyber Warfare and the Laws of War

Heather Harrison Dinniss (Swedish National Defence College) has published Cyber Warfare and the Laws of War (Cambridge Univ. Press 2012). Here's the abstract:

The information revolution has transformed both modern societies and the way in which they conduct warfare. Cyber Warfare and the Laws of War analyses the status of computer network attacks in international law and examines their treatment under the laws of armed conflict. The first part of the book deals with the resort to force by states and discusses the threshold issues of force and armed attack by examining the permitted responses against such attacks. The second part offers a comprehensive analysis of the applicability of international humanitarian law to computer network attacks. By examining the legal framework regulating these attacks, Heather Harrison Dinniss addresses the issues associated with this method of attack in terms of the current law and explores the underlying debates which are shaping the modern laws applicable in armed conflict.

Source: International Law Reporter

Globalización del Derecho. Aspectos jurídicos y derechos humanos, de William Guillermo Jiménez

En el presente trabajo se explora la relación entre derecho y globalización, con el propósito de establecer futuros campos de investigación. Se inicia con una introducción acerca de los efectos de la globalización sobre el Estado nacional, para pasar luego a una breve mirada sobre el significado de la globalización. En tercer lugar, se presentan los principales temas, problemas y focos de interés encontrados sobre la relación entre derecho y globalización, especialmente el tema de los derechos humanos. Finalmente, se realizan algunas conclusiones, en las que se destaca la importancia de abrir nuevos campos de estudio sobre globalización debido a la necesidad de regulación que requieren los fenómenos globalizados.

Enlace para la publicación:  ESAP, Revista Nova et Vetera

Mavroidis: Trade in Goods (Second Edition)

Petros Mavroidis (Columbia Univ. - Law) has published the second edition of Trade in Goods (Oxford Univ. Press 2012). Here's the abstract:

This new edition of Trade in Goods is an authoritative work on international trade by one of the most influential scholars in the field. It provides a comprehensive and detailed analysis of every WTO agreement dealing with trade in goods. The focus of the book is on the reasoning behind the various WTO agreements and their provisions, and the manner in which they have been understood in practice. It introduces both the historic as well as the economic rationale for the emergence of the multilateral trading system, before dealing with WTO practice in all areas involving trade in goods. It contests the claim that the international trade agreements themselves represent 'incomplete contracts', realized through interpretation by the WTO and other judicial bodies. The book comprehensively analyses the WTO's case law, and it argues that a more rigorous theoretical approach is needed to ensure a greater coherence in the interpretation of the core provisions regulating trade in goods.

Alter: The Multiple Roles of International Courts and Tribunals: Enforcement, Dispute Settlement, Constitutional and Administrative Review

Karen J. Alter (Northwestern Univ. - Political Science) has posted The Multiple Roles of International Courts and Tribunals: Enforcement, Dispute Settlement, Constitutional and Administrative Review (in International Law and International Relations: Synthesizing Insights from Interdisciplinary Scholarship, Jeffrey L. Dunoff & Mark A. Pollack eds., forthcoming). Here's the abstract:

This chapter is part of an upcoming interdisciplinary volume on international law and politics. The chapter defines four judicial roles states have delegated to international courts (ICs) and documents the delegation of dispute settlement, administrative review, enforcement and constitutional review jurisdiction to ICs based on a coding of legal instruments defining the jurisdiction of 25 ICs. I show how the design of ICs varies by judicial role and argue that the delegation of multiple roles to ICs helps explain the shift in IC design to include compulsory jurisdiction and access for nonstate actors to initiate litigation. I am interested in the multiple roles ICs play because they allow us to appreciate the many different contributions ICs make to international politics. ICs do oversee state compliance with international agreements, but this is not all they do. Finally, I explain the relevance of this analysis for two prevalent debates regarding ICs; 1) whether we should conceive of ICs as Agents or Trustees and 2) whether compulsory jurisdiction and private litigant access for ICs inherently features undermine national sovereignty.

Source: International Law Reporter

The Structure of Global Law: Fracture, Fluidity, Permeability, and Polycentricity

Larry Catá Backer
The Pennsylvania State University Dickinson School of Law
July 1, 2012
CPE Working Paper No. 2012-7

Abstract:     

Global law can be understood as the systematization of anarchy, as the management of a loosely intertwined universe of autonomous governance frameworks operating dynamically across borders and grounded in functional differentiation among governance communities. Global law is a way of pointing to an emerging universe of systems that share characteristics and whose interactions lend them to organization; it is the as the law of non-state governance systems. The structure of global law can be understood as an amalgamation of four fundamental characteristics that together define a new order in form that is, in some respects, the antithesis of the orderliness and unity of the law-state system it will displace (though not erase). The essay considers the structure of global law in this context, understood as an amalgamation of four fundamental characteristics that together define a new order in form that is, in some respects, the antithesis of the orderliness and unity of the law-state system it will displace (though not erase). These four fundamental characteristics — fracture, fluidity, permeability, and polycentricity — comprise the fundamental structure of global law. Fracture, fluidity, permeability and polycentricity are the basic characteristics of global law, the systematization of which marks its field boundaries. These also serve as the structural foundations of its constitutional element, its substantive element, and its process element. From that systematization one can derive a method of theorizing the emerging framework of the unity of disunity in governance, in which law and governance systems multiply within a discernible internal logic, while the objects of regulation remain constant. This essay continues work on the evolution of a "law" beyond that of the domestic legal orders of states and the international law frameworks that serve as an expression of state based collective governance. To that extent, it seeks to liberate theory both from the ideological constraints of the state system and as well from the limitations of earlier work in transnational law. To consider the possibility of global law, of law/governance beyond the state, it is necessary to avoid attaching its framework either to the state or to law (as traditionally and narrowly understood as a product of the state).

Source with link for the publication: Social Science Research Nework

Knight & Egerton: The Routledge Handbook of the Responsibility to Protect

W. Andy Knight (Univ. of Alberta - Political Science) & Frazer Egerton (Government of Nova Scotia) have published The Routledge Handbook of the Responsibility to Protect (Routledge 2012). The table of contents is here. Here's the abstract:

This Handbook offers a comprehensive examination of the Responsibility to Protect norm in world politics, which aims to end mass atrocities against civilians. The Responsibility to Protect (R2P) is amongst the most significant norms in global politics. As the authoritative guide to R2P, this edited volume gathers together the most respected and insightful voices to address key issues related to this emerging norm.


Source: International Law Reporter

Arato: Constitutional Transformation in the ECtHR: Strasbourg's Expansive Recourse to External Rules of International Law

Julian Arato (New York Univ. - Law) has posted Constitutional Transformation in the ECtHR: Strasbourg's Expansive Recourse to External Rules of International Law (Brooklyn Journal of International Law, Vol. 37, no. 2, p. 348). Here's the abstract:

The European Court of Human Rights is a constituted judicial body, established by international treaty among the member States of the Council of Europe. Yet it can hardly be described as a static creature of the Parties.

The Court has undergone dramatic constitutional change since its inception, resulting in an organization significantly more autonomous, independent, and robust in its maturity. Certain important changes have been achieved through formal amendment by the Parties. At the same time, however, the constitution of the ECtHR has undergone a quieter, informal kind of development – through the Court’s own practice in the discharge of its normal functions. Change of this latter type may be called constitutional transformation, by contrast to formal constitutional amendment. This paper is about the transformative effect of the Court’s approach to the interpretation of its constituent instrument, the ECHR. More specifically, the focus is on its approach to one particular technique of interpretation, codified at VCLT 31(3)(c) (providing for the consideration of external sources of international law). On the one hand, as is often recognized, the Court relies on the technique to ground a dramatic and evolutive mode of treaty interpretation – expanding the substantive rights of the Convention in light of sources external to it. Yet on the other hand, I want to suggest, the Court gives 31(3)(c) itself an astonishingly broad construction, to justify considering an extraordinary array of external sources – thereby expanding its own material competence to develop the Convention on the basis of developments outside of the Convention. This latter dimension of the Court’s interpretive approach, I argue, has brought about a genuine constitutional transformation.

Source: International Law Reporter

Head, Mann, and Kozlina on Transnational Governance

Michael Head, Scott Mann, and Simon Kozlina (eds), Transnational Governance: Emerging Models of Global Legal Regulation (Ashgate, 2012) has just been published.

The book description reads:

As globalization continues to spread and evolve, so nation-states attempt to govern financialization, tax evasion, corruption, terrorism, civil and military conflicts and environmental dangers, social polarization and the complexities in human rights implementation, by institutional and transnational means. This volume discusses these issues from different legal perspectives and highlights the challenges of governing human activity in an age of remarkable interconnectedness.

Covering a broad range of policy areas and analysis of emerging forms of governance from liberal to critical and Marxist, the chapters are legal in their approach and form an important contribution to the growing study of emergent forms of authority, coordination and power developing in response to the challenges presented by some of the key contemporary governance issues in the first half of the twenty-first century.

Source: Juris Diversitas

von Bogdandy & Venzke: International Judicial Lawmaking: On Public Authority and Democratic Legitimation in Global Governance

Armin von Bogdandy (Max-Planck-Institut für ausländisches öffentliches Recht und Völkerrecht) & Ingo Venzke (Univ. of Amsterdam - Law) have published International Judicial Lawmaking: On Public Authority and Democratic Legitimation in Global Governance (Springer 2012). Contents include: