Search: Affective Justice: Book Symposium: A Response

another thought-provoking discussion of my work here on the impressively revamped Opinio Juris website. Although each blogpost makes many points that deserve thoughtful response, space and time permit only this brief overarching answer. Overall, I am reassured that the commentary basically reaffirms several of the book’s key themes, as summarized in my initial symposium entry: (1) the anatomy of a struggle and the strategy of counter-resistance, (2) the critiques to my discussion of “America’s Wars” (Chapter 5); (3) some responses to particular critiques and (4) what’s really at stake. The...

Oliver Windridge Congratulations to the Karen Alter, Laurence Helfer and Jacqueline McAllister. This article serves as a clear and concise introduction to the ECOWAS Community Court of Justice (ECCJ). I was especially interested to read of the ECCJ’s evolution to encompass human rights cases (surely a positive sign in itself of Africa’s shift towards prioritising human rights protection?) and the Court’s subsequent courageous judgments often in the face of the government opposition One small point, on the introduction posting to the AJIL Symposium (posted February 3rd 2014) the box containing...

whereas violations of access rights do not. I’ve only had a chance to read the opinion quickly, so let me offer some initial reactions, and reserve the right to come back later with a more detailed analysis. The Court uniformly accepts the use of foreign law to interpret treaties First, as regular readers know, there’s a lot of controversy surrounding the use of foreign law by some members of the Court in recent years. Indeed, Chief Justice Roberts, Justice Alito and Justice Sotomayor were all called on in their confirmation...

...enforceable. Justice Scalia seemed to view this as impinging on Article III, although he thought qualifying them as non-self executing (using his definition of the term) would solve the problem. Justice Breyer, in contrast, took a more prudential counter-position, noting that it might make hundreds of U.S. treaty provisions unconstitutional. Speaking of Justice Breyer, I was intrigued by his attempt to simplify this case as a straight-up application of the Supremacy Clause: JUSTICE BREYER: Maybe you could spend a minute explaining that, because, as I read the Constitution, it says...

Justice Ginsburg has fired the latest salvo in the ongoing debate about the Court’s use of foreign and international law sources in constitutional adjudication. On Friday, she gave a speech to the International Academy of Comparative Law at American University, entitled “A decent respect to the Opinions of [Human]kind”: The Value of a Comparative Perspective in Constitutional Adjudication. Not surprisingly given her earlier opinions, Justice Ginsburg comes out strongly in favor of the Court’s use of foreign and international law materials to interpret U.S. law, including the Constitution. She begins...

...functions, and the provision of training and capacity building for justice personnel; i) Procedures and rules for co‐ordination between the different courts and functions within the criminal justice system, as well as between institutions of the criminal justice system and the other institutions and mechanisms envisaged by the JRRD; j) Adequate resources for delivering timely and meaningful justice. Another interesting aspect of the report’s recommendations is its approach to traditional Sudanese reconciliation mechanisms. It endorses those mechanisms, as it should — but it also rightly insists that traditional justice is...

...case also raises a host of issues on the nexus between enforcing judgments and pursing denial of justice claims in investment arbitration. Can Dole now bring a “denial of justice” claim against Nicaragua under the U.S.-Nicaragua BIT? What effect, if any, would the district court judgment have in such a case? Or consider the Dole case in light of Chevron’s litigation woes in Ecuador. I’m curious what relationship, if any, there is between its investment arbitration claim of denial of justice and attempts to prevent enforcement of foreign judgment for...

Opinio Juris is pleased to announced that in cooperation with the Council on Foreign Relations we will be sponsoring a book discussion with Walter Russell Mead about his new book, God and Gold: Britain, America, and the Making of the Modern World. The book discussion will be held the week of February 4, and we wanted to announce it early to give our readers the opportunity to buy the book and participate in the discussion. In addition to Mead’s participation, we will have prominent guests as well as the participation...

I am delighted to announce the publication of my book “The Nuremberg Military Tribunals and the Origins of International Criminal Law.” The book can be ordered from Oxford University Press here; Amazon should have it (at a whopping $8.78 discount) in the next few days. Here for the last time is the cover: Once again, I want to thank all of the Opinio Juris readers who have given me feedback on draft chapters and/or the layout of the book’s cover. Your contribution to the final product has been immeasurable. And...

Hostage Response...All that said, I agree with Eugene’s claim that the Palestinian Authority may not qualify as the government of Palestine — at least without the inclusion of Hamas. You both are obscuring the fact that the Justice Minister who filed the most recent declaration and complaint with the ICC was sworn in on 2 June 2014 as part of the new Unity Government backed by both the PLO and Hamas. Many reliable sources, including Haaretz, USA Today and Al Jazeera, reported that Netanyahu and the Israeli Security Cabinet used...

that the ICC does not need to intervene in Colombia, because its threats to do so have encouraged the Colombian judiciary to increase its efforts to combat impunity, an effect known as “positive complementarity.” Here is the AMICC’s assessment: The Prosecutor of the International Criminal Court, by pressuring Colombia through statements and visits, seems to have boosted Colombia’s historically ineffective justice system. The Colombian Supreme Court is making an unprecedented effort and has had success in bringing to justice those responsible for the worse atrocities against human rights. Although the...

Several months back, Opinio Juris put out a call for papers for our inaugural on-line symposium to junior scholars. The theme was described as follows: As long as people have been writing about public international law, commentators have suggested that it is a system in crisis or somehow under stress. After a moment of optimism at the end of the Cold War, scholarship has returned to the challenges of international law. Opinio Juris is convening an on-line symposium to carefully consider just what these challenges may be: Terrorism? Hegemony? Illegitimacy?...