Human Rights Law Commons^™

Culture Change, Lan Cao

Faculty Publications

No abstract provided.

After Atrocity Examples From Africa: The Right To Education And The Role Of Law In Restoration, Recovery, And Accountability, Erika George

Faculty Scholarship

This article begins to consider these important questions through a discussion of the multiple models used to address, and redress massive human rights violations in South Africa, Rwanda, and Sierra Leone. I argue that lawyers and policy makers working to advance the rule of law must consider the role of law in transitional societies not only as a means of ensuring that perpetrators of grave human rights abuses are held accountable, but also as a foundation for the future. I submit that for the rule of law to take root, the conditions of a society must be fertile; and respect …

Human Rights Outlaws: Nuremberg, Geneva, And The Global War On Terror, George J. Annas

Faculty Scholarship

International human rights law was born from the ashes of World War II. The most important post-World War II products are the United Nations, the Nuremberg Trials, the Universal Declaration of Human Rights, and the Geneva Conventions of 1949. But that was not the end of the story. International human rights law continued to develop and expand right up to September 11,2001, most notably through the adoption of the International Covenant on Civil and Political Rights2 and the Convention Against Torture, 3 and the establishment of the International Criminal Court.4 With the exception of the criminal court, the United States …

Physicians And Torture: Lessons From The Nazi Doctors, Michael Grodin, George J. Annas

Faculty Scholarship

How is it possible? What are the personal, professional and political contexts that allow physicians to use their skills to torture and kill rather than heal? What are the psychological characteristics and the social, cultural and political factors that predispose physicians to participate in human rights abuses? What can be done to recognize at-risk situations and attempt to provide corrective or preventive strategies? This article examines case studies from Nazi Germany in an attempt to answer these questions. Subjects discussed include the psychology of the individual perpetrator, dehumanization, numbing, splitting, omnipotence, medicalization, group dynamics, obedience to authority, diffusion of responsibility, …

The Arab Charter On Human Rights 2004, Susan M. Akram

Faculty Scholarship

The Boston University International Law Journal is publishing, for the first time, an English version of the 2004 Arab Charter on Human Rights. A very brief review of how the 2004 Arab Charter came into being introduces this English translation. The drafting history of the Arab Charter on Human Rights begins in 1960. In that year, members of the Union of Arab Lawyers (the oldest NGO in the Arab world) requested the League of Arab States (created in 1945) during their meeting in Damascus to adopt an Arab Convention on Human Rights. Eight years later, participants in the first meeting …

Geography And International Law: Towards A Postcolonial Mapping, Tayyab Mahmud

Faculty Articles

Postcolonial theory aims at a critical interrogation of legitimizing knowledge claims put forward by proponents of the resurgent Empire. This article undertakes such an interrogation at the intersection of geography and international law. It aims to demonstrate that both modern geography and modern international law were constituted in, by, and through imperatives of Empire and unavoidably bear traces of their formative origin. The aim is to theorize the spatiality of global relations of domination and resistance under the shadow of international law. The article first identifies the vantage point of this critical engagement, namely postcolonial approach to inquiry. It then …

Reinforcing Refugee Protection In The Wake Of The War On Terror, Edwin Odhiambo Abuya

Faculty Articles

This article examines how the Convention Against Torture and Other Cruel, Inhuman or Degrading Treatment or Punishment (CAT) can be used as a practical tool to enhance the protection of persons who have fled their home States in search of asylum in the wake of the global "war on terror." It compares and contrasts provisions of CAT to similar provisions contained in international refugee law. This article contends that, in some respects, the protection provisions of CAT are wider than those found in international refugee law, and, in other respects, narrower than those found in international refugee law. It concludes …

Moiwana Village V. Suriname: A Portal Into Recent Jurisprudential Developments Of The Inter-American Court Of Human Rights, Thomas Antkowiak

Faculty Articles

On June 15, 2005, the Inter-American Court issued its judgment in Moiwana Village v. Suriname, which held Suriname responsible for numerous human rights violations and ordered several remedial measures. In a separate opinion, one of the Tribunal's veteran judges, Ant¿nio Can¿ado-Trindade, wrote that the case "raises issues of great transcendence." Certainly, the decision illustrates several of the Court's latest jurisprudential developments, and navigates a few rising socio-political tides in South and Central America. This brief essay seeks to demonstrate how the Moiwana case: a) presents factual situations that are increasingly common before the Court; b) continues to develop key legal …

Civil Liability For Violations Of International Humanitarian Law: The Jurisprudence Of The Ethiopia-Eritrea Claims Tribunal In The Hague, Won Kidane

Faculty Articles

Violations of international humanitarian law are compensable by a state causing the violations. The roots of this obligation can be traced to Article 3 of Hague Convention IV, which states that a party to the conflict which violates the provisions of [international humanitarian law] shall . . . be liable to pay compensation. It shall be responsible for all acts committed by persons forming part of its armed forces. A similar rule is also contained in Protocol I Additional to the 1949 Geneva Conventions. In practice, the enforcement of this important provision of international humanitarian law has remained a matter …

Past Reflections, Future Insights: African Asylum Law And Policy In Historical Perspective, Edwin Odhiambo Abuya

Faculty Articles

This article argues that an understanding of the evolution of asylum is an essential ingredient in the search for ideas and perspectives to the plight facing forced migrants. Using Kenya as a case study, the paper evaluates the extent to which procedures used to determine claims for asylum, protection outcomes and entitlements met international human rights and refugee law standards. It is contended that limited resources, porous boundaries and the mass movement of asylum seekers have compromised the level of protection offered to those who seek surrogate protection in African states like Kenya. In conclusion, critics in the area of …

The Land Of The Free: Human Rights Violations At Immigration Detention Facilities In America, Caitlin J. Mitchel

LLM Theses and Essays

In America today, aliens who commit even minor visa violations can be detained in one of many immigration detention facilities throughout the U.S. These detainees may be transferred to a facility far away from their homes, families, and attorneys. While imprisoned in these detention facilities, some detainees are treated as and housed with criminals. Their substantive and procedural rights are limited and their human rights are violated. The U.S. laws that should protect them are the very laws that strip them of their rights to court proceedings, challenges of decisions regarding detention, and judicial review. By issuing substantial reservations, declarations, …

Comfort Women: Human Rights Of Women From Then To Present, Jinyang Koh

LLM Theses and Essays

This paper discusses the human rights of women through the atrocities in the Japanese comfort system during World War II. Approximately 100,000 military sexual slaves, so-called "comfort women", were recruited coercively, raped and mostly killed under the control of the Japanese government and military. The stance of Japan which has denied any legal liability in this matter affects severely the retrogression of the human rights of women. In order to ameliorate the human right at both international and domestic levels ultimately, it is significant to observe the facts of the comfort women issue, to analyze the legal liabilities of the …

International Legal Standards Governing The Use Of Child Soldiers, Dorcas B. Mulira

LLM Theses and Essays

This paper seeks to analyze the international laws governing the use of children in armedconflict. Despite the prohibition of the use of child soldiers in armed conflict in internationallaw, States and non-State actors continue to actively recruit, abduct, and directly use children,some as young as eight, in hostilities. International humanitarian law's limited scope prevents itfrom protecting the worldÕs most vulnerable children, child soldiers, while human rightsinstruments adopted to make up for these limitations lack enforcement mechanisms, thereforerendering the much-needed protection for child soldiers inadequate. As development ofinternational law concerning child soldiers progresses on paper, progress on the ground lagsbehind, thus …

Open Or Closed: Balancing Border Policy With Human Rights, Elizabeth M. Bruch

Kentucky Law Journal

No abstract provided.

The War On Speech In The War On Terror: An Examination Of The Espionage Act Applied To Modern First Amendment Doctrine, Emily Posner

Cardozo Arts & Entertainment Law Journal

No abstract provided.

Joel R. Pruce On The Human Rights Reader: Major Political Essays, Speeches And Documents From Ancient Times To The Present (Second Edition), By Micheline R. Ishay. New York, Ny: Routledge, 2007. 592pp., Joel R. Pruce

Human Rights & Human Welfare

A review of:

The Human Rights Reader: Major Political Essays, Speeches and Documents from Ancient Times to the Present (Second Edition), by Micheline R. Ishay. New York, NY: Routledge, 2007. 592pp.

Freeing All God’S Children, Clifford Bob

Human Rights & Human Welfare

A review of:

Freeing God’s Children: The Unlikely Alliance for Global Human Rights by Allen D. Hertzke. Lanham, MD: Rowman & Littlefield, 2004. 419pp.

“I’M Just Talking About The Law”: Guantánamo And The Lawyers, Marten Zwanenburg

Human Rights & Human Welfare

A review of:

Guantánamo: The War on Human Rights by David Rose. New York: The New Press, 2004.

Noble Human Rights Defender Or International Band-Aid? On Contemporary Humanitarianism, Kurt Mills

Human Rights & Human Welfare

A review of:

The Humanitarians: The International Committee of the Red Cross by David P. Forsythe. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2005.

Making Sense Of A Senseless War, J. Peter Pham

Human Rights & Human Welfare

A review of:

A Dirty War in West Africa: The RUF and the Destruction of Sierra Leone by Lansana Gberie. Bloomington, IN: Indiana University Press, 2005.

and

Young Soldiers: Why They Choose to Fight by Rachel Brett and Irma Specht. Boulder, CO: Lynne Rienner Publishers, 2005.

The Ethics Of Torture, Rebecca Evans

Human Rights & Human Welfare

A review of:

Torture: Does It Make Us Safer? Is It Ever OK? A Human Rights Perspective. Edited by Kenneth Roth and Mindy Worden. New York: The New Press, 2005. 201 pp.

Human Rights And The War On Terror Second Edition: Introduction, Jack Donnelly

Human Rights & Human Welfare

“9/11 changed everything.” Not really. In fact, there has been far more continuity than change over the past six years in both international and domestic politics. Nonetheless, human rights often have been harmed—although not by terrorism but by “the war on terror.”

Title Page

Human Rights & Human Welfare

Title page for the 2007 supplement to the Human Rights and the War on Terror topical research digest.

Children's Rights Are Human Rights- An Introductory Handbook For Students And Professionals, Claire Bedard

Center for the Human Rights of Children

This handbook is intended for students and professionals of all disciplines- either closely or remotely connected to serving the needs of children. The goal of this handbook is to advance the cause of children everywhere.

Rehabilitation Or Revenge: Prosecuting Child Soldiers For Human Rights Violations, Nienke Grossman

All Faculty Scholarship

International law provides no explicit guidelines for whether or at what age child soldiers should be prosecuted for grave violations of international humanitarian and human rights law such as genocide, war crimes, and crimes against humanity. This paper argues that the hundreds of thousands of children under age eighteen participating in armed conflicts around the globe should be treated primarily as victims, not perpetrators, of human rights violations and that international law may support this conclusion. In the case of children, the world community should choose rehabilitation and reintegration over criminal prosecution because of children's unique psychological and moral development, …

Change In The Human Rights Universe, Makau Mutua

Journal Articles

No abstract provided.

The U.N. Disability Convention: Historic Process, Strong Prospects And Why The U.S. Should Ratify, Tara J. Melish

Journal Articles

On December 13, 2006, the United Nations General Assembly unanimously adopted the Convention on the Rights of Persons with Disabilities. The Convention is historic and path-breaking on several levels, both in protection terms for the world's 650 million persons with disabilities who may now draw upon its provisions in defense of their internationally-protected rights, and in relation to the unprecedented level of civil society input and engagement in the negotiation process. This sustained and constructive engagement has given rise to a dynamic process of dialogue, cooperation, and mutual trust that will fuel monitoring and implementation work, at national and international …

The Priority Of The Person: Some Critical Challenges Facing International Human Rights In The Next Generation, Paolo G. Carozza

Book Chapters

From the Introduction

One of the great pleasures for me of teaching regularly at ASERI has been the chance to interact with a marvellous cross-section of young people from all of Europe and beyond. In them I have found a hope, enthusiasm, openness and dynamism that transcends their languages and nationalities. One can only hope that they will keep those qualities alive as they are called to face the challenges that the world of international affairs will bring to their generation, demands that will be as multifaceted and cross-cultural as they themselves are. Many of the issues that they will …

Global Health And Human Rights Imperative, Patricia C. Kuszler

Articles

Open any magazine, click on a television news channel, or surf the net and you are likely to find global health highlighted as one of the foremost challenges of new millennium. First, this article will consider the meaning and measures of global health and detail the path to improved health and development prescribed by the United Nations Millennium Development Goals. Second, it will trace the development of international human rights law as it relates to health. Third, it demonstrate how human rights and health, long traversing parallel routes, are in fact converging in the 21st Century quest for global health–a …

Militating Democracy: Comparative Constitutional Perspectives, Ruti Teitel

Michigan Journal of International Law

Can constitutional review by judges save democracy? This Article identifies and discusses the rise of "militant constitutional democracy" by exploring diverse approaches to the role of constitutional and transnational judicial review in rights protection and the challenges that these approaches present to the workings of democracy, the possibilities of compromise, consensus, and conciliation in political life, and the challenge to other constitutional values as well. "Militant constitutional democracy" ought to be understood as belonging to transitional constitutionalism, associated with periods of political transformation that often demand closer judicial vigilance in the presence of fledgling and often fragile democratic institutions; it …