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Articles 1 - 28 of 28
Full-Text Articles in Law
The Least We Can Do, Susan E. Waltz
The Least We Can Do, Susan E. Waltz
Human Rights & Human Welfare
In the early months of 2003, when the U.S. was only threatening war, humanitarian relief organizations expected thousands of refugees to flee from Iraq into neighboring countries of Jordan and Syria. They were surprised when it did not happen. Four years later, the anticipated wave has at last arrived—and in tsunami proportions.
Iraqi Resettlement: Why Congress Will Act, David A. Weinberg
Iraqi Resettlement: Why Congress Will Act, David A. Weinberg
Human Rights & Human Welfare
I would like to commend Human Rights & Human Welfare for their recent roundtable on the Iraqi refugee crisis. The Roundtable rightly draws attention to the United States government’s woefully inadequate efforts thus far to address a major humanitarian crisis of its own making.
However, I do not agree with Professor Daniel Whelan’s assessment of “why Congress won’t act” on Iraqi resettlement. Dr. Whelan argues that the new Congress appears reluctant to resettle a reasonable number of Iraqi refugees in danger because Democrats fear that doing so would precipitate Iraqi state failure by means of “brain drain.” Instead, I would …
October Roundtable: Introduction
October Roundtable: Introduction
Human Rights & Human Welfare
An annotation of:
“No Refuge Here: Iraqis Flee, but Where?” by Joseph Huff-Hannon. Dissent. Summer 2007.
Would Iraqi Refugees Please Disappear, Richard A. Falk
Would Iraqi Refugees Please Disappear, Richard A. Falk
Human Rights & Human Welfare
I am grateful to Joseph Huff-Hannon for drawing our attention vividly and movingly to the plight of Iraqi refugees, its magnitude and cruelty. There are more than two million Iraqi refugees, with an estimated 50,000 per month added to the total. Many are languishing in terrible conditions in such neighboring countries as Syria and Jordan. These states, neither of which are notable as places of refuge, lack the capabilities for humane treatment even if their governments were altruistically inclined. Many Iraqis cannot even find such refuge, and remain hapless nomads in search of a sanctuary country. The U.S. refusal to …
Will Refuge Continue To Be Elusive, Katherine Gockel
Will Refuge Continue To Be Elusive, Katherine Gockel
Human Rights & Human Welfare
According to U.N. estimates, if current trends continue, the number of Iraqi asylum seekers by year-end could reach between 40,000 to 50,000. The influx of Iraqis into states such as Syria and Jordan also threatens to be a destabilizing force in those countries. Therefore, it is unreasonable to expect these states to individually cope with migration flows of this magnitude.
Iraqi Resettlement: Why Congress Won't Act, Daniel J. Whelan
Iraqi Resettlement: Why Congress Won't Act, Daniel J. Whelan
Human Rights & Human Welfare
After making an excellent case for the plight of Iraqi asylum seekers who have served as valuable allies to the United States in Iraq, Joseph Huff-Hannon’s article suggests that Congress should play a stronger role in developing a resettlement policy to allow Iraqis, who have been on “our side,” to come to the U.S. Given the current political climate on Iraq—and with Congressional Democrats desperate to score some kind of victory in its battle with the Bush White House—what exactly is holding them back?
Fleeing From Violence Versus Fleeing From Poverty, Michael Goodhart
Fleeing From Violence Versus Fleeing From Poverty, Michael Goodhart
Human Rights & Human Welfare
Nour al Khal worked as a translator for New York Times reporter Steven Vincent, who was murdered by Shiite militants in Iraq. Vincent’s widow has been trying to help al Khal (who was kidnapped and shot by the same group who killed Vincent) win asylum in the United States. So far political and bureaucratic obstacles have proven insurmountable.
Wars Against Civilians Are Unjust Wars, Richard A. Falk
Wars Against Civilians Are Unjust Wars, Richard A. Falk
Human Rights & Human Welfare
For those of us old enough to recall the anti-war testimony of Vietnam vets during the early 1970s, reading the chilling report by Hedges and Al-Arian on the attitudes of Iraq war vets is shocking, and yet not surprising. It is shocking because of the eyewitness confirmation of cruelty and lethal brutality on a regular basis in the interactions between the coalition army of occupation and Iraqi civilian society. Sadly, it is not shocking because of the nature of the violent resistance to occupation being encountered by American forces in Iraq, giving rise to a Vietnam-style mentality of counterinsurgency in …
Facing Up To The Truth, Susan E. Waltz
Facing Up To The Truth, Susan E. Waltz
Human Rights & Human Welfare
American GIs who liberated Dachau from the Nazis in April 1945 exist in our collective memory as iconic representations of the American soldier-hero: competent and capable, disciplined, principled and fundamentally good. From their collective example, we expect American soldiers to reveal, report, and excoriate war crimes. This makes it difficult to acknowledge that Americans may also commit war crimes—and on a regular basis.
September Roundtable: Introduction
September Roundtable: Introduction
Human Rights & Human Welfare
An annotation of:
“The Other War: Iraq Vets Bear Witness” by Chris Hedges and Laila Al-Arian. The Nation, July 30, 2007.
Occupational Hazard, Michael Goodhart
Occupational Hazard, Michael Goodhart
Human Rights & Human Welfare
“The Other War” describes how the patrols, supply convoys, checkpoints, raids, and arrests, which make up the daily routines of U.S. soldiers in Iraq, sometimes involve degrading and abusive treatment of Iraqi civilians. Through interviews with some of those soldiers, the article portrays the everyday tragedy of the Iraq war and demonstrates how the very policies used to “secure” the country are creating greater insecurity and sparking Iraqi resentment of the occupation. The authors’ main point is that such abuses are inevitable under what they call “misguided and brutal colonial wars and occupations” like Iraq, “the French occupation of Algeria… …
Bad Apples Or Bad Policies?, Daniel J. Whelan
Bad Apples Or Bad Policies?, Daniel J. Whelan
Human Rights & Human Welfare
In a scene from the Woody Allen film Hannah and Her Sisters, the haughty and cantankerous character Frederick (Max von Sydow) is telling his girlfriend (Barbara Hershey) how he spent the evening flipping through channels on television. Ever the arrogant social critic, Frederick remarks,
You missed a very dull TV show on Auschwitz. More gruesome film clips. And more puzzled intellectuals declaring their mystification over the systematic murder of millions. The reason they can never answer the question: “How could it possibly happen?” is that it’s the wrong question. Given what people are, the question is: “Why doesn't it happen …
National Security, The Law, The Meda: Shaping Public Perceptions, Linda Robinson
National Security, The Law, The Meda: Shaping Public Perceptions, Linda Robinson
International Law Studies
No abstract provided.
Military And The Media In Perspective: Finding The Necessary Balance, James P. Terry
Military And The Media In Perspective: Finding The Necessary Balance, James P. Terry
International Law Studies
No abstract provided.
Mercenaries And Other Ways Of Breaking The Law: Why Our Blood Should Boil, Judith Blau
Mercenaries And Other Ways Of Breaking The Law: Why Our Blood Should Boil, Judith Blau
Human Rights & Human Welfare
Among the many consequences of the terrorist attacks of 9/11, the absence of investigative journalism and critical reflection in the U.S. is, perhaps, the most troubling; though we are now seeing a reversal of this trend. Jeremy Scahill has been one of the brightest and best examples of this reversal, relentlessly pursuing a trail of wrongdoing involving the U.S. government and private corporations.
Oil. The Geopolitics Of Oil And Iraq, Issam Al-Chalabi
Oil. The Geopolitics Of Oil And Iraq, Issam Al-Chalabi
New England Journal of Public Policy
The author deals only with the recent developments that will shape the destiny of Iraq and determine whether it will remain a unified country or disintegrate. He is not optimistic.
July Roundtable: Introduction
Human Rights & Human Welfare
An annotation of:
“Outsourcing the War ” by Jeremy Schaill. The Nation. May 28, 2007.
Private Military Industry And The Laws Of War, Mahmood Monshipouri
Private Military Industry And The Laws Of War, Mahmood Monshipouri
Human Rights & Human Welfare
The “war on terrorism,” according to Jeremy Scahill, has led to the most privatized war in the history of the United States of America: the war in Iraq, waged partially by private security contractors who are, for the most part, accountable to no higher legal-political authority. This brings us to an obvious question: Is this type of warfare an imperative part of counterterrorism?
Rooting The Privatization Of War In A Broader Political Context, Ali Wyne
Rooting The Privatization Of War In A Broader Political Context, Ali Wyne
Human Rights & Human Welfare
On the issue of military outsourcing, I think that it would be valuable to place Jeremy Scahill’s research and critique in a broader context.
Can The Next American President Switch The Tracks?, Harry Kreisler
Can The Next American President Switch The Tracks?, Harry Kreisler
Human Rights & Human Welfare
For decades the Washington mantra has been privatization. As Secretary of Defense in Bush 41’s administration and as CEO of Haliburton, Dick Cheney was influential in the application of this idea to defense policy. Now as Vice President of the United States, he and his coterie of followers have taken the idea to a new level. According to Jeremy Scahill, the United States has reached a tipping point in waging the Iraq war, with dire consequences for defense policy, democratic accountability, and the global perception of who we are and what we stand for.
May Roundtable: Introduction
Human Rights & Human Welfare
An annotation of:
“The Politics of Naming: Genocide, Civil War, Insurgency” by Mahmood Mamdani. London Review of Books. March 8, 2007.
Politics Of Naming And Politics Of Responsibility, Rhoda Howard-Hassmann
Politics Of Naming And Politics Of Responsibility, Rhoda Howard-Hassmann
Human Rights & Human Welfare
Mahmood Mamdani is right to complain that the American—and international—public is unaware of the political complexity of the Darfur conflict. He is also right to point out that selective or inconsistent uses of the terms “genocide,” “civil war,” and “insurgency” can mask covert, or even overt, political agendas. His comparison of Darfur to Iraq is telling. And he is right to point out that even with the best of humanitarian intentions, the presentation of a simplified version of Darfur, in which “Arabs” persecute “Africans,” can play into the “war on terror,” insofar as, in the minds of at least some …
The Return Of Moral Equivalence, J. Peter Pham
The Return Of Moral Equivalence, J. Peter Pham
Human Rights & Human Welfare
During the latter stages of the Cold War, one school of ethical analysis, ultimately labeled as “moral equivalence” by the late Jeane Kirkpatrick, measured Western liberal democracies against utopian standards in a radical critique which redefined the political discourse, erasing distinctions between the Soviet Union and its satellites on the one hand and the United States and its allies on the other.
Missing The Point, Colin Thomas-Jensen
Missing The Point, Colin Thomas-Jensen
Human Rights & Human Welfare
“What would happen if we thought of Darfur as we do of Iraq, as a place with a history and politics—a messy politics of insurgency and counterinsurgency?” (§4). This is the most telling question posed by Professor Mahmood Mamdani in “The Politics of Naming: Genocide, Civil War, Insurgency.” The implication is that the growing public demand for strong international action—military or otherwise—to halt the atrocities in Darfur is somehow unwarranted because people have failed to understand that the systematic crimes against humanity committed against civilians in Darfur (and indeed Iraq) are an inevitability of “the messy politics of insurgency and …
The Moral Vocabulary Of Violence, David L. G. Rice
The Moral Vocabulary Of Violence, David L. G. Rice
Human Rights & Human Welfare
What is at stake in labeling a particular incidence of large-scale violence “genocide”? Mahmood Mamdani rightly argues that “genocide” is an insufficient description of the conflict in Darfur. I would suggest that the problematic nature of that terminology goes back to its inception after World War II. Activists have inherited the concept of “genocide” from a particular historical moment. Now, “ genocide” carries unique moral weight in the discourse of international politics. When violence against civilians has been widely accepted as a necessary outcome of the preservation of peace, activists find it necessary to imagine a worse evil than the …
Iraq, Secured Transactions, And The Promise Of Islamic Law, Mark J. Sundahl
Iraq, Secured Transactions, And The Promise Of Islamic Law, Mark J. Sundahl
Vanderbilt Journal of Transnational Law
When Iraq regains political stability, major reconstruction projects will have to be funded and local businesses will need financing in order to gain a foothold in the new economy. In order to attract the necessary capital, the Iraqi law of secured transactions must be reformed to allow for lenders to take security in the assets of their borrowers. However, the challenge of reforming Iraqi commercial law is complicated by the requirement under the new Iraqi Constitution that any new statutes enacted by the Iraqi legislature comply with the principles of Islamic law. This Article sets forth proposals for reform that …
Responsibility To Pay: Compensating Civilian Casualties Of War, Jonathan Tracy
Responsibility To Pay: Compensating Civilian Casualties Of War, Jonathan Tracy
Human Rights Brief
No abstract provided.
Private Attorneys General V. "War Profiteers": Applying The False Claims Act To Security Contractors In Iraq, Bryan Terry
Private Attorneys General V. "War Profiteers": Applying The False Claims Act To Security Contractors In Iraq, Bryan Terry
Seattle University Law Review
In order to provide context for the Custer Battles court's opinion, Part II of this Note generally describes the FCA and the policies behind its qui tam provision, discusses policy rationales behind the use of private security contractors by the U.S. government, and highlights how security contractors like Custer Battles fit into that picture within the reality of present-day Iraq. Part III examines the reasoning of the Custer Battles court, and Part IV critiques that reasoning and the application of precedent in this case. Part V proposes an alternative to the court's reasoning which more closely aligns with the interests …