Law Commons^™

Property And Political Community: Democracy, Oligarchy, And The Case Of Ukraine, Monica E. Eppinger

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Widening wealth gaps in Western democracies have brought new scrutiny to relationships between property and political community. For the prior quarter century, Western legal scholars have urged privatization around the globe as the key to a virtuous circle of "market democracy." This Article traces origins of the market democracy consensus to ideas that identify positive features of political community -- liberty, wealth, or democracy -- with private property ownership. Fieldwork in Ukraine, where Western privatization advice was followed at a time of founding a new polity, provides data to compare predictions with outcomes. Two unexpected figures -- the Oligarch and …

Marxist And Soviet Law, Stephen C. Thaman

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This chapter addresses both the Marxist critique of law before the Russian Revolution and the development of the Soviet Law Structure. It discusses the three main trends in Soviet Criminal Law before elucidating how these trends affected the General Part and the Special Part of Soviet Criminal Codes and overall Soviet criminal policy.

The Penal Order: Prosecutorial Sentencing As A Model For Criminal Justice Reform?, Stephen C. Thaman

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This chapter traces the history of the penal order from its earliest roots through its consolidation as a normal alternative form of procedure in Germany. It compares the types of penal order procedures found in modern criminal procedure codes, and it compares penal orders with other “consensual” procedural modes that also involve considerable prosecutorial influence in determination of the level of guilt and punishment: diversion, pleas and stipulations of guilt, and abbreviated trials based on the contents of the preliminary investigation dossier. Finally, it explores whether the penal order, could eventually become a model for the consensual resolution of all …

Should Juries Give Reasons For Their Verdicts?: The Spanish Experience And The Implications Of The European Court Of Human Rights Decision In Taxquet V. Belgium, Stephen C. Thaman

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This article discusses the Belgian jury system and the decision in Taxquet v. Belgium and then explores to what extent a requirement of reasoned judgments will affect the survival of European juries. It focuses on Spain, where the jury is required to give reasons for its verdicts, and where a lively high-court jurisprudence has developed addressing the quality and sufficiency of jury reasons. This article suggests that it might be appropriate for jury courts in the United States to in some way justify their decision of guilt, in order to minimize the amount of completely innocent persons who have been …

Experimenting With Territoriality: Pan-European Music License And The Persistence Of Old Paradigms, Ana Santos Rutschman

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This article tells the story of what could have been an interesting and important shift in our approach to territoriality in the digitalized world. Europe had the chance to be the cradle of an unprecedented copyright experience – the creation of a quasi pan- continental license in the music field – but it might have lost that opportunity in the midst of non-binding recommendations and resolutions. This article argues this loss is due to the overreaching persistence of old paradigms, namely the principle of territoriality.

Nation-Building In The Penumbra: Notes From A Liminal State, Monica E. Eppinger

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The emergence of post-Socialist legal orders is reshaping some of the familiar terrain of comparative legal studies. This Article, invited as part of an effort to think about the topic of "What the Rest think of the West," reconsiders the vast legal re-codification projects that stand at the center of "nation-building" projects in formerly Socialist states. Such projects, and the rupture from which they emerge, challenge essentialist or static notions of identity and assumptions of where the West is or where the Rest begin. Anthropological concepts of "liminality" and "deixis" assist in understanding Ukrainian legal experts' thinking on legal reforms …

Truth Or Legality: The Limits On The Laundering Of Illegally Gathered Evidence In A State Under The Rule Of Law (Verdad O Legalidad: Los Límites Del Blanqueo De Pruebas Ilegalmente Recogidas En Un Estado De Derecho) (Spanish), Stephen C. Thaman

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This paper discusses the tension between the constitutional rights to silence and to privacy and the important goal of criminal procedure to ascertain the truth. It traces exclusionary rules from the inquisitorial rules relating to nullities, to modern constitutional, statutory and jurisprudential rules for excluding illegally gathered evidence.

Note: downloadable document is in Spanish

Miranda In Comparative Law, Stephen C. Thaman

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Not only have the Miranda warnings become a recognized procedure in police interrogations in the United States, but they have been adopted or strengthened over the years in formerly inquisitorial countries like Germany, Italy, Spain and most recently France, and are now recognized as having constitutional status. This article discusses the protections afforded to criminal suspects and defendants overseas when faced with interrogation by police, prosecutors, investigating magistrates or judges of the investigation. It compares the admonitions given to such suspects with those provided in the Miranda decision and discusses their constitutional, or statutory status. It further discusses when such …

Spain Returns To Trial By Jury, Stephen C. Thaman

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In 1995, the Spanish Parliament reenacted trial by jury in criminal cases by implementing a mandate of the 1978 post Franco Spanish Constitution. This article discusses the 17 year dispute, following the ratification of the democratic post-Franco Spanish Constitution, on whether Article 25 mandated the reintroduction of lay participation in the criminal trial, and, if so, whether in the form of the classic jury or a continental European style court with lay assessors. This article analyzes the Law on Trial by Jury and its implementation in the first year of trials, and references Spain’s experience with trial by jury in …