Human Rights Law Commons^™

Poetic Justice, Darrell Cannon

Public Interest Law Reporter

No abstract provided.

The Invisibility Of Female Farmworkers: How Current Workers' Rights Legislation Fails To Adequately Protect Female Farmworkers And Exposes Them To Serious Health And Safety Risks, Martha Laura Garcia

Public Interest Law Reporter

Migrant and seasonal farmworkers are one of the most isolated and vulnerable population groups in the United States. Not only is the nature of their work exhausting and dangerous, but many times, the workers face other challenges, like cultural and language barriers and limited access to legal, health, and educational services. Female farmworkers are particularly vulnerable to the many risks seasonal and migrant farmworkers face, with the additional challenge of having limited forms of legal relief. By giving an overview of current labor laws and presenting the main risks female farmworkers face, this article will demonstrate that labor laws and …

Tunnel Vision: How The System Chooses Its Target, Alison Hill

Public Interest Law Reporter

No abstract provided.

Many Poor Americans Are Not Getting Access To Clean Drinking Water, A Basic Human Right, Keimer Raymond

Public Interest Law Reporter

No abstract provided.

Reform Demanded By Minorities On Police's Use Of Excessive Force And The U.S. Government's Resistance To Change, Jessica Younan

Public Interest Law Reporter

No abstract provided.

Dignity Rights: A Response To Peggy Cooper Davis's Little Citizens And Their Families, Jane M. Spinak

Faculty Scholarship

Professor Spinak responds to Professor Davis’ comment by considering how the concept of human dignity can be used to reassert human rights – of individual members of the family and the family as an entity – that have been diminished, if not destroyed, by poverty and inequality.

Baxian Tremf Anxieties And Patterns Of Norm Entrepreneurship In Canada-Nigerian Human Rights Engagements: A Theoretical Overview, Obiora C. Okafor

Articles & Book Chapters

The article argues that the evidence that has been systematically analyzed in the study that grounds this volume at once support and undermine certain elements of the two theoretical frameworks that grounded the research: Upendra Baxi’s germinal theory on the emergence to global dominance of a kind of “trade-related market-friendly human rights” (TREMF) paradigm/discourse/mentality, and Martha Finnemore and Karthryn Sikikink’s strategic social constructivist theory on the role of the norm entrepreneur in generating and driving the so-called human rights “norm life cycles.” The article then suggests, in consequence, that both of these theoretical frameworks require a (modest) measure of refinement.

The Nature, Attainments, Problems And Prospects Of Canadian-Nigerian Human Rights Engagements: An Analytical Overview, Obiora C. Okafor

Articles & Book Chapters

By way of a fully developed conclusion, this article offers a broad analytical overview of the insights that have been jointly and severally generated by the main sub-studies on which the articles in this volume are based. It offers such overarching discussions, one after the other, in relation to the nature, attainments, problems, and prospects of Canadian-Nigerian international human rights engagements. Drawing upon these analytical insights, the article then makes some pertinent recommendations that are addressed to the relevant stakeholders, especially in Canada and Nigeria, i.e. policy-makers, practitioners and theorists alike (depending on which of the itemized points they find …

Does International Human Rights Law In African Courts Make A Difference, Daniel Abebe

Faculty Scholarship

Is international human rights law effective in Africa? Extant studies assess effectiveness fry focusing on the potential of individual African regional and sub-regional courts to promote human rights and influence domestic actors. However, few if any studies actually evaluate the entire human rights jurisprudence of the five major African courts with jurisdiction to hear human rights claims. In this Article, I examine the entire human rights caseload of these courts from 1988 through 2015 along four important dimensions of effectiveness: (1) court structure; (2) volume of cases; (3) compliance rate; and (4) funding and independence. The Article finds that African …

Poverty In The Human Rights Jurisprudence Of The Nigerian Appellate Courts (1999-2011), Obiora C. Okafor, Basil E. Ugochukwu

Articles & Book Chapters

The major objective of this article is to examine the extent to which the human rights jurisprudence of the Nigerian appellate courts has been sensitive and/or receptive to the socio-economic and political claims of Nigeria’s large population of the poor and marginalized. In particular, the article considers: the extent to which Nigerian human rights jurisprudence has either facilitated or hindered the efforts of the poor to ameliorate their own poverty; the kinds of conceptual apparatuses and analyses utilized by the Nigerian courts in examining the issues brought before it that concerned the specific conditions of the poor; and the key …

Backlash Against International Courts In West, East And Southern Africa: Causes And Consequences, Karen J. Alter, James T. Gathii, Laurence R. Helfer

Faculty Scholarship

This paper discusses three credible attempts by African governments to restrict the jurisdiction of three similarly-situated sub-regional courts in response to politically controversial rulings. In West Africa, when the ECOWAS Court upheld allegations of torture by opposition journalists in the Gambia, that country’s political leaders sought to restrict the Court’s power to review human rights complaints. The other member states ultimately defeated the Gambia’s proposal. In East Africa, Kenya failed in its efforts to eliminate the EACJ and to remove some of its judges after a decision challenging an election to a sub-regional legislature. However, the member states agreed to …

Feminism And International Law In The Post 9/11 Era, Jayne C. Huckerby

Faculty Scholarship

No abstract provided.

The Thirteenth Amendment, Disparate Impact, And Empathy Deficits, Darrell A. H. Miller

Faculty Scholarship

No abstract provided.

Legal Formulations Of A Human Right To Information: Defining A Global Consensus, Kimberli Morris Kelmor

Law Library Faculty Works

There is a growing body of law across the globe that seeks to define a right to information. Any study of such laws quickly reveals a great diversity of definitions for both the type of information covered and the nature of the right. Access to various particular types of information is routinely granted in piecemeal fashion through all levels of government including national sub-constitutional laws, national constitutions, and regional and international treaties. In the hierarchy of individual rights, constitutionally granted rights are commonly perceived as the strongest and are most likely to be accepted as inviolable. Thus, the increasing number …

Examining The Legality Of The Guantánamo Bay Detention Center According To International Humanitarian Law And International Human Rights Law, Sydney T. Winchester

Honors Undergraduate Theses

The purpose of this research paper is to examine how international humanitarian law (IHL) and international human rights law (IHRL) are applied to the Guantánamo Bay detention center. This paper was completed through the research of international treaties, court cases, and secondary sources that thoroughly discussed issues pertaining to Guantánamo and international law.

This paper first examines the differences between the two laws by looking at the particular roles each is meant to play in the subject of international law, as well as how the two have been applied thus far to the situation at Guantánamo. Second, the paper discusses …

The Variation In The Use Of Sub-Regional Integration Courts Between Business And Human Rights Actors: The Case Of The East African Court Of Justice, James T. Gathii

Faculty Publications & Other Works

No abstract provided.

Trafficking Smuggled Migrants: An Issue Of Vulnerability, Rachel A. Hews

Global Tides

This paper analyzes why the UN’s efforts against the sex trafficking of smuggled migrants, specifically regarding the Palermo and Smuggling Protocols, have been inadequate in preventing migrant smuggling. It concludes that the crime-based focus on prosecution overshadows prevention of the crime and protection of the victims, and that a human rights approach addressing the vulnerability of smuggled migrants would be more effective in reducing migrant smuggling long-term. Proposed solutions include decreasing both the “push” and “pull” factors of migration by ratifying existing legislation regarding basic human rights, implementing national policies that increase migrant rights in destination countries, and shifting further …

Finding Safe Harbor: Eliminating The Gap In Colorado's Human Trafficking Laws, Jessica A. Pingleton

University of Colorado Law Review

In March 2014, the Colorado Court of Appeals acquitted Dallas Cardenas of all human trafficking charges. The court determined that under the 2014 version of Colorado's human trafficking statute, a defendant who sold the sexual services of a minor, as opposed to selling a minor for sex, did not commit the crime of human trafficking. Following the Cardenas decision, the state legislature passed House Bill 1273, which broadened the language of the statute and eliminated all possible affirmative defenses, including minor consent. Under the new law, a defendant can no longer argue that a minor consented to commercial sex. However, …

Legacies Of Exceptionalism And The Future Of Gay Rights In Singapore, Stewart Chang

Scholarly Works

This article analyses how the ties between Singaporean exceptionalism and its Western colonial and neocolonial roots explain why the Singapore's legislature and judiciary have retained its anti-sodomy statute under s 377A of the Penal Code. After decolonisation, restrictive laws pertaining to sexual conduct, originally justified by colonial lawmakers as bringing superior Western moral order to the uncivilised Asian territories, evolved into an "Asian values" moral exceptionalism that distinguished Singapore from the overly liberal West. This exceptionalism, however, also illustrates an Oedipal angst of the Singaporean Government to overcome and overtake the old colonial father in its attempt to redefine itself …

Limiting Deterrence: Judicial Resistance To Detention Of Asylum-Seekers In Israel And The United States, Michael Kagan

Scholarly Works

Governments have advanced the argument that asylum-seekers may be detained in order to deter other would-­be asylum­-seekers from coming. But in recent litigation in the United States and Israel, this justification for mass detention met with significant resistance from courts. This Essay looks at the way the American and Israeli courts dealt with the proposed deterrence rationale for asylum-seeker detention. It suggests that general deterrence raises three sequential questions:

1. Is deterrence ever legitimate as a stand alone justification for depriving people of liberty?

2. If deterrence is sometimes legitimate, is it valid as a general matter in migration control, …