Saturday, June 6, 2009

Anderson: Targeted Killing in U.S. Counterterrorism Strategy and Law

Kenneth Anderson (American Univ. - Law) has posted Targeted Killing in U.S. Counterterrorism Strategy and Law. Here's the abstract:

Targeted killing, particularly through the use of missiles fired from Predator drone aircraft, has become an important, and internationally controversial, part of the US war against al Qaeda in Pakistan and other places. The Obama administration, both during the campaign and in its first months in office, has publicly embraced the strategy as a form of counterterrorism. This paper argues, however, that unless the Obama administration takes careful and assertive legal steps to protect it, targeted killing using remote platforms such as drone aircraft will take on greater strategic salience precisely as the Obama administration allows the legal space for it in international law to shrink.

Moreover, the paper argues that non-state enemies of the United States will not always be al Qaeda or groups covered by Security Council resolutions or the US Authorization for the Use of Military Force. Eventually there will emerge other threats that do not fall within the existing armed conflicts, and the United States is likely to seek to address at least some of those threats using its inherent rights of self-defense, whether or not a conflict within the meaning of international humanitarian law (IHL) and its thresholds is underway, and using domestic law authority under the statutes establishing the CIA. In that case, a US administration seeking to offer a legal rationale justifying its use of targeted killing might discover that reliance upon a state of IHL-armed conflict does not provide it the robust authority to use force that the US has traditionally asserted under its rights of inherent self-defense.

This is a policy paper, not a law review or scholarly article, and it offers blunt advice to the Obama administration and the US Congress with a particular normative goal in mind - to preserve the legal rationales for the use of self-defense in targeted killing, whether or not an IHL armed conflict is underway, consistent with the positions taken by the United States in the 1980s, and culminating with a statement of the US position on self-defense against terrorism and targeting terrorists in third-state safe havens by then-State Department legal advisor Abraham Sofaer in 1989. The point of the paper is to urge the Obama administration, and offer it advice, on how to preserve the legal category of targeted killing as an aspect of inherent rights of self-defense and US domestic law.

As such, this paper runs sharply counter to the dominant trend in international law scholarship, which is overwhelmingly hostile to the practice. It urges the Obama administration to consider carefully ways in which apparently unrelated, broadly admirable human rights goals, such as accepting extraterritorial application of the International Covenant on Civil and Political Rights, or accepting its standards as a complement to the lex specialis of IHL, or accepting recent soft-law standards offered by some influential NGOs such as the International Committee of the Red Cross to define "direct participation in hostilities," have the effect of making legally difficult, if not legally impossible, a counterterrorism strategy of targeted killing using standoff platforms that the Obama administration has correctly embraced as both more effective and more discriminating from a humanitarian stance. It is frank, practical advice to the Obama administration that it must assert the legality of its practices in the face of a hostile and influential international soft-law community or risk losing the legal rationale for a signature strategy.

The draft policy paper runs 20,000 words and is a Working Paper of the Series on Counterterrorism and American Statutory Law, a project of the Brookings Institution, the Georgetown University Law Center, and the Hoover Institution, none of whom are responsible for the contents of individual papers. A finalized version of the paper will appear in Benjamin Wittes, Legislating the War on Terror: An Agenda for Reform (Brookings Institution Press 2009).

Friday, June 5, 2009

Ní Aoláin: Learning the Lessons: What Feminist Legal Theory Teaches International Human Rights Law and Practice

Fionnuala D. Ní Aoláin (Univ. of Minnesota - Law) has posted Learning the Lessons: What Feminist Legal Theory Teaches International Human Rights Law and Practice. Here's the abstract:
In the contemporary international moment, as the long-term impact of 9/11 and the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan continue to shape and redefine international legal and political rules, this analysis pauses to reflect on the gendered elements which ground international legal norms. As an international legal scholar I focus on how feminist legal theory can be applied to the present, and how insights gleaned in domestic legal contexts (significantly though not exclusively within western states) are relevant to the experiences of women in multiple jurisdictional and cultural environments. My concluding observations are specifically drawn from societies emerging from war and repression, and ruminate on the experiences of women in those contexts.

Addis: Imagining the International Community: The Constitutive Dimension of Universal Jurisdiction

Adeno Addis (Tulane Univ. - Law) has posted Imagining the International Community: The Constitutive Dimension of Universal Jurisdiction (Human Rights Quarterly, Vol. 31, pp. 129-162, 2009). Here's the abstract:
The assertion of prescriptive and adjudicative universal jurisdictions by some countries in relation to a handful of offenses that are classified as international or universal crimes (e.g. genocide) has led to a great deal of controversy. Those who favor universal jurisdiction argue that certain acts (often crimes) affect all of us, not just the specific individual or group of victims or the country of which the victims are nationals. It is therefore legitimate, they argue, for any state to punish or suppress such acts regardless of any traditional jurisdictional connection between the alleged acts and the state asserting jurisdiction. The availability of universal jurisdiction is premised on the presumed effect of certain crimes on humanity as a whole. Those who commit these offenses are referred to as hostis humani generis-enemies of human kind. Skeptics argue that the idea of universal jurisdiction is conceptually incoherent, inconsistent with the principle of political self-determination, and has great potential to be an instrument of political mischief. While they disagree on the conceptual coherence and utility of the notion of universal jurisdiction, both proponents and opponents view its function in purely instrumental terms, to provide the condition for punishing or suppressing certain offenses that affect all of us. This article argues that universal jurisdiction also serves another, less articulated purpose. It has a constitutive function as well. It is partly a process through which the identity of the international community is imagined and enacted. It is an expression of a sense of ourselves (a community of humankind) at given moments of time. This article argues that neglect of this constitutive dimension leads to an incomplete analysis of universal jurisdiction.

Conference: Business and International Law

Today, the British Institute of International and Comparative Law will host its annual conference. The conference theme is: "Business and International Law." The program is available here.

Thursday, June 4, 2009

Horn, Mavroidis, & Sapir: Beyond the WTO? An Anatomy of EU and US Preferential Trade Agreements

Henrik Horn (Research Institute of Industrial Economics (IFN)), Petros C. Mavroidis (Columbia Univ. - Law), & André Sapir (Free Univ. of Brussels (VUB/ULB) - European Center for Advanced Research in Economics and Statistics (ECARES)) have posted Beyond the WTO? An Anatomy of EU and US Preferential Trade Agreements. Here's the abstract:
It is often alleged that PTAs involving the EC and the US include a significant number of obligations in areas not currently covered by the WTO Agreement, such as investment protection, competition policy, labour standards and environmental protection. The primary purpose of this study is to highlight the extent to which these claims are true. The study divides the contents of all PTAs involving the EC and the US currently notified to the WTO, into 14 'WTO' and 38 ‘WTO-X' areas, where WTO provisions come under the current mandate of the WTO, and WTO-X provisions deal with issues lying outside the current WTO mandate. As a second step, the legal enforceability of each obligation is evaluated, judged on the extent to which the text specifies clear obligations. Among the findings are: (i) EC agreements contain almost four times as many instances of WTO-X provisions as do US agreements; (ii) but EC agreements evidence a very significant amount of ‘legal inflation’ (i.e., non-legally enforceable provisions) in the WTO-X category, and US agreements actually contain a more of enforceable WTO-X provisions than do the EC agreements; and (iii) US agreements tend to emphasize regulatory areas more compared to EC agreements.

Chander: Trade 2.0

Anupam Chander (Univ. of California, Davis - Law) has posted Trade 2.0 (Yale Journal of International Law, forthcoming). Here's the abstract:

Where the last century saw the dismantling of barriers to trade in goods, the new century will see the dismantling of barriers to trade in services. Once theorized as nontradable, services now join goods in a global marketplace powered by advances in communications technology. Today, an engineer, accountant, or lawyer can supply her services across the globe without boarding a plane. Less well understood is that cyber-trade encompasses not just the services outsourced to Bangalore, but also the online services supplied by Silicon Valley to the world. Apple, eBay, and Yahoo too are exporters of information services, seeking to become middlemen to the world. Google now earns half of its income overseas. Almost sub rosa, the Internet has become a global trading platform rivaling any history has yet produced. But law developed over millennia for the paradigm of goods is unprepared for trade, version 2.0.

The pressure on law is clear: Antigua challenges U.S. rules barring online gambling; Brazil demands that Google identify hate speakers; an Alien Torts Statute suit charges Yahoo with abetting Chinese torture; and the United States challenges Chinese media restrictions on movie, music, and financial information services. Once we recognize the connections between these disputes, we can begin to form a general theory of cyber-trade. Ricardo’s theory of comparative advantage applies to all trade, whether in goods or in information. Economic theory thus counsels, and international treaties compel, the dismantling of barriers to cyber-trade. Yet, because of its remote nature, it is easy to assert consumer protection to bar online competition. I articulate a principle of technological neutrality to smoke out barriers hiding under this veneer. To flourish, cyber-trade will also require digital analogues to the physical infrastructure for services, from handshakes to courts.

The footloose nature of cyber-trade poses a more fundamental challenge - to law itself. Via the net, service providers can flout local law from afar. This race to the bottom arises from the exploitation of overly liberal regimes, lacking consumer and other protections. A second potential race to the bottom arises from overly repressive regimes, which require service providers to serve as auxiliaries of the authoritarian state. I offer principles to protect local control of global Internet trade without jeopardizing either human rights or the World-Wide nature of the Web.

Knop, Michaels, & Riles: International Law in Domestic Courts: A Conflict of Laws Approach

Karen Knop (Univ. of Toronto - Law), Ralf Michaels (Duke Univ. - Law), & Annelise Riles (Cornell Univ. - Law) have posted International Law in Domestic Courts: A Conflict of Laws Approach (American Society of International Law Proceedings, forthcoming). Here's the abstract:

The relationship between international law and domestic law is rarely understood as a conflict of laws. Understanding it in this way opens up a parallel with the field of conflict of laws: the field for which the relationship between legal systems, especially the role of another system's jurisdiction, laws, and judgments vis-à-vis the domestic legal system, are exactly the bread-and-butter issues. We argue for such an approach to international law in domestic courts: an approach that we elaborate as "theory through technique."

In our view, conflicts should be seen broadly as the discipline that developed to deal with conflicts between laws, without necessarily being committed to any one method or policy. Surprisingly, we demonstrate that it is precisely the seemingly negative features of conflicts - the field's high degree of technicality disparaged as a "conflict-of-laws machine" and the multitude of theories famously deemed a "dismal swamp" - that figure among the advantages of a conflict-of-laws approach to international law in domestic courts.

A conflict-of-laws approach offers ways to respect the nature of international law as law, without simplifying that nature by characterizing it exactly as domestic law. In addition, seeing the parallel with conflict of laws brings a wealth of experience that can enrich and refine the debate on international law in domestic courts. Finally, the parallel with conflicts changes international law in domestic courts from a specific problem addressed by international and constitutional lawyers into a general problem of relativism - which, we argue, conflict of laws is uniquely positioned to address.

Ratner: Bringing Ethical Inquiry into International Law

Steven R. Ratner (Univ. of Michigan, Ann Arbor - Law) has posted Bringing Ethical Inquiry into International Law (in Looking to the Future: Essays on International Law in Honor of W. Michael Reisman, forthcoming). Here's the abstract:
International law and ethics share a common goal of helping us understand the norms and institutions needed to promote a just world order. Yet each of the two fields has approached this shared task with little regard for the insights of other, and interdisciplinary collaboration is now imperative. This essay shows the complementary nature of inquiries in political and moral philosophy, on the one hand, and international law, on the other, by examining the so-called New Haven School (or policy-oriented jurisprudence), an international law method that explicitly considers values as both inputs and outputs of the process of making law. It finds that the School’s sociological orientation does not adequately integrate ethical inquiries essential to prescribing law, in particular questions about the scope of duties that individuals and states owe those abroad. Using the current legal debate over the extraterritorial application of human rights as an example, the paper shows how approaches from moral and political philosophy can help provide a rigorous and principled basis for the prescription of law, as well as link seemingly unrelated questions of international law to each other.

Wednesday, June 3, 2009

Call for Papers: EU - Mexican Legal, Commercial and Business Relations

The Endowed Research Chair in European Studies on Development and Competitiveness (Cátedra Estudios Europeos sobre Desarrollo y Competitividad) of the School for Government, Social Sciences and Humanities of the Tecnológico de Monterrey (ITESM), headed by María de Lourdes Dieck Assad, former Ambassador of Mexico for the European Union, has issued a call for papers for a book on "EU - Mexican Legal, Commercial and Business Relations." Here's the call:

In the 1980's Mexico significantly transformed its international economic policy from protectionism to tradeliberalization. Two of the most notable occurrences in this framework were the formation of the North American Free Trade Area in 1994 and the Mexican – European Free Trade Agreement, which entered into force in 2000. Both granted Mexico a preferential access to two of the most important and dominating markets of the world.

Due to their strong commercial ties, the Mexican - US relations in the context of NAFTA have been analyzed in profusion by academic literature. On the other hand, even with the entry into force of the EU - Mexico Free Trade Agreement, EU's position as Mexico's second most important trading partner and the recent classification of Mexico as a "Strategic Partner" of the EU, little reference has been made to the legal, commercial and business relations of this partnership.

To enrich the discussion in this field and in the context of the EU - Mexico Free Trade Agreement 10th year anniversary to be commemorated on October 1st 2010, the Endowed Research Chair in European Studies on Development and Competitiveness (Cátedra Estudios Europeos sobre Desarrollo y Competitividad) of the School for Government, Social Sciences and Humanities of the Tecnológico de Monterrey (ITESM), headed by Dra. María de Lourdes Dieck Assad, former Ambassador of Mexico for the European Union, invites to the contribution for book under the working title:

"EU - Mexican Legal, Commercial and Business Relations"

Covering topics involving:

  • International and World Trade Law
  • European Mexican Business
  • Economic Analysis
  • European Community Law
  • Business Strategies
  • Political Economy Analysis
  • Protection of Investment
  • Institutional Cooperation
  • Fair Trade and Social Responsibility

Propositional abstracts of about 300 - 400 words in length should be sent no later than July 31st, 2009 to Gerhard Niedrist gerhard.niedrist@itesm.mx, Associate Professor at the Masters Program of International Law at ITESM. Submitted abstracts will be reviewed for acceptance by a group comprised of researchers from the organizing institution. Responses on whether proposals are accepted will be sent to submitters by September 2009. The final chapters (about 10,000 words in length including footnotes and references) should be submitted by February 29th 2010. The contributions should be in English and will be published through a major international publisher in the first half of 2010.

The final works will be presented as one stream at the "Bicentennial Anniversary on the Mexican
Independence Conference" to be held in Monterrey, México in September 2010.

New Volume: Netherlands Yearbook of International Law

The latest volume of the Netherlands Yearbook of International Law (Vol. 39, 2008) is out. Contents include:
  • Fabian Amtenbrink, The Multidimensional Constitutional Legal Order of the European Union – A Successful Case of Cosmopolitan Constitution-Building?
  • Ruth L. Okediji, WIPO-WTO Relations and the Future Of Global Intellectual Property Norms
  • Jan Vanhamme, Formation and Enforcement of Customary International Law: The European Union's Contribution
  • Alexander Orakhelashvili, International Law and Geopolitics: One Object, Conflicting Legitimacies?

Fassbender: The United Nations Charter as the Constitution of the International Community

Bardo Fassbender (Universität der Bundeswehr München - Law) has published The United Nations Charter as the Constitution of the International Community (Martinus Nijhoff Publishers 2009). Here's the abstract:
The “constitutionalization” of international law is one of the most intensely debated issues in contemporary international legal doctrine. The term is used to describe a number of features which distinguish the present international legal order from “classical” international law, in particular its shift from bilateralism to community interest, and from an inter-state system to a global legal order committed to the well-being of the individual person. The author of this book belongs to the leading participants of the constitutionalization debate. He argues that there indeed exists a constitutional law of the international community that is built on and around the Charter of the United Nations. In this book, he explains why the Charter has a constitutional quality and what legal consequences arise from that characterization.

New Issue: Journal of World Trade

The latest issue of the Journal of World Trade (Vol. 43, no. 3, June 2009) is out. Contents include:
  • Locknie Hsu, SWFs, Recent US Legislative Changes, and Treaty Obligations: Sovereign Wealth Funds, Recent US Legislative Changes, and Treaty Obligations
  • Rupa Chanda, Mobility of Less-Skilled Workers under Bilateral Agreements: Lessons for the GATS
  • Arwel Davies, Interpreting the Chapeau of GATT Article XX in Light of the ‘New’ Approach in Brazil-Tyres
  • Xiaomei E, China’s WTO Accession and Sustainable Development: Challenges and Policy Responses
  • Andrew D. Mitchell & Tania Voon, Patents and Public Health in the WTO, FTAs and Beyond: Tension and Conflict in International Law
  • Alan Swinbank, EU Sugar Policy: An Extraordinary Story of Continuity, But Then Change
  • Vik Naidoo, Trade Commitments in Education Services: The Need to Move Out of the Current Impasse
  • Ruwantissa Abeyratne, Carbon Trading in Commercial Aviation

New Issue: Revista Española de Derecho Internacional

The latest issue of the Revista Española de Derecho Internacional (Vol. 60, no. 1, 2008) is out. Contents include:
  • Ángel Sánchez Legido, Garantías diplomáticas, no devolución y prohibición de la tortura
  • Ángel Espiniella Menéndez, La "Europeización" de decisiones de derecho privado
  • Julio Jorge Urbina, Prevención y control de la contaminación causada por buques en el mar territorial: competencias del estado ribereño y contribución de las organizaciones internacionales
  • María Isabel Torres Cazorla, La reactivación de los consulados honorarios en la práctica española de las últimas décadas
  • Elena Crespo Navarro, La Segunda Conferencia de Paz de La Haya (1907) y la posición de España
  • Ángeles Lara Aguado, Adopción internacional: relatividad de la equivalencia de efectos y sentido común en la interpretación del derecho extranjero
  • Carlos Espaliú Berdud, ¿Un derecho de paso "inocente" por el mar territorial de los buques extranjeros que transportan sustancias altamente contaminantes?
  • Mercedes Soto Moya, La libre circulación de personas como concepto ambivalente

Tuesday, June 2, 2009

New Issue: Schweizerische Zeitschrift für internationales und europäisches Recht

The latest issue of the Schweizerische Zeitschrift für internationales und europäisches Recht (Vol. 18, no. 4, 2008) is out. Contents include:
  • Christa Tobler, Aktuell - ZUM Junktim zwischen der Fortführung und der Ausdehnung der Personenfreizügigkeit in der Eidgenössischen Volksabstimmung vom 8. Februar 2009
  • Stathis Banakas, Unde Venis et Quo Vadis? European tort law revisited
  • Alexander H E Morawa, Global Constitutional Interaction - A Question of Methodology?

New Issue: ASA Bulletin

The latest issue of the ASA Bulletin (Vol. 27, no. 1, 2009) is out. Contents include:
  • Richard Bamforth & Katerina Maidment, “All join in” or not? How well does international arbitration cater for disputes involving multiple parties or related claims?
  • Michael Young & Simon Chapman, Confidentiality in International Arbitration Does the exception prove the rule? Where now for the implied duty of confidentiality under English law?
  • Noradèle Radjai, Confidentiality in International Arbitration: Brief overview of the position in Switzerland and further reading
  • Thomas Clay, La Convention de New York vue par la Doctrine Française

New Issue: International Journal of Marine and Coastal Law

The latest issue of the International Journal of Marine and Coastal Law (Vol. 24, no. 2, 2009) is out. Contents include:
  • Johannes F. Imhoff & Michael Hügler, Life at Deep Sea Hydrothermal Vents—Oases Under Water
  • Fernando de la Calle, Marine Genetic Resources. A Source of New Drugs
    The Experience of the Biotechnology Sector
  • Louise Angélique de La Fayette, A New Regime for the Conservation and Sustainable Use of Marine Biodiversity and Genetic Resources Beyond the Limits of National Jurisdiction
  • Frida M. Armas-Pfirter, How Can Life in the Deep Sea Be Protected?
  • Lorraine (Lori) Ridgeway, Marine Genetic Resources: Outcomes of the United Nations Informal Consultative Process (ICP)
  • Serge Beslier, The Protection and Sustainable Exploitation of Genetic Resources of the High Seas from the European Union's Perspective
  • Rüdiger Wolfrum, Concluding Remarks
  • Diethard Mager, Climate Change, Conflicts and Cooperation in the Arctic: Easier Access to Hydrocarbons and Mineral Resources?
  • Aldo Chircop, The Growth of International Shipping in the Arctic: Is a Regulatory Review Timely?
  • Agustín Blanco-Bazán, Specific Regulations for Shipping and Environmental Protection in the Arctic: The Work of the International Maritime Organization
  • Christian Reichert, Determination of the Outer Continental Shelf Limits and the Role of the Commission on the Limits of the Continental Shelf
  • Vladimir Golitsyn, Continental Shelf Claims in the Arctic Ocean: A Commentary
  • L.D.M. Nelson, The Settlement of Disputes Arising From Conflicting Outer Continental Shelf Claims
  • Oran R. Young, The Arctic in Play: Governance in a Time of Rapid Change
  • Alf Håkon Hoel, Do We Need a New Legal Regime for the Arctic Ocean?

Halliday & Carruthers: Bankrupt: Global Lawmaking and Systemic Financial Crisis

Terence C. Halliday (American Bar Foundation and University of Illinois College of Law - Center on Law and Globalization) & Bruce G. Carruthers (Northwestern Univ. - Sociology) have published Bankrupt: Global Lawmaking and Systemic Financial Crisis (Stanford Univ. Press 2009). Here's the abstract:

The Asian Financial Crisis dramatically illustrated the vulnerability of financial markets in emerging, transitional, and advanced economies. In response, international organizations insisted that legal reforms could help protect markets from financial breakdowns. Sitting at the nexus between the legal system and the market, corporate bankruptcy law ensures that the casualties of capitalism are treated in an orderly way.

Halliday and Carruthers show how global actors—including the IMF, World Bank, UN, and international professional associations—developed comprehensive norms for corporate bankruptcy laws and how national policymakers responded in turn. Drawing on extensive fieldwork in China, Indonesia and Korea, the authors reveal how national policymakers contested and negotiated domestic laws in the context of global pressures. The first study of its kind, this book offers a theory of legal change to explain why global/local tensions produce implementation gaps. Through its analysis of globalization, this book has lessons for international organizations and developing and transition economies the world over.

New Issue: International Community Law Review

The latest issue of the International Community Law Review (Vol. 11, no. 2, May 2009) is out. Contents include:
  • Alexander Breitegger, Sacrificing the Effectiveness of the European Convention on Human Rights on the Altar of the Effective Functioning of Peace Support Operations: A Critique of Behrami Saramati and Al Jedda
  • Gaetano Pentassuglia, Evolving Protection of Minority Groups: Global Challenges and the Role of International Jurisprudence
  • Ekaterina Yahyaoui Krivenko, Feminism, Modern Philosophy and the Future of Legitimacy of International Constitutionalism

New Issue: International Arbitration Law Review

The latest issue of the International Arbitration Law Review (Vol. 12, no. 2, 2009) is out. Contents include:
  • Hong-Lin Yu, Who is an arbitrator? A study into the issue of immunity
  • Joel Greer, Practical considerations regarding certain aspects of electronic disclosure in international arbitration
  • Philip Clifford & Oliver Browne, Lost at sea or a storm in a teacup? Anti-suit injunctions after Allianz Spa v West Tankers
  • Sophie Nappert, Case comment: Louis Dreyfus SAS v Holding Tusculum

Workshop: Roberts

Adam Roberts (Univ. of Oxford - Politics and International Relations) will give a talk today at the Oxford Human Rights Discussion Group on "Military Occupations: Can the Laws of War and Human Rights Both Apply?"

International Co-operation and the Modern Prosecutor

Today, the British Institute of International and Comparative Law will host a seminar on "International Co-operation and the Modern Prosecutor." Details can be found here.

Monday, June 1, 2009

New Issue: Arbitration: The International Journal of Arbitration, Mediation and Dispute Management

The latest issue of Arbitration: The International Journal of Arbitration, Mediation and Dispute Management (Vol. 75, no. 1, February 2009) is out. Contents include:
  • Vijay Bhatia, Christopher Candlin, & Rajesh Sharma, Confidentiality and integrity in international commercial arbitration practice
  • Winnie Ma, Recommendations on public policy in the enforcement of arbitral awards
  • Erich Suter, The process from void to valid for agreements to mediate
  • Zannis Mavrogordato & Gabriel Sidere, The nature and enforceability of ICSID provisional measures
  • James Hargrove & Vanessa Liborio, Arbitration and insolvency: English and Swiss perspectives
  • Doug Jones, Competence – Competence

Grant: Admission to the United Nations: Charter Article 4 and the Rise of Universal Organization

Thomas D. Grant (Univ. of Cambridge - Law) has published Admission to the United Nations: Charter Article 4 and the Rise of Universal Organization (Martinus Nijhoff Publishers 2009). Here's the abstract:
The United Nations began as an alliance during World War II. Eventually, however, the UN came to approximate a universal organization - i.e., open to and aspiring to include all States. This presents a legal question, for Article 4 of the Charter contains substantive criteria to limit admission of States to the UN and no formal amendment has touched that part of the Charter. This book gives an up-to-date account of admission to the UN, from the 1950s ‘logjam’ through on-going controversies like Kosovo and Taiwan. With reference to Charter law, the book considers how Article 4 came to accommodate universality and what the future of a universal organization in a world of politically diverse States might be.

New Issue: ICC International Court of Arbitration Bulletin

The latest issue of the ICC International Court of Arbitration Bulletin (Vol. 19, no. 1, 2008) is out. Contents include:
  • Mirèze Philippe, New Upgrades to ICC NetCase
  • Pierre Tercier, ICC Rules of Arbitration: A Decade of Use
  • ICC Arbitration: A Ten-Year Statistical Overview
  • Boris Karabelnikov and Dominic Pellew, Enforcement of International Arbitral Awards in Russia - Still a Mixed Picture
  • Fabrizio Marrella, The New (Rome I) European Regulation on the Law Applicable to Contractual Obligations: What has Changed?

Symposium: The United States and the Future of Global Governance

On May 7 and 8, the Council on Foreign Relations held a symposium on "The United States and the Future of Global Governance." There were a number of interesting sessions, including one on "The Use of Force and Accountability in International Law - A U.S. Perspective." Videos and transcripts are available here.

Boyle: New Institutions for Human Rights Protection

Kevin Boyle (Univ. of Essex - Law) has published New Institutions for Human Rights Protection (Oxford Univ. Press 2009). Here's the abstract:

This book presents a multi-faceted approach to one of the most crucial challenges facing Human Rights institutions today - the implementation gap that exists between human rights norms and their enforcement by States. Comprising contributions from renowned international scholars in the field of human rights, New Institutions for Human Rights Protection examines how the human rights commitments entered into by States might be translated more effectively into protection for individuals in practice and the crucial role that human rights institutions, at both a national and international level, have to play in this endeavour.

Focusing on recent developments in respect to institutions such as the UN Human Rights Council and the EU's Fundamental Rights Agency (FRA), these essays present a thorough account of the objectives and challengers facing the international community today with respect to human rights. From an account of the origins and mandate of the UN Human Rights Council to its potential conflict with the missions of the Treaty bodies and from study of the role of institutions in the field of racism and discrimination to the potency of human rights norms and institutions to uphold minority interests, this volume offers original and diverse perspectives on the role of fledgling human rights institutions.

New Volume: Australian Year Book of International Law

The latest volume of the Australian Year Book of International Law (Vol. 27, 2009) is out. Contents include:
  • James Hathaway, The Value of Year Books of International Law
  • The Howard Government and International Law
    • Donald R Rothwell & Kim Rubenstein, Introduction: Australia and International Law during the Howard Years
    • Greg Carne, Neither Principled nor Pragmatic? International Law, International Terrorism and the Howard Government
    • Sarah Joseph, The Howard Government's Record of Engagement with the International Human Rights System
    • Stuart Kate, Australia and East Timor during the Howard Years: An International Law Perspective
    • Jane McAdam & Kate Purcell, Refugee Protection in the Howard Years: Obstructing the Right to Seek Asylum
    • Gregory Rose, Australian Approaches to International Environmental Law during the Howard Years
    • Gerry Simpson, Warriors, Humanitarians, Lawyers: The Howard Government and the Use of Force
    • Jeff Waincyme, The Howard Government's Legacy in International Trade and Investment
  • Ilias Bantekas, The Foundations of Arbitrability in International Commercial Arbitration
  • Alexander Kunzelmann, An Australian International Law: The Impact of Australian Courts on the Fragmentation of International Law

Sunday, May 31, 2009

Binder, et al.: International Investment Law for the 21st Century: Essays in Honour of Christoph Schreuer

Christina Binder, Ursula Kriebaum, August Reinisch, & Stephan Wittich (all Univ. of Vienna - Law) have published International Investment Law for the 21st Century: Essays in Honour of Christoph Schreuer (Oxford Univ. Press 2009). Contents include:
  • Elihu Lauterpacht, Christoph Schreuer: an Appreciation
  • Hanspeter Neuhold, A Tribute to Christoph Schreuer
  • Guido Santiago Tawil, Most Favoured Nation Clauses and Jurisdictional Clauses in Investment Treaty Arbitration
  • Kaj Hober, MFN Clauses and Dispute Resolution in Investment Treaties - Have We Reached the End of the Road?
  • Christina Knahr, Investments 'in the Territory' of the Host State
  • Carolyn Lamm, Consent and Due Process in Multiparty Investor-State Arbitrations
  • Gerold Zeiler, Jurisdiction, Competence and Admissibility of Claims in ICSID Arbitration Proceedings
  • Anthony Sinclair, Contract Claims before Treaty Tribunals
  • Christoph Liebscher, Monitoring of Domestic Courts in BIT Arbitrations. A Brief Inventory of Some Issues
  • Audley Sheppard, Arbitrator Independence in Investment Arbitration
  • Loretta Malintoppi, Provisional Measures in Recent Proceedings: What Parties Request and What Tribunals Order
  • Friedl Weiss, Inherent Powers in Investment Arbitration
  • Irmgard Marboe, ICSID Annulment Decisions - 3 Generations Revisited
  • Ieva Kalnina & Domenico Di Pietro, The Scope of ICSID Review and Erga Omnes Effect of Annulment Decisions. The Case of CMS v. Argentina
  • Oscar Garibaldi, On the Denunciation of the ICSID Convention, Consent to ICSID Jurisdiction, and the Limits of the Contract Analogy
  • Keyvan Rastegar, Denouncing ICSID
  • Andrea Bjorklund, State Immunity and Enforcement of Arbitral Awards
  • Stanimir Alexandrov, Enforcement of ICSID Awards: Articles 53 and 54 of the ICSID Convention
  • Peter T. Muchlinski, The Diplomatic Protection of Foreign Investors: a Tale of Judicial Caution
  • Abby Cohen Smutny, Protection of Shareholders in International Investment Law, Commenting on the ICJ Decision in Diallo v. Congo and How it Relates to the Jurisprudence in the Investment Treaty Context
  • V.V. Veeder, Chancellor Wirth and the Mologoles Concession 1923-1927: the German-speaking Origins of the ICSID Convention
  • Emmanuel Gaillard, The Notion of Investment
  • Ursula Kriebaum, Local Remedies and the Standards for the Protection of Foreign Investment
  • Ole Spiermann, Premature Treaty Claims
  • Maria Cristina Griton, Do Umbrella Clauses apply to Unilateral Declarations?
  • Michael Waibel, BIT by BIT: The Silent Liberalization of the Capital Account
  • Stephen M. Schwebel, The United States Model BIT and Denial of Justice in International Law
  • Yves Fortier, The Canadian Approach to Investment Protection: How Far Have We Come?
  • Marek Wierzbowski, Conflict of Norms Stemming from Intra-EU BITs and EU Legal Obligations: Some Remarks on Possible Solutions
  • Waldemar Hummer, Investment Rules in Regional Integration Agreements in Latin America - the Case of the Andean Pact/Andean Community
  • Gerhard Hafner, The Provisional Application of the Energy Charter Treaty
  • Christina Binder, Changed Circumstances in Investment Law. Interfaces between the Law of Treaties and the Law of State Responsibility with a Special Focus on the Argentine Crisis
  • Asif Qureshi, The Economic Emergency Defence in Bilateral Investment Treaties: A Development Perspective
  • Christian Tomuschat, The European Court of Human Rights as Investment Protection Tribunal
  • Luzius Wildhaber & Isabelle Wildhaber, Recent Case Law on the Protection of Property in the European Convention on Human Rights
  • Bruno Simma & Theodore Kill, Harmonizing Investment Protection and International Human Rights: First Steps Towards a Methodology
  • Stephan Wittich, The Principle of Joint Tortfeasors in Investment Arbitration
  • Thomas W. Wälde, Interpreting Investment Treaties: Experiences and Examples
  • Guiditta Cordero Moss, Commercial Arbitration and Investment Arbitration: Fertile Soil or False Friends?
  • James Crawford, Continuity and Discontinuity in International Dispute Settlement
  • Rudolf Dolzer, Contemporary Law of Foreign Investment: Revisiting the Status of International Law
  • Andrés Rigo, Precedent in Investment Treaty Arbitration
  • Charles Brower, Michael Ottolenghi, & Peter Prows, The Saga of CMS: Res Judicata, Precedent, and the Legitimacy of ICSID Arbitration
  • Moshe Hirsch, Compliance with Investment Treaties: When States are more likely to Breach or Comply with Investment Treaties?
  • Ernst-Ulrich Petersmann, The Impact of Human Rights on International Investment Law and Investor-State Arbitration
  • August Reinisch, The Future of Investment Arbitration