Law Commons^™

Environment, States, And International Organizations: The Role Of Global Environmental Conventions In Protecting The Environment, Natalia Escobar Pemberthy

Graduate Doctoral Dissertations

Global environmental conventions are created to address and resolve global environmental problems. Assessments of the achievement of specific environmental goals, however, indicate that there is room for progress and that stronger collective action is required. Given that there are no empirical instruments to measure implementation and to determine the factors behind individual countries’ results, challenges emerge that require the expansion of existing analytical frameworks around environmental conventions and their role as global governance instruments. This study develops an empirical instrument – the Environmental Conventions Index – to assess the implementation of global environmental conventions, determining the main trends for both …

Jeremy I. Levitt's Africa: Mapping New Boundaries In International Law (Book Review), Makau Mutua

Makau Mutua

This is a review of Jeremy Levitt’s edited collection of chapters in Africa: Mapping the Boundaries of International Law, which is an impressive work to the dearth of scholarship on Africa’s contribution to the normative substance and theory of international law. The book explicitly seeks to counter the racist mythology that Africans were tabula rasa in international law. In his own introduction to the book, Levitt makes it clear that “Africa is a legal marketplace, not a lawless basket case.” The eight contributors to the book are renowned scholars who make the case that Africa is not stuck in pre-history …

Human Rights International Ngos: A Critical Evaluation, Makau Mutua

Makau Mutua

Published as Chapter 7 in NGOs and Human Rights: Promise and Performance, Claude E. Welch, Jr., ed.

The Human rights movement can be seen in a variety of guises. It can be seen as a movement for international justice or as a cultural project for “civilizing savage” cultures. In this chapter, I discuss a part of that movement as a crusade for a political project. International nongovernmental human rights organizations (INGOs), the small and elite collection of human rights groups based in the most powerful cultural and political capitals of the West, have arguably been the most influential component of …

To Speak With One Voice: The Political Effects Of Centralizing The International Legal Defense Of The State, Guillermo J. Garcia Sanchez

Faculty Scholarship

When a government official defends a case before an international court, whose interest should he/she be representing? In today’s era of expanding international treaties that give standing to individual claimants, international courts review the actions of different government actors through the yardsticks of international law. The state is not unitary; alleged victims can bring international claims against various government entities including the executive, the legislature, the administrative branch, and the judiciary. Yet, the international legal defense of government actions is in the hands of the executive power. This paper focuses on the consequences of this centralization for inter-branch politics. It …

International Law In National Schools, Ryan M. Scoville

Indiana Law Journal

Why is international law ineffective at times in achieving its aims, such as preventing human rights abuses, forestalling armed conflict, and ensuring global cooperation on matters ranging from the environment to nuclear proliferation? This Article offers original empirical research to suggest that an important and underappreciated part of the answer lies in legal education. Conducting a global survey on the study of international law at thousands of law schools in over 190 countries, the Article reveals significant cross-national disparities in the pervasiveness of international legal training, and draws on other research to highlight similar variations in instructional quality, topical emphases, …

Unilateral Non-Colonial Secessions: An Affirmation Of The Right To Self-Determination And A Legal Exception To The Use Of Force In International Law, Ilya Berlin

Electronic Thesis and Dissertation Repository

Secession has contributed to nearly 50 intra-state armed conflicts around the world, and remains a complex issue in public international law. Over the past 72 years, several cases stand out as providing evidence of state practice with regards to invoking a successful right to unilateral secession: Bangladesh, Croatia, South Sudan, East Timor, Eritrea and Kosovo, to name a few. However, apart from invoking a right to secession, these cases also share a common factor that legitimized their independence: their Unilateral Non-Colonial (UNC) secessions became legal as a result of two factors: (i) an invocation of a right to self-determination which …

Affirming Brahimi: East Timor Makes The Case For A Model Criminal Code, Megan A. Fairlie

Megan A. Fairlie

No abstract provided.

Interauthority Relationships, Michael S. Green

Popular Media

No abstract provided.

General Counsel Of The Fbi, James Baker, In Conversation With Professor Mary Derosa On The Fbi And International Justice, Mary B. Derosa

Georgetown Law Faculty Publications and Other Works

Mary DeRosa, Georgetown Law Professor, former Deputy Counsel to President Obama for National Security Affairs, former Legal Advisor to the National Security Council under President Obama, and former Deputy Legal Adviser to the National Security Council in the Clinton Administration, interviewed current General Counsel of the Federal Bureau of Investigation (FBI), James Baker. The two discussed the FBI’s role in international law enforcement and the domestic tension between technological advancement and law enforcement duties.

The International Criminal Court: A Figurehead Of Justice, Megan Stoddard

Senior Theses

International law has existed since nation states began to recognize one another. However, the defined study of international criminal law and the resulting International Criminal Court is a fairly recent institution in our history, so there are still many questions about its operation. The question explored here is the power of the court. When put in the international political stage, the International Criminal Court can seem very powerful, but this is a question of the international influence the court can have over the world, and potential international criminals. To explore these ideas, the history of the court and international criminal …

The Battle Over Scientific Whaling: A New Proposal To Stop Japan’S Lethal Research And Reform The International Whaling Commission, Laura Hoey

William & Mary Environmental Law and Policy Review

No abstract provided.

A Historical Account Of The Internationalization Of Invest Disputes: What The Global South Should Know When Negotiating Bilateral Investment Treaties, Felix O. Okpe

Florida A & M University Law Review

Under international law, and perhaps in the context of the ICSID Convention, it is fair to state that; the potential for investment disputes is more likely with respect to foreign investments hosted in the global south. In most situations when investment disputes arise, foreign investors often allege that an act that includes regulatory initiatives of the host state or an omission attributable to the host state, has occasioned a violation of applicable investment agreement. Sometimes the basis for the alleged breach results from underlying contractual claims by the foreign investor. Thus, investment claims have created the intellectual foundation for a …

Foreword: The Art Of International Law, Michael P. Scharf, Katie Steiner

Faculty Publications

September 16, 2016, Case Western Reserve University School of Law’s Frederick K. Cox International Law Center, in conjunction with the celebration of the Cleveland Museum of Art’s centennial anniversary, convened a day-long conference with leading scholars and practitioners from around the world to explore topics at the intersection of art and international law.

Grave Crimes And Weak Evidence: Fact-Finding Evolution In International Criminal Law, Nancy Amoury Combs

Faculty Publications

International criminal courts carry out some of the most important work that a legal system can conduct: prosecuting those who have visited death and destruction on millions. Despite the significance of their work--or perhaps because of it--international courts face tremendous challenges. Chief among them is accurate fact-finding. With alarming regularity, international criminal trials feature inconsistent, vague, and sometimes false testimony that renders judges unable to assess with any measure of certainty who did what to whom in the context of a mass atrocity. This Article provides the first-ever empirical study quantifying fact-finding in an international criminal court. The study shines …

Astroturf Activism, Melinda (M.J.) Durkee

Scholarship@WashULaw

Corporate influence in government is more than a national issue; it is an international phenomenon. For years, businesses have been infiltrating international legal processes. They secretly lobby lawmakers through front groups: “astroturf” imitations of grassroots organizations. But because this business lobbying is covert, it has been underappreciated in both the literature and the law. This Article unearths the “astroturf activism” phenomenon. It offers an original descriptive account that classifies modes of business access to international officials and identifies harms, then develops a critical analysis of the laws that regulate this access. I show that the perplexing set of access rules …

Cross-Border Evidence Gathering In Transnational Criminal Investigation: Is The Microsoft Ireland Case The 'Next Frontier'?, Robert Currie

Articles, Book Chapters, & Popular Press

A recent and prominent American appeals court case has revived a controversial international law question: can a state compel a person on its territory to obtain and produce material which the person owns or controls, but which is stored on the territory of a foreign state? The case involved, United States v. Microsoft, features electronic data stored offshore which was sought in the context of a criminal prosecution. It highlights the current legal complexity surrounding the cross-border gathering of electronic evidence, which has produced friction and divergent state practice. The author here contends that the problems involved are best understood—and …

Industry Lobbying And "Interest Blind" Access Norms At International Organizations, Melissa J. Durkee

Scholarly Works

The standard approach of many international organizations (IOs) to non-governmental associations makes no formal distinctions between nonprofit private sector groups, known as trade or industry associations, and public interest groups. Thus, most IOs offer accreditation and access to both kinds of group on equal terms, without differentiating between them. I call this approach “interest blind” and use this short essay to examine its origins and consequences. Specifically, the approach has resulted in robust participation in international governance by industry and trade lobbying groups, which can affect the quality of deliberation at IOs and of the information that international officials and …

Rethinking East Mediterranean Security: Powers, Allies & International Law, Sami Dogru, Herbert Reginbogin

Touro Law Review

No abstract provided.

Tallinn, Hacking, And Customary International Law, Ahmed Ghappour

Faculty Scholarship

Tallinn 2.0 grapples with the application of general international law principles through various hypothetical fact patterns addressed by its experts. In doing so, its commentary sections provide a nonbinding framework for thinking about sovereignty, raising important considerations for states as they begin to articulate norms to resolve the question of precisely what kinds of nonconsensual cyber activities violate well-established international laws — a question that will likely be the focus of international lawyers in this area for some time to come.

This essay focuses on one area of state practice where states are already dealing with these issues: the use …

Ending The Excessive Use Of Force At Home And Abroad, Mary Ellen O'Connell

Journal Articles

In the mid-1980s the American Society of International Law (ASIL) launched an initiative to engage more women and minority members in the Society and international law more generally.' Professor Henry Richardson was there, encouraging all of the new aspirants, including me. He is still doing that, and this essay in his honor is an expression of gratitude, admiration, and affection. It develops themes Hank and I have both pursued for decades: human rights, peace and non-violence, and the promotion of international law and ASIL.

Cyber Strategy & Policy: International Law Dimensions, Matthew C. Waxman

Faculty Scholarship

Important international law questions for formulating cyber strategy and policy include whether and when a cyber-attack amounts to an “act of war,” or, more precisely, an “armed attack” triggering a right of self-defense, and how the international legal principle of “sovereignty” could apply to cyber activities. International law in this area is not settled. There is, however, ample room within existing international law to support a strong cyber strategy, including a powerful deterrent. The answers to many international law questions discussed below depend on specific, case-by-case facts, and are likely to be highly contested for a long time to come. …