In association with the International Commission of Jurists

Books

02 Feb

What is power? Which states have it, and which don’t? Are there some processes that accelerate its ascendancy and others that quicken its decay? Most of all, how does public international law (PIL) correspond to this concept and to these processes? In Emerging Powers and the International Order, Andreas Buser touches upon all of these questions. In the following post,...

|
02 Feb

[Congyan Cai is a Professor of International Law at Fudan University School of Law.] The landscape of international power has seen considerable realignment in the past decade, which is expected to continue in coming years. A couple of former less powerful states whose voices were silenced have increased their capability to influence international economic governance and their economic power continues to grow. In contrast, those great powers...

|
01 Feb

[Helmut Philipp Aust is a Professor of Law at the Freie Universität Berlin.] For the last few years, the world has been enthralled by the gradual withdrawal of the United States from its previous role as a key actor shaping the global economic order through multilateral institutions and based on rules of international law. Probably the trademark of the Trump administration, its slogan “America first” easily translated...

|
01 Feb

This week, we have the pleasure of hosting an exciting discussion on Andreas Buser's recent book, Emerging Powers, Global Justice and International Economic Law: Reformers of an Unjust Order? published by Springer. From the Publisher: The book assesses emerging powers’ influence on international economic law and analyses whether their rhetoric of reforming this ‘unjust’ order translates into concrete reforms. The questions at the...

|
18 Dec

Justice as Message is 436-page is a detailed exploration of justice as a message, including the various forms, messaging can take. Of particular interest to me was chapter 6, “International criminal law as expressivist justice-meanings, implications and critiques.” Stahn opens this chapter by stating that “expressivist practices have a larger space in international criminal justice than traditionally assumed.” Whether we like it or not, in the business of...

|
18 Dec

[Priya Urs is a PhD Candidate at the Faculty of Laws, University College London, where her doctoral research addresses the application of the gravity criterion for admissibility at the International Criminal Court. (priya.urs.17@ucl.ac.uk)] Carsten Stahn’s Justice as Message introduces and examines the myriad manifestations of expression in the field of international criminal justice. The contribution of the book is its ambitious inquiry into the use of expressivism as a...

|
17 Dec

[Marina Aksenova is a Professor of international and comparative criminal law at IE University, Madrid, email: marina.aksenova@ie.edu.] I enjoyed reading Carsten Stahn’s Justice as Message (OUP, 2020). The work presents a carefully weaved tapestry of ideas surrounding the concept of expressivism in international criminal law. The book is undertaking an impressive task of bridging a normative gap between the ambition of international criminal law and its reality...

|
16 Dec

[Darryl Robinson is an Associate Professor at Queen’s University Faculty of Law (Canada), specializing in international criminal justice.]  Carsten Stahn’s Justice as Message is a singularly impressive work.  Carsten weaves together ideas from several bodies of literature, in a manner that is breathtaking in its depth, breadth and sensitivity.  Over the last 25 years, scholarship on international criminal law (ICL) has been greatly enriched.  In earlier, lonelier days...

|
15 Dec

[Mark A. Drumbl is the Class of 1975 Alumni Professor of Law and Director, Transnational Law Institute, Washington and Lee University.] Carsten Stahn, in the very first line of his terrifically impressive book, invokes a jingle from The Police. When I was teenage boy, I loved the Police. I greatly fancied Sting, his confidence and his presence, and how in his songs he tapped into the churn and...

|
14 Dec

[Diane Marie Amann is the Emily & Ernest Woodruff Chair in International Law and Faculty Co-Director of the Dean Rusk International Law Center at the University of Georgia School of Law.] The eye cannot help but be drawn to the cover of Justice as Message, the new analysis by Carsten Stahn of, to quote the subtitle, Expressivist Foundations of International Criminal Justice. On the high-gloss paper jacket...

|
14 Dec

[Carsten Stahn is a Professor of International Criminal Law and Global Justice at Leiden Law School, Programme Director of the Grotius Centre (The Hague) and author of Justice as Message: Expressivist Foundations of International Law.] Blogs play an essential role in discussing scholarship. With more books being published each year, it is difficult for a general readership to keep track of publications...

|
14 Dec

This week, we are happy to host an insightful discussion on Carsten Stahn's latest book, Justice as Message: Expressivist Foundations of International Criminal Justice, published by Oxford University Press. From the publisher: International criminal justice relies on messages, speech acts, and performative practices in order to convey social meaning. Major criminal proceedings, such as Nuremberg, Tokyo, and other post-World War II...

|