Law Commons^™

Untold Truths: The Exclusion Of Enforced Sterilizations From The Peruvian Truth Commission's Final Report, Jocelyn E. Getgen

Cornell Law School Berger International Speaker Papers

This presentation argues that the exclusion of enforced sterilization cases from the Peruvian Truth Commission's investigation and Final Report effectively erases State responsibility and decreases the likelihood for justice and reparations for women victims-survivors of State-sponsored violence in Peru. In a context of deep cultural and economic divides and violent conflict, this presentation recounts how the State's Family Planning Program violated Peruvian women's reproductive rights by sterilizing low-income, indigenous Quechua-speaking women without informed consent. This presentation argues that these systematic reproductive injustices constitute an act of genocide, proposes an independent inquiry, and advocates for a more inclusive investigation and final …

Attempt, Conspiracy, And Incitement To Commit Genocide, Jens David Ohlin

Cornell Law Faculty Publications

In these brief commentaries to the U.N. Genocide Convention, I explore three criminal law modes of liability as they apply to the international crime of genocide. Part I analyzes attempt to commit genocide and uncovers a basic tension over whether attempt refers to the genocide itself (the chapeau) or the underlying offense (such as killing). Part I concludes that the tension stems from the fact that the crime of genocide itself is already inchoate in nature, since the legal requirements for the crime do not require an actual, completed genocide, in the common-sense understanding of the term, but only a …

Enhancing Enforcement Of Economic, Social And Cultural Rights Using Indicators: A Focus On The Right To Education In The Icescr, Sital Kalantry, Joycelyn E. Getgen, Steven Arrigg Koh

Cornell Law Faculty Working Papers

Nearly fifteen years ago, Audrey R. Chapman emphasized the importance of ascertaining violations of the International Covenant on Economic, Social and Cultural Rights (ICESCR) as a means to enhance its enforcement. Today, the violations approach is even more salient given the recent adoption of the ICESCR’s Optional Protocol, a powerful tool to hold States parties accountable for violations.

Indicators are essential tools for assessing violations of economic, social and cultural rights (ESCRs) because they are often the best way to measure progressive realization. Proposed guidelines on using indicators give guidance on the content of States parties reports to treaty monitoring …

The United Nations Declaration On The Rights Of Indigenous Peoples: A New Dawn For Indigenous Peoples Rights?, Ronald Kakungulu

Cornell Law School Inter-University Graduate Student Conference Papers

Governments in many countries of the world struggle with how to accommodate properly the needs and claims [rights] of native/indigenous peoples within their jurisdictions whose presence long predates European conquest and occupation. In this paper, a comparison and contrast of the approaches of the African and other jurisdictions whose jurisprudence is informative to the protection of the rights of African indigenous peoples, like the Inter-American Court of Human Rights compared with the US, Canada, New Zealand and Australia ‘the big four’ who voted against the UN Declaration on the Rights of Indigenous on September 13, 2007 at the UN General …

Why Paretians Can’T Prescribe: Preferences, Principles, And Imperatives In Law And Policy, Robert C. Hockett

Cornell Law Faculty Publications

Recent years have witnessed two linked revivals in the legal academy. The first is renewed interest in articulating a normative “master principle” by which legal rules might be evaluated. The second is renewed interest in the prospect that a variant of Benthamite “utility” might serve as the requisite touchstone. One influential such variant now in circulation is what the Article calls “Paretian welfarism.”

This Article rejects Paretian welfarism and advocates an alternative it calls “fair welfare.” It does so because Paretian welfarism is inconsistent with ethical, social, and legal prescription, while fair welfare is what we have been groping for …

Measuring State Compliance With The Right To Education Using Indicators: A Case Study Of Colombia’S Obligations Under The Icescr, Sital Kalantry, Jocelyn Getgen, Steven A. Koh

Cornell Law Faculty Working Papers

The right to education is often referred to as a “multiplier right” because its enjoyment enhances other human rights. It is enumerated in several international instruments, but it is codified in greatest detail in the International Covenant on Economic, Social and Cultural Rights (ICESCR). Despite its importance, the right to education has received limited attention from scholars, practitioners, and international and regional human rights bodies as compared to other economic, social and cultural rights (ECSRs). In this Article, we propose a methodology that utilizes indicators to measure treaty compliance with the right to education. Indicators are essential to measuring compliance …

Untold Truths: The Exclusion Of Enforced Sterilizations From The Peruvian Truth Commission's Final Report, Jocelyn E. Getgen

Cornell Law Faculty Publications

This Article argues that the exclusion of enforced sterilization cases from the Peruvian Truth Commission's investigation and Final Report effectively erases State responsibility and decreases the likelihood for justice and reparations for women victims-survivors of State-sponsored violence in Peru. In a context of deep cultural and economic divides and violent conflict, this Article recounts how the State's Family Planning Program violated Peruvian women's reproductive rights by sterilizing low-income, indigenous Quechua-speaking women without informed consent. This Article argues that these systematic reproductive injustices constitute an act of genocide, proposes an independent inquiry, and advocates for a more inclusive investigation and final …

Human Persons, Human Rights, And The Distributive Structure Of Global Justice, Robert C. Hockett

Cornell Law Faculty Publications

It is common for economically oriented transnational legal theorists to think and communicate mainly in maximizing terms. It is less common for them to notice that each time we speak explicitly of maximizing one thing, we speak implicitly of distributing another thing and equalizing yet another thing. Moreover, we effectively define ourselves and our fellow humans by reference to that which we equalize. For it is in virtue of the latter that our global welfare formulations treat us as "counting" for purposes of globally aggregating and maximizing.

To analyze maximization language on the one hand, and equalization and identification language …

Untold Truths: The Exclusion Of Enforced Sterilizations From The Peruvian Truth Commission's Final Report, Jocelyn E. Getgen

Cornell Law Faculty Publications

This Article argues that the exclusion of enforced sterilization cases from the Peruvian Truth Commission's investigation and Final Report effectively erases State responsibility and decreases the likelihood for justice and reparations for women victims-survivors of State sponsored violence in Peru. In a context of deep cultural and economic divides and violent conflict, this Article recounts how the State's Family Planning Program violated Peruvian women's reproductive rights by sterilizing low-income, indigenous Quechua-speaking women without informed consent. This Article argues that these systematic reproductive injustices constitute an act of genocide, proposes an independent inquiry, and advocates for a more inclusive investigation and …