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20 Nov Microfinance Meltdown in India
...reach to poor people in a commercial way; it’s not precisely microfinance, and not microfinance in the “faux-market” development sense I suggested earlier. It is the search for a genuinely commercial product of banking for the poor that provides capital and banking services — but which manages to cover costs and return a profit. NGO development programs cannot possibly serve the needs of all those people at that level; their specialization is with a different population of very poor people. For all these reasons and more, I have been supportive...20 Apr Kony 2012: The Complex Kaleidoscope of Transitional Justice in Uganda
[Michael A. Newton is Professor of the Practice of Law, Vanderbilt University Law School] The Kony 2012 campaign had the laudable goal of increasing public awareness in order to aid the search for justice and accountability in the wake of LRA atrocities. In fact, the worldwide attention had the paradoxical effect of demonstrating the lamentable reality that the optimal pathway towards authentic justice for LRA victims in that setting is neither simple nor self-obvious. This is true for a number of reasons which I shall summarize. Firstly, the complexity of...25 Jan The Art and Craft of International Environmental Law
...international law!” That really got me going, so I replied — somewhat pedantically — that I happened to be a professor of international law and that, as a legal matter, Norway is in compliance with the International Whaling Convention. He stomped off in search of greener pastures. I found the encounter fascinating because it illustrated so many themes in international environmental law: the intertwining of scientific and factual disputes, the special discursive power of legal argumentation, the various design features of international agreements. And I got to thinking, what could...
10 Oct On Community, Courage, and Change in the Classroom: A Response to Mohsen al Attar
...the inner struggles of life in the borderlands are “played out in outer terrains.” Teaching issues like racial injustice in the classroom, I am acutely aware of my identity as a junior scholar and faculty of colour. I anxiously search students’ body language for signs – eyerolls, sighs, sniggers – that they see their lecturer as an angry coloured man with a personal agenda. This is not because any student has ever behaved this way in my classroom, but because I have been conditioned – by life experience, literature, and...
21 Mar The Turkey Tribunal’s Long Shot: Stretching Territorial Jurisdiction and Disregarding Positive Complementarity Options (Part I)
[Dr. Ligeia Quackelbeen is an Assistant Professor in International and European Criminal Law (Tilburg University) currently researching problems of interpretation arising from inter alia the concurrence of legal regimes and examining these issues in light of the legality principle and fair labelling.] On 9 February 2023, a communication was submitted to the Office of the Prosecutor (OTP) of the ICC by the Belgian law firm Van Steenbrugge Advocaten (VSA), under the guidance of Prof. Em. Dr. Johan Vande Lanotte, former Deputy Prime Minister of Belgium and reputed professor on International...19 May New Journal: The International Political Theory Beacon
It seems international law scholars with a philosophical temperament will no longer be forced to troll the library stacks in search of the latest articles bearing on their interests but not searchable on Lexis or Westlaw. Starting next week, the Editorial Board of the web-based International Political Theory Beacon promises to periodically select the finest articles, essays, and book reviews in the field and make them available online in one convenient location. Think of it like a specialized edition of The Philosopher’s Annual. The IPT Beacon will also host a...
01 Aug Key Insights and Lessons from The First World Congress on Enforced Disappearances
...genocide. Uruguay and Argentina have explicitly included enforced disappearances in their respective definitions of genocide, respectively through legislation or case law. International Humanitarian Law Regarding war crimes, which are grave violations of international humanitarian law, it is important to note that international humanitarian law treaties do not explicitly refer to the term “enforced disappearances.” However, enforced disappearances violate prohibitions against other acts, such as torture (see Rule 90), which are recognized war crimes. As such, enforced disappearances may qualify as criminal conduct under IHL when they entail acts that are...04 Nov Where Have I Seen the NYT’s Detainee Data Project Before …? And Is the Times Implying that It’s Okay to Hold Some Detainees Without Trial?
The New York Times ran a front page story from its lead Guantanamo reporter yesterday. (William Glaberson and Margot Williams, research assistance Andrei Scheinkman, “Next President Will Face Test on Detainees: Some at Guantanamo Called Serious Risks,” NYT, Monday, November 3, 2008 (behind reg. user wall), A1; plus a referenced data base of detainees used to analyze the detainee records.) Now, where was it I first heard of what Glaberson et al. have done here – created an elaborate data base of all the detainees and their statements in front...
30 Oct Third Annual Symposium on Pop Culture and International Law: Three Tales of Omelas – Utopia, Harm and International Law
...current moment, where climate change is happening, tech tycoons talk of colonialising the moon, and global inequalities are expanding, in a search for some answers there has been a turn towards utopia in the academy, in popular culture, and by activists. The science-fiction Omelas stories provide an approach to utopian-thinking that negates a grand progress narrative as a response to global challenges. These Omelas stories force us to interrogate the foundational structures of international law for the harms perpetuated, to question whether our methods as international lawyers might re-entrench those...09 Apr Book Symposium: Textualism in Treaty Interpretation–A Genealogy
the men who framed the treaty which we are to seek, rather than some possible meaning which can be forced upon isolated words or sentences. The second statement, issued by the Iran-US Special Claims Tribunal in 1984, holds that: [T]he Vienna Convention does not require any demonstration of a ‘converging will’ or of a conscious acceptance by each Party of all implications of the terms to which it has agreed. It is the ‘terms of the treaty in their context and in the light of its object and purpose’ with...