Public Law and Legal Theory Commons^™

Defragmentation Of Public International Law Through Interpretation: A Methodological Proposal, Anne Van Aaken

Indiana Journal of Global Legal Studies

Fragmentation of public international law (PIL) is perceived as a growing problem and answers to it are proliferating. International courts and tribunals are adjudicating ever more on issues that would be considered-were they not transnational or international in nature-constitutional problems. In national law, countervailing values, or intra-constitutional conflicts, are reconciled through a balancing of those values that is usually embedded in the application of the proportionality principle. A similar mechanism in PIL remains underdeveloped from a methodological point of view. This article aims to develop a methodological proposal for defragmentation through interpretation, drawing on legal theory, to be more precise …

The Legal Limits Of Universal Jurisdiction, Anthony J. Colangelo

Faculty Journal Articles and Book Chapters

Despite all the attention it receives from both its supporters and critics, universal jurisdiction remains one of the more confused doctrines of international law. Indeed, while commentary has focused largely and unevenly on policy and normative arguments either favoring or undercutting the desirability of its exercise, a straightforward legal analysis breaking down critical aspects of this extraordinary form of jurisdiction remains conspicuously missing. Yet universal jurisdiction's increased practice by states calls out for such a clear descriptive understanding. This Essay engages this under-treated area. It offers to explicate a basic, but overlooked, feature of the law of universal jurisdiction: If …

David P. Forsythe On Non-State Actors And Human Rights. Edited By Philip Alston. Oxford, Uk: Oxford University Press, 2005. 350pp., David P. Forsythe

Human Rights & Human Welfare

No abstract provided.

A Foundation For International Taxation: The Institutional Competence Of Nations, Eric T. Laity

ExpressO

This Article proposes a conceptual foundation for the field of international tax law. The Article refers to this foundation as the institutional competence of nations in global economic development. A nation’s institutional competence is its discretion to make decisions in pursuit of our collective goal of global economic development, discretion that is subject to a number of standards and limitations.

The Article constructs the institutional competence of nations in global economic development from institutional economics, simple game theory, and the literature on social norms. The Article expresses the institutional competence of nations through standards and limitations that reduce the abuse …

Compliance Theory And The Inter-American Court Of Human Rights, Morse Tan

ExpressO

Abstract This essay fills a gap by exploring compliance theory in international law to the Inter-American Court of Human Rights. After introducing the topic and setting the context, it delves into the question of why nations follow international law. Interacting with prominent theoretical models (including the managerial model, fairness and legitimacy, transnational legal process, self-interest, and a comparative perspective with Europe), it arrives at a critical synthesis in the conclusion.

Compliance Theory And The Inter-American Court Of Human Rights, Morse Hyun-Myung Tan

ExpressO

This essay fills a gap by exploring compliance theory in international law to the Inter-American Court of Human Rights. After introducing the topic and setting the context, it delves into the question of why nations follow international law. Interacting with prominent theoretical models (including the managerial model, fairness and legitimacy, transnational legal process, self-interest, and a comparative perspective with Europe), it arrives at a critical synthesis in the conclusion.

International Legal Compliance: Surveying The Discipline, William C. Bradford

ExpressO

No abstract provided.

The Professional Professor, Kent D. Syverud

Vanderbilt Journal of Transnational Law

Welcome to the Vanderbilt Law School and to this happy occasion in which we reflect on the life and career of Jonathan Charney. I say this is a "happy" occasion deliberately. There have been two months and a lot of tears since Jonathan died, and I know for many people here including me the loss is still deeply felt in expected and unexpected ways. But we are celebrating today, and we should be happy as we reflect on the extraordinary career and accomplishments and life of Jonathan Charney.

After Seattle: Public International Organizations, Non-Governmental Organizations (Ngos), And Democratic Legitimacy In An Era Of Globalization: An Essay In Contested Legitimacy, Kenneth Anderson

Working Papers

This working monograph (about 120,000 words) analyzes the relationship between public international organizations such as the United Nations system and international non-governmental organizations under conditions of globalization. It argues that international organizations and international NGOs are locked in an embrace of mutual legitimation, each giving the other important political legitimacy, in favor of liberal internationalism and at the expense of democratic sovereignty. The monograph argues that the legitimacy that each gives the other is based on flawed assumptions about the nature of civil society and "international civil society," on the one hand, and global governance and the possibilities of international, …

The Kantian Theory Of International Law, Fernando R. Tesón

Scholarly Publications

This Article defends the view, first developed by Immanuel Kant, that international law and domestic justice are fundamentally connected.'

A New Concept Of Consent And World Public Order, Stuart S. Malawer

Vanderbilt Journal of Transnational Law

There have been, however, many instances under traditional international legal theory when a state's consent has not been required. Professor Brierly, in a trenchant critique, has stated that consent as the basic concept of obligation under customary international law has involved no more than the use of a legal fiction. Moreover, the traditional notion of consent in treaty law has stated that any form of coercion on the state does not invalidate a treaty; freely given consent is not required. Furthermore consent by new states to existing rules of customary international law has been implied regardless of any actual consent. …

The Neo-Positivist Concept Of International Law, Anthony D'Amato

Faculty Working Papers

The question "Is international law really law?" has not proved troublesome, according to Hart, because "a trivial question about the meaning of words has been mistaken for a serious question about the nature of things." Hart defends international law in Bentham's terms as "sufficiently analogous" to municipal law. It is important to see in what way this analogy is viewed by Hart in order to determine whether the reasoning he offers is too high a price to pay for accepting a neo-positivist into the circle of those who hold that international law is really law.