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Tracing Transparency: Public Governance of Algorithms and the Experience of Contact Tracing Apps
(2022)
The Blind Men and the Elephant: An Empirical Analysis of the Social Sciences in International Law
(2024)
What is the role of the social sciences in international law? This article maps how international law interacts with the social sciences, including its concepts, findings, methods, and epistemologies. It provides a first encompassing genealogy of social science references in six renowned international law journals, including the American, Asian, European, Leiden, and Nordic Journal of International Law as well as the British International and Comparative Law Quarterly, by using a corpus linguistic approach that encompasses more than 15,000 documents from 1907 to 2022. Moreover, it explores how structural factors related to the institutionalization and funding of certain strands of social science-inspired international law scholarship have influenced regional and temporal patterns in Europe, Germany, and Australia.
Building on feminist and postcolonial theoretical approaches across International Relations (IR) and security studies, this Special Issue advances an emerging research agenda within EU studies by shedding light on the gendered and racialised logics of EU security and their links to colonial histories and practices. Together, the contributions to this Special Issue demonstrate how EU security is intrinsically connected to and constituted by histories of colonialism, racism and patriarchy. At the same time, they also highlight how the colonial, racialised and gendered dynamics that underpin EU security and that are mobilised by the EU, its institutions and member states are always complex and shifting. Importantly, they do so by decentring our analysis of EU security moving our focus often away from the EU and towards different, somewhat unexpected sites and geographical locations of EU security. The current war in Ukraine underwrites the need for more historical, contextual and decentred work on EU security, while also highlighting the necessity to reflect on dominant practices of knowledge production and the experiences of people living in and with war through a feminist and postcolonial lens
4.2 Interdisciplinarity
(2024)
As a field of practice, international human rights law (IHRL) is in constant motion. The four books under review explore the legal, political, and civic dynamics that continuously shape and reshape this vibrant area of law. In this Essay, I underscore two important trends in contemporary IHRL scholarship that these books highlight. First, these works share a strong emphasis on agency, understood as human action that makes a difference in the world, be it the agency of individuals, domestic civil society organizations, transnational organizations, or courts. Highlighting agency, rather than overarching political, economic, and social structures, in turn shifts the attention from human rights law and doctrine “in the books” to an understanding of human rights law as a purposive and dynamic practice.
In his monograph The Redress of Law, Emilios Christodoulidis provides a sophisticated genealogical study of the emergence of total market thinking in Europe. With market constitutionalism having sidelined political constitutionalism, the potential of law to organise the political community is significantly restricted. By examining the commodification of labour, processes of bargaining, unemployment, and strikes, Christodoulidis demonstrates the destructive consequences of law in the service of market rationalities as well as its potential for strategic action to build collective identity in the EU (European Union).
Yet, I argue that this book comes with two significant blind spots, namely a dated understanding of both law and labour. First of all, Christodoulidis’s systems theoretical understanding of law is neglecting the material conditions that law continuously re-produces in the course of globalization. Secondly, his vision of labour remains rather traditional, focused on unionised, white, and male workers. Both elements are central pillars of his analysis but do not reflect the current reality of the 21st century. In this Article, I challenge his conceptualization by situating his work in recent research on the role of law and labour regulation in global capitalism.
The German Federal Constitutional Court (BVerfG) has for decades used informality to establish, build, and protect its authority. Yet, as the political landscape has shifted in recent years, in particular since the end of the Merkel-era Grand Coalition and the rise of the right-wing populist AfD, several longstanding informal practices and institutions have become politicized. Those concern extra-judicial activities of judges, regular informal meetings between the Court and the government, and privileged early access to the Court’s press releases for certain journalists. This Article first introduces various forms of informality that the BVerfG employs in its internal self-administration and the judicial-legal culture in general, before tracing how, why, and by whom the three aforementioned practices of informality are challenged. Ultimately, this Article analyzes how the Court and its judges respond to the politicization of informality, and in particular how it triggered processes of formalization of judicial behavior and changes in institutional communication.
This Article addresses the pressing issues surrounding the use of automated systems in public decision-making, specifically focusing on migration, asylum, and mobility. Drawing on empirical data, this Article examines the potential and limitations of the General Data Protection Regulation and the Artificial Intelligence Act in effectively addressing the challenges posed by automated decision-making (ADM). The Article argues that the current legal definitions and categorizations of ADM fail to capture the complexity and diversity of real-life applications where automated systems assist human decision-makers rather than replace them entirely. To bridge the gap between ADM in law and practice, this Article proposes to move beyond the concept of “automated decisions” and complement the legal protection in the GDPR and AI Act with a taxonomy that can inform a fundamental rights analysis. This taxonomy enhances our understanding of ADM and allows to identify the fundamental rights at stake and the sector-specific legislation applicable to ADM. The Article calls for empirical observations and input from experts in other areas of public law to enrich and refine the proposed taxonomy, thus ensuring clearer conceptual frameworks to safeguard individuals in our increasingly algorithmic society.
On 4 July 2023, the Third Section of the European Court of Human Rights (ECtHR) delivered the first judgment on the compatibility of facial recognition technology with human rights in Glukhin v. Russia. The case concerned the use of facial recognition technology (FRT) against Mr Glukhin following his solo demonstration in the Moscow underground. The Court unanimously found a violation of Article 8 (right to respect for private life) and Article 10 (freedom of expression) of the European Convention of Human Rights (ECHR). Regarding FRT, the Court concluded that the use of highly intrusive technology is incompatible with the ideals and values of a democratic society governed by the rule of law. This case note analyses the judgment and shows its relevance in the current regulatory debate on Artificial Intelligence (AI) systems in Europe. Notwithstanding the importance of this decision, we argue that the Court has left crucial questions unanswered.
This paper is concerned with the question of whether constitutional systems that have adopted the centralised, “Kelsenian”, model of judicial review, which is prevalent in Eastern Europe, can engage in “responsive judicial review” (Dixon, 2023). It focuses on two features that can be associated with the constitutional courts created in this region after the end of communism, which, the paper argues, can significantly hamper their capacity to identify and counter democratic blockages. These are: (1) their limited standing rules that prioritise the access of political bodies to constitutional courts, and (2) the latter’s commitment to formalism, which can prevent judges from engaging with the structural and contextual issues that are causing a democratic blockage.
The climate crisis will continue to affect human and natural systems across Latin America and the Caribbean (LAC). Undoubtedly, this jeopardizes entire communities’ enjoyment of human rights. In that context, the Inter-American Human Rights System (IAHRS) is expected to respond, particularly since its organs have jurisdiction to order remedies over most LAC countries, provided they determine a rights violation. Despite the growing number of domestic human rights-based climate cases in the region, the organs of the IAHRS have yet to adjudicate and order remedies in a case concerning the climate crisis. Against this backdrop, this article inquires how to understand climate remedies from a political ecology perspective to capture the LAC climate litigation experience. Additionally, the article asks what the challenges of implementing such remedies may be. To answer these questions, first, it compares the remedial approaches of domestic courts in six finally decided climate-related cases with those of the Inter-American Court of Human Rights (IACtHR) in ‘anti-extractivist’ cases. Second, it applies a political ecology lens to understand the elements that might hinder the implementation of the identified remedies. The article argues that the socioeconomic cost for States largely determines remedial compliance in domestic climate litigation and the IACtHR’s anti-extractivist litigation. Ultimately, the aim is to anticipate the future of climate remedies and their effectiveness at the IACtHR based on present climate litigation in LAC.
Memory laws – Protecting the good name of the nation – de facto memory laws – Prohibiting statements about the past – Article 301 of the Turkish Criminal Code – Protecting the good name of Poland and the Polish nation – Protecting the good name of the nation as de facto memory laws – Role of organisations in implementing the laws – Rule of law – Independence of the judiciary – European Court of Human Rights – Chilling effect – European memory politics
Resettlement
(2023)
This chapter discusses the dialectic relationship of general principles and the evolution of human rights in the EU legal order. Human (or fundamental) rights are of specific signifcance for general principles as an area of reference in a number of ways: in regard to the methodology of defining and identifying general principles; their link to constitutional values of the EU, the relationship between different sources of human rights in the EU; the relationship between unwritten general principles and a codified source; the specific, active and multidimensional dynamics of general principles in the context of fundamental rights; the relationship of general principles in the area of fundamental rights with their codification in the EU Charter on Fundamental Rights; and their possible continued relevance for courts in adjudicating human rights in the UK in post-Brexit.
Turkey
(2020)
This contribution takes Turkey’s use of the derogation mechanism in the aftermath of the failed military coup of 15 July 2016 as a springboard to critically address the operation and the fallacies of the contemporary European derogation regime. The assessment will reveal whether the European system of human rights protection has succeeded in adopting an adequate and viable approach that can counterbalance the increased leeway accorded to derogating states, and formulate safeguards to mitigate human rights abuses. The contribution concludes by providing a road map proposal for adequate oversight marked by rigorous scrutiny of derogation claims that can be described as a ‘consultation and cooperation process’. This process would place the Secretary General of the Council of Europe in a more active and operationally focused position to influence state decisions, to counterbalance the increased leeway accorded to derogating states, and to formulate safeguards to mitigate human rights abuses.
This chapter analyses IOM’s practices and policies on immigration detention from the 1990s to date, spanning a period of significant change in its approaches to detention. The chapter first distills pertinent international human rights law (IHRL) on migration-related detention, and then examines IOM’s normative statements concerning detention. It shows that while IOM generally emphasises international legal standards, it also tends to stress states’ ‘prerogative’ to detain, frame alternatives to detention (ATDs) as a desirable option rather than a legal obligation, and weave an operational role for itself, notably through assisted voluntary returns (AVRs). The chapter then interrogates IOM’s involvement in detention through four case studies. These reveal not only IOM’s changing role regarding detention, but its enduring part in a global system whereby powerful states and regions seek to contain protection seekers ‘elsewhere.’ The chapter concludes that, without constitutional and institutional change to ensure it meets its positive human rights obligations, and deeper critical reflection on its humanitarian duties, IOM’s practice risks expanding and legitimating detention.
Monitoring and evaluation (M&E) is a form of expert knowledge that is central to migration governance. This article analyses M&E of the EU Trust Fund for Africa (EUTF), created in 2015 to ‘fight the root causes of migration’. Combining institutionalist accounts with practice theory, we examine whether M&E knowledge production served the instrumental purpose of assessing policy impact or mainly legitimated particular policy actors and positions. We find that M&E did not produce evidence on whether the EUTF met its objectives. However, in the context of the EU's multiple crises, M&E knowledge production served to seek legitimacy not only for the EUTF, but also for the further fusion of development and migration policies, and for the EU as a competent and transparent actor. Our analysis highlights that knowledge use and knowledge production are connected, and that M&E knowledge politics allow for the legitimation of both actors and policies.
This paper investigates the Turkish Constitutional Court (TCC)’s treatment of legal challenges brought against Turkey’s legal responses to the COVID-19 pandemic. Drawing on a detailed examination of the TCC’s institutional features, political origins and jurisprudential trajectory, and taking three politically salient judgments of the TCC concerning Turkey’s executive-dominated pandemic control as the point of departure, the paper argues that the TCC chose to exercise judicial restraint both in protecting fundamental rights and reviewing pandemic policies of the executive. It also argues that the TCC’s judicial restraint during the pandemic was simply the re-manifestation of its ‘play-it-safe’ strategy — a judicial stance the TCC willingly adopted in the aftermath of the 2016 attempted coup despite possessing strong constitutional powers of judicial review, and its established attitude of assertive scrutiny in the past. From a more theoretical perspective, the analysis also explores how the passive role to which the TCC is consigned in an increasingly authoritarian regime since the 2016 failed coup relates to the global phenomenon of judicialization of authoritarian politics.
This article shows that in the 20 years following the adoption of the Rome Statute of the International Criminal Court its nature has surfed on three waves. Building upon the Court’s case law on the principle of legality and the immunity of state officials from non-party states, it shows that the Statute was initially conceived to be of universal nature, transcending the interests of all states. However, following a series of pushbacks, the Court revised this case law to rightly acknowledge that its Statute is first of all a multilateral treaty regulating the conduct committed in the territory and by nationals of its states parties. Yet, this second wave maintained the potential for the Statute to be universally applicable when the Court’s jurisdiction is based on ad hoc declarations of acceptance or Security Council referrals. However, the journey to amend the Statute to define the crime of aggression and new war crimes might have made the prospects for universal application dependent upon universal ratification. This article argues that this third wave certainly evinces a novel shift towards state consent, but that direct and indirect forms of consent can still premise the Court’s jurisdiction over situations concerning states which have not ratified the Statute or its amendments.
Sovereignty, Technology and Governance after COVID-19: Legal Challenges in a Post-Pandemic Europe
(2022)
This book imagines how Europe might re-organise and re-group after the COVID-19 crisis by assessing its effectiveness when responding to it. For this purpose, it directs its focus on: i) sovereignty challenges; ii) technological challenges and iii) governance challenges. These three challenges do not present hermetic legal problems, they intersect and connect on many levels. The book shows this by examining the relationship between public and private power, and illustrating how the rise of technocratic authority is deeply connected to the choice of technological solutions. It illustrates how constitutional decisions taken during states of emergency give rise to private governance challenges related to cybersecurity and data protection. Experts from the fields of EU governance, data protection, and technology explore these questions to provide answers to how the EU might develop in the future.
It is an era of expansion for the International Organization for Migration (IOM), an increasingly influential actor in the global governance of migration. Bringing together leading experts in international law and international relations, this collection examines the dynamics and implications of IOM's expansion in a new way. Analyzing IOM as an international organization (IO), the book illuminates the practices, obligations and accountability of this powerful but controversial actor, advancing understanding of IOM itself and broader struggles for IO accountability. The contributions explore key, yet often under-researched, IOM activities including its role in humanitarian emergencies, internal displacement, data collection, ethical labour recruitment, and migrant detention. Offering recommendations for reforms rooted in empirical evidence and careful normative analysis, this is a vital resource for all those interested in the obligations and accountability of international organizations, and in the field of migration.
This working paper aims to examine the ‘displacement regime complex’, displacement referring to both internally and externally displaced persons, taking into account the competing roles of UNHCR and IOM in both spheres of activity. The title of the paper ‘Reform for protection’, aims to outline institutional reforms that aim to increase protection for the displaced, informed by binding universal human rights standards, and institutional principles relating to accountability and participation of most affected populations.
This report explores the refugee recognition regime in Niger. Quantitatively, Niger is the most important transit and refugee host country in West Africa. Niger is also at the forefront of debates on migration management in the region, as it is presented by International Organisations and states of the Global North as an alternative destination to the limited refugee protection in Libya and North Africa. Against the background of a relative dearth of literature on refugee recognition regimes (RRR) in (West) Africa and generally the Global South, this study draws on ethnographic field research and desk research to analyse the norms, institutions, modes of recognition, quality of recognition processes and of protection in Niger. This report’s research was completed in July 2021 and except a few data points, does not include any developments thereafter.
This paper explores the refugee recognition regime in Egypt, a major host of refugees in the Middle East and North Africa region and one of UNHCR’s largest refugee status determination operations. Although the situation of refugees in Egypt has been the subject of significant study, this paper seeks to address, through a desk-based study, the nature and performance of the refugee recognition regime in Egypt, in particular the norms, institutions, modes of recognition, quality of recognition processes and quality of protection that is available to refugees in Egypt. The main findings are detailed in this executive summary.
This report focuses primarily on the actions of the United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees (UNHCR) because of its central and contested role in refugee protection. Drawing on primary and secondary data, it reviews how UNHCR has developed a range of protection interventions, some non-ideal, in response to the actions of state and non-state actors who maintain a hostile environment for migrants with irregular status.
The concept of ‘continuing violation’ allows reviewing applications concerning effects of violations that started before a treaty came into a force with regard to a state that allegedly committed the violation. This article analyses how the UN Human Rights Committee has recently approached two communications concerning continuing violations that occurred in the 1930s and 1940s (K.K. and Others v Russia; F.A.J. and B.M.R.A. v Spain). It critiques the fact that the Committee has introduced an additional qualification to its case law on continuing violations, namely that it has no jurisdiction over the violations with continuing effect, when underlying violations happened in the ‘very distant past’. The article argues that communications raising violations of the families of forcibly disappeared persons – at least these brought by their children – should not be ruled inadmissible because of time constraint since the disappearances. Lastly, the article reveals a tacit influence of the European Court of Human Rights on the Committee in the analysed case law.
In the summer of 2021 deliberate actions by the Belarusian state authorities led to a huge increase of people irregularly crossing the border from Belarus to Poland. Instead of addressing this humanitarian crisis, the Polish government responded with actions that were in violation of its international obligations and domestic law. Among these measures was carrying out “pushbacks” and grounding them in Polish domestic law. “Pushbacks” are the practice of returning people to the border without assessing their individual situation. The formalization of those practices in 2021 was done within two legal frameworks; one interim and one permanent. They continue to function in parallel while containing different provisions. This article assesses the two frameworks’ compatibility with domestic and international law and concludes that they both violate domestic and international rules. In the context of EU law, the article demonstrates the incompatibility of the two frameworks with the so-called Asylum Procedures Directive and Return Directive. The article urther argues that the pushbacks violate the European Convention of Human Rights and would not fall within the exceptions to the prohibition of collective expulsions.
The paper analyses how the European Court of Human Rights (ECtHR or the Court) assesses evidence when states conceal border practices, such as pushbacks, comparing the Court’s approach in those cases to that in enforced disappearance cases. In both types of cases, states deny that the conduct – which would have violated human rights – has taken place and provide neither the applicants nor the Court with evidence. While surface examination of the relevant case law could suggest that the ECtHR shifts the burden of proof in the same way in both sets of cases, I demonstrate that the Court expects applicants in covert border enforcement cases to provide stronger evidence, which is then labelled as prima facie evidence. I argue that the burden of proof should be shifted in the same way in both scenarios, as the position of the victims and the availability of evidence is strikingly similar.
This report discusses the evolution of the refugee recognition regime (RRR) in Kenya, chiefly over the period of 2000-2020. It highlights the government’s responses towards refugee protection, its bifurcated approach towards refugees based on where they reside, the challenges faced by protection seekers in the recognition process, and the shifts in responsibility between the government and UNHCR. The report is based on extensive desk-based research as well as original fieldwork, including interviews and focus group discussions with adult asylum seekers and refugees, as well as officers involved in refugee status determination (RSD) processes. The research targeted refugees and asylum seekers from the top four recognised nationalities in Kenya in the 20-year period: Somalis, South Sudanese, Ethiopians, and Congolese from the Democratic Republic of Congo (DRC).
This paper explores the refugee recognition regime in Jordan, the country hosting the second highest number of refugees per capita in the world. Against the background of a relative dearth of literature on refugee recognition regimes – in Jordan and more widely – this desk-based study analyses the norms, institutions, modes of recognition, quality of recognition processes, and quality of protection of the Jordanian refugee recognition regime. It focuses on the four key national ‘cohorts’ – Iraqis, Sudanese, Syrians and Yemenis.
Lebanon is one of the most important countries to understand the dynamics of the refugee recognition regime. It has received a large number of displaced people, and since the arrival of Syrians, it has been the highest per capita refugee-hosting country in the world. It is, therefore, crucial to understand how displaced persons are received, how their asylum applications are assessed, and how their protection needs are met in the country. This report describes Lebanon’s refugee recognition regime and assesses UNHCR’s quality of recognition process and the quality of protection for asylum seekers and refugees. It provides an overview of existing legislation and brings together original insights from legal aid organisations, UNHCR staff, and asylum seekers and refugees. The report, outlined in seven sections, first gives an overview of the existing literature and then explains the methods.
This report examines South Africa’s refugee recognition regime which is typified by an individualised refugee status determination (RSD) system that sets it quite apart from other major refugee-hosting countries in Africa, whose major mode of refugee recognition is group-based. The report focuses on a twenty-year period (1998-2018) highlighting the various areas of contestation within the refugee protection space and South Africa’s adherence to its obligations, under both domestic and international law. Although extensive work has been carried out regarding the quality of RSD process in South Africa, gaps are still evident with respect to the refugee recognition institutions and their relational dynamics and how this impacts the refugee recognition regime and refugee protection generally. The report is based on desk research and original fieldwork in South Africa among various elites working in the refugee protection area as well as refugees and asylum seekers in South Africa drawn from three nationalities: Somalis, Ethiopians and Congolese from the Democratic Republic of Congo (DRC).
The closure of the Greek-Macedonian border on 8 March 2016 entailed systematic pushbacks. The largest operation occurred on 14-15 March 2016, when more than 1500 refugees were summarily returned from North Macedonia to Greece. The complaint of AA and others v North Macedonia addressed this large-scale pushback operation. However, instead of condemning these pushbacks, the European Court of Human Rights expanded the exception from the prohibition of collective expulsions created in the case of ND and NT v Spain and found the applicants culpable of circumventing legal pathways, ignoring that these were clearly not available in practice. Thereby, the Court reproduces exclusionary reasoning that has shaped the European Convention on Human Rights since its inception.
This article analyzes the political and legal dynamics of continuity and change in the appropriation of human rights in Turkey against the backdrop of growing authoritarian practices. Human rights appropriation in Turkey has traditionally focused on the interpretation of human rights favoring national security and secular sensibilities to determine who has human rights and to what extent. The recent decade is a case of continuity and change. While the secularist frame has been replaced by a religious frame defining authentic human rights holders as members of the “pious” Turkish Muslim family and society, the national security frame has remained a continuous source of human rights appropriation. The article first offers an account of the dynamics of old forms of human rights appropriation in Turkey. It then analyzes the new actors, strategies, and transnational dimensions of new forms of human rights (mis)appropriation.
Dieser Beitrag beleuchtet die Frage, wie politische und soziale Kategorisierungen den Zugang zu Aufnahmeprogrammen regulieren und wie entstehende Ungleichheiten gerechtfertigt werden. Über humanitäre Aufnahmeprogramme nehmen europäische und andere sichere Länder eine begrenzet Zahl Schutzsuchender aus Erstzufluchtsländern auf. Auf Basis von Herkunft, Geschlecht, Alter und anderen Kategorien wird entschieden, wer ›am schutzbedürftigsten‹ ist und entsprechend umgesiedelt werden soll. Anhand der deutschen humanitären Aufnahmeprogramme für syrische Geflüchtete untersucht der Beitrag Kategorisierungspraktiken aus praxistheoretischer und intersektionaler Perspektive entlang des gesamten Aufnahmeprozesses. Dadurch wird einerseits die Verwobenheit verschiedener Kategorisierungspraktiken unterschiedlicher Akteur:innen und andererseits die Hierarchisierung von Schutzbedarf deutlich.
Actualités/News
(2021)
Actualités/News
(2021)
Actualités/News
(2021)
Actualités/News
(2021)
Actualités/News
(2022)
Climate litigation in the Global South is a novel and increasingly prominent phenomenon that prompted a first wave of scholarly work examining and systematizing its main features. Despite the rigour that these academic accounts apply to assessing the main legal arguments of both litigants and courts, they fail to address the possible tensions between climate justice and the consequences of a domestic court decision in developing nations that did not substantially contribute to the climate crisis. This piece aims to fill that gap by using case law from the Global South to examine challenges around remedies, which will underscore the tensions between climate justice and litigation. Thereafter, this piece, drawing from international norms, advocates for the recognition of a duty of international cooperation, which can inform future courts’ orders in climate cases in both the Global North and the Global South. This normative exercise provides the basis to reconcile climate litigation in the Global South with climate justice, two reputed allies.
This article considers the Inter-American Human Rights System (IAHRS) as a response to the general assessments of some critical scholarship on international law. It employs the concept of “oscillation of international law” to organize different views of the international human rights and environmental law (IHREL) scholarship, two legal regimes that speak loudest to the IAHRS’ interests. These views are distributed within a spectrum that goes from utopian demands placed on IHREL, to apologist defenses of these legal regimes. I put forward a third strand of critical intervention by framing the IAHRS as a space of political and legal contention that promises to address some of the IHREL’s shortcomings. I caution, however, that, although the IAHRS functions as an enabling platform for subaltern polities that redraw the boundaries of legal meanings, the system may fall short in tackling challenges that are contingent on global capitalist logics.
This article maps climate litigation developments in Latin America and their human rights and constitutional rights implications. As in other regions of the Global South, groups and individuals in Latin America have engaged in litigation to counter environmental harms threatening or violating the enjoyment of their human rights. Climate change, either as a primary or as a secondary concern, is slowly becoming a key focus of this form of strategic human rights-based litigation. Despite the gradual increase of the ‘Latin American docket’ of climate litigation cases, very few academic accounts have explored its legal dimensions or its contextual underpinnings. This article addresses this lacuna by identifying and examining the constitutional opportunities for and constraints upon adjudicating climate-related cases through human rights law, and also problematizes the development of climate litigation in Latin America by drawing attention to the influence of extractivist political and economic interests. The categories used for analysis stem from the literature on climate litigation in the Global South, case law and interviews with Latin-American litigants. The article concludes by stressing that this type of climate litigation is increasing and has led to several favourable verdicts, but caution is warranted as some political economy elements might hinder the development of such litigation, its inclusivity and long-term effectiveness.
Europe’s extraordinary response to those fleeing the Russian invasion of Ukraine in February 2022 has prompted many criticisms of Europe’s treatment of other refugees, and indeed people of colour and members of ethnic minorities fleeing Ukraine. While stark, this differentiated response in not unusual: The global refugee regime treats different refugees differently, as a matter of course. Refugees often encounter racialized migration controls, and systems which privilege some refugees over others. The article seeks to clarify when these practices violate the international legal prohibitions on discrimination on grounds of race and nationality. To do so, it focuses on race discrimination in general international human rights law, clarifying the interaction between general human rights principles and instruments, and the specialist instrument in the field, the International Convention on the Elimination of all Forms of Racial Discrimination. We identify how differences in treatment on grounds of nationality may engage the prohibition on race discrimination both directly (in particular when nationality equates to national origin) or indirectly. Concerning nationality discrimination, the article focuses in particular on the added value of Article 3 of the 1951 Convention on the Status of Refugees, which obliges states to ‘apply the provisions of this Convention to refugees without discrimination as to race, religion or country of origin.’ We examine Article 3 both within the overall scheme of the Refugee Convention and as a source to guide interpretation of international human rights norms.
For many women and girls sexist and misogynistic language is an everyday experience. Some instances of this speech can be categorized as ‘sexist hate speech’, as not only having an insulting or degrading character towards the individuals to whom the speech is addressed, but also resonating with the entire group, contributing to its silencing, marginalization and exclusion. The aim of this article is to examine how sexist hate speech is handled in international human rights law. The argument derives from the claim than that legal discourse should distinguish between ‘sexist speech’ and ‘sexist hate speech’, and that the later may be qualified as a form of violence against women. Then it analyses the approaches of two human rights protection systems—the United Nations and the Council of Europe system—towards the phenomenon of sexist hate speech, by taking their position towards hate speech in general as a point of reference. In both systems, sexist hate speech is being addressed more eagerly under the gender equality framework, including counteracting violence against women, than in their interpretation of hate speech under general human rights law. The article argues the importance of recognizing and addressing sexist hate speech both within the framework of gender equality instruments and anti-hate speech framework established by international human rights bodies.
The main aim of the article is to test how states implement international humanitarian law (IHL) with regard to the families of missing persons. The article shows relevant IHL shortcomings and compares them with rules applicable in cases of enforced disappearance. The national legislation collected in the section titled ‘The Missing and Their Families’ of the National Implementation Database of the International Committee of the Red Cross is then examined. The analysis addresses three core questions that are particularly relevant for families of missing persons: (1) Who is considered a missing person under each law? Approaching this question allows the testing of whether states follow the understanding of ‘missing persons’ under IHL treaty law. The second and third questions address two issues that are crucial for families of missing persons that are not addressed in IHL: (2) How is the legal status of the missing person regulated? (3) Are family members provided with measures of reparation and/or assistance? This approach reveals that states rarely apply the IHL understanding of ‘missing persons’ and predominantly exceed IHL by addressing some of the identified shortcomings. It further shows that states provide families of missing persons either with reparation measures – in cases of human rights violations – or, less often, with measures of assistance in post-conflict situations.
Never has the doctrine of command responsibility been shaken as when the Appeal Chamber of the International Criminal Court issued the Bemba Appeal Judgment. The latter solely addresses whether the defendant – Jean-Pierre Bemba, former Commander-in-chief of the Mouvement de libération du Congo – took reasonable and necessary measures to prevent or punish his subordinates’ crimes perpetrated in the Central African Republic. Yet, the various dissenting, separate and concurring opinions advocate opposing positions on the scope, elements and nature of this notorious doctrine. This paper relocates the ‘sharp disagreements’ that surfaced during the Bemba Appeal Judgment within the broader phenomena of the individualisation of war. Through an in-depth examination of the interpretation offered by the appellate judges, it designs a model of command responsibility that properly individualises Article 28 Rome Statute, and, by the same token, respect the fundamental rights of military commanders.
How did the Council of Europe cope with its member states that engaged in rule of law backsliding? This article analyses the responses of the Venice Commission, the Council of Europe’s expert body on constitutional matters, to Turkey, Hungary, and Poland as their governments eliminated key checks and balances on their power, curtailed judicial independence, and undermined political pluralism and civil society. It finds that the Venice Commission managed to address a set of particularly vital issues that get to the heart to rule of law backsliding in these countries. Despite the breadth of the Venice Commission’s forthright involvement, these case studies display the limitations on the part of other Council of Europe bodies in forming a coordinated approach and response to rule of law backsliding.
Since the collapse of the peace process in 2015, the Turkish Government has sought to turn every move towards Kurdish rights into an existential threat – a process led to the re-securitization of the Kurdish question. Ever since the descent of Turkey into an authoritarian polity has begun in the aftermath of the June 2015 elections, the Kurdish minority has suffered a brutal crackdown marked by high of political imprisonment and greater restrictions on freedom of assembly and association and on electoral aspects of self-determination. This commentary will take a closer look at the dire consequences of the collateral impact of Turkey’s authoritarian turn on the Kurdish political movement from the perspectives of minority rights and self-determination.
States of emergency are often declared due to underlying problems of minority group accommodation, and the extraordinary limitation of rights arising from them tends to have a particularly striking effect on such groups. This was true, for instance, with the emergency measures adopted by the British authorities in the context of the ‘Troubles’ in Northern Ireland. The same appears true in respect of the Turkish state of emergency in the aftermath of the failed military coup of 15 July 2016 vis-à-vis the position of Turkey’s Kurds. In spite of the fact that the declaration of the state of emergency constituted a response to an attempted coup which was, allegedly, orchestrated by the Gülen Movement, it is clear that the resulting derogating measures have also targeted ‘other individuals and organizations’, mainly those allegedly connected to the PKK (Kurdistan Workers’ Party), and thus extended to Turkey’s Kurdish periphery. This chapter seeks to map the impact of the Turkish post-coup derogation measures on Turkey’s Kurds and to test them against the non-discrimination principle, minority rights, and the right of self-determination.
With several reports highlighting cases in which migrants fleeing the war on Ukraine had disappeared en route to a safe haven in the EU, this Policy Brief by Dr. Grazyna Baranowska analyses how the EU and its member states address the issue of missing migrants. Ahead of the first International Migration Review Forum, it specifically shows how the Commission’s 10-Point-Plan to manage the arrival of more than 6 million Ukrainian refugees can provide a suitable model for further European initiatives to address the challenges related to missing migrants and implement the Global Compact on Safe, Orderly and Regular Migration to that end.
The focus of this edited volume is the often-overlooked importance of secondary rules of international law. Secondary rules of international law-such as attribution, causality, and the standard and burden of proof-have often been neglected in scholarly literature and have seen fragmented application in international legal practice. Yet the systemic nature of international law entails that coherent and consistent application of such rules is a key element in reinforcing the legitimacy of decisions of international courts and tribunals. Accelerated development of international law and international litigation, coupled with the fragmented nature of the adjudicatory terrain calls for theoretical scrutiny and systemic analysis of the developments in the judicial treatment of secondary rules.
This publication makes three important contributions to the study of secondary rules. First, it offers a comprehensive, expert doctrinal analysis of how standard of review, causation, evidentiary rules, and attribution operate in the case law of international courts or tribunals in fields spanning human rights, trade, investment, and humanitarian law. Second, it comparatively evaluates the divergent layers of meanings and normative expectations attached to secondary rules in international law scholarship as well as in the judicial practice of international courts and tribunals. Finally, the book investigates the role that secondary rules play in the development of the primary rules in international law and for the legitimacy of the decisions of international courts and tribunals.
Earlier scholarly works have not problematized the role of secondary rules of international law in adjudication thoroughly. Secondary Rules of Primary Importance in International Law seeks to fill this gap by emphasizing the consequential nature of these secondary rules and argues that the outcome of litigation is fundamentally shaped by the exact standard of proof, standard of review, or attribution basis that is chosen by adjudicators. As such, the book offers an important resource for the study and practice of international law against the backdrop of the wide-ranging and fragmented nature of international adjudication.
Regional protection
(2022)
Written by leading experts in the field, this compelling textbook explores the essentials of international human rights law, from foundational issues to substantive rights and systems of protection. A variety of perspectives bring this multifaceted and sometimes contentious subject to life, making International Human Rights Law the ideal companion for students of human rights.
Understanding pledge and review: learning from analogies to the Paris Agreement review mechanisms
(2022)
This article draws lessons for the effectiveness of the Paris Agreement’s pledge and review mechanisms from the performance of comparable review mechanisms established under other international treaties. The article employs systematic evidence synthesis methods to review the existing literature on international review mechanisms in the human rights, trade, labour, and monetary policy fields and identifies six common factors influencing their performance. Applying these findings to the Paris Agreement, the analysis finds that its review mechanisms incorporate many of these factors. In particular, they combine both expert and peer review, allow for repeated interaction and capacity building, and facilitate the regular and transparent provision of information. The comparative analysis also highlights two major deficiencies of the Paris Agreement: the absence of procedures to assess the adequacy of national pledges and actions taken to implement them, and resource constraints in carrying out a complex and arduous review process. Active engagement of non-state actors with review mechanisms is identified as a potential remedy to these shortcomings. However, the overall experience of other regimes suggests that, on their own, review mechanisms provide few incentives for states to undertake significant policy changes. Rather, the political context of each regime conditions the performance of review mechanisms. We therefore conclude that the Paris Agreement’s review mechanisms alone are unlikely to bring about the necessary ratcheting up of climate policy ambitions.
European Community Judicial Review in the Irish Courts -
Scope, Standards and Separation of Powers
(2003)
This essay examines the interpretation of the core international treaty dedicated to the elimination of racial discrimination, the International Convention on the Elimination of All Forms of Racial Discrimination (CERD), and in particular how the prohibition on race discrimination applies to the treatment of migrants. This essay is timely, as CERD has travelled from the margins of human rights law to the center of the hottest interstate lawfare. At the time of writing, the first ever interstate dispute before any UN treaty body is before the CERD Committee, and CERD has been invoked in several interstate cases before the International Court of Justice (ICJ). Unfortunately, this crucible of adjudication has not marked an increase in principled interpretation. This essay critiques the recent admissibility ruling of the ICJ in Qatar v. U.A.E. for its marginalization of the prohibition of race discrimination, in particular the failure meaningfully to consider how nationality discrimination may constitute prohibited race discrimination.
The COVID-19 pandemic not only ravaged human bodies but also had profound and possibly enduring effects on the health of political and legal systems, economies and societies. Almost overnight, governments imposed the severest restrictions in modern times on rights and freedoms, elections, parliaments and courts. Legal and political institutions struggled to adapt, creating a catalyst for democratic decline and catastrophic increases in poverty and inequality.
This handbook analyses the global pandemic response through five themes: governance and democracy; human rights; the rule of law; science, public trust and decision making; and states of emergency and exception. Containing 12 thematic commentaries and 25 chapters on countries of diverse size, wealth and experience of COVID-19, it represents the combined effort of more than 50 contributors, including leading scholars and rising voices in the fields of constitutional, international, public health, human rights and comparative law, as well as political science, and science and technology studies.
Taking stock after the onset of global emergency, this book provides essential analysis for politicians, policy-makers, jurists, civil society organisations, academics, students and practitioners at both national and international level on the best, and most concerning, practices adopted in response to COVID-19 - and key insights into how states and multilateral institutions should reform, adapt and prepare for future emergencies.
This article introduces the Special Issue on ‘The Responses of the Council of Europe to the Decay of the Rule of Law and Human Rights Protections’. The Council of Europe (CoE), a unique international organisation with its commitment to protect and promote human rights, the rule of law, and democracy, has been severely tested by the spread and consolidation of trends posing systemic threats to its foundational goals. The authors of this Special Issue assess how the European Court of Human Rights, the Venice Commission, the Parliamentary Assembly, the Committee of Ministers, and the office of the Secretary General have addressed systemic threats to the foundational principles of the organisation in the last decade. The Special Issue finds that the respective legal-institutional features and capacities of the CoE organs as well as the constraining influence of the broader political context in Europe on them vary significantly, hampering the CoE’s ability to produce timely, consistent, and co-ordinated responses against systemic threats.
This article undertakes a survey of the changes in the structure of the interpretive doctrines of the European Court of Human Rights (the Court) over time in an exploration of the aging of the European Convention on Human Rights (ECHR or the Convention) on its 70th anniversary. It argues that the Court’s interpretive doctrines that seek to give due defer ence to national rights traditions, canons and institutions have become increasingly pervasive in the Court’s procedural and substantive case law in the last two decades. This, in particular, has come at a loss for interpretative doctrines that interpret the Convention as a practical and effective living pan-European instrument. This argument is built in four parts. First it offers a defence of why a study of the interpretive doctrines of the Court over time is a good proxy for studying the ECHR’s ageing process. In the second part, it discusses the rich doctrinal forms of due deference and effective interpretation in the case law of the Court – both young and mature. Part three explains how the judicialisation and expansion of the European human rights system in late 1990 s transitioned to a more height ened and sophisticated focus on due deference doctrines in the Court’s case law. Finally, part four examines whether the recent judicial innovations under the Court’s Article 18 case law and the widely celebrated success of increased ownership of the Convention by domestic courts can act as counter points to the argument that the effective interpretation principle has suffered a loss as the Convention has aged, concluding that none of this may offset the fact that the Convention at 70 is more conservative in spirit than its younger self.
Migration laws and controls distribute important social goods: the right to enter and reside in a particular state, and the rights that attach to any such residence. Migration controls determine individuals’ life chances, including sometimes, their very survival. Migration control is a broad concept. Some practices, such as visa administration, control the possibility of travel by regular means, dictating access to mobility opportunities. Other aspects of migration control, such as the conferral of nationality, determine access to permanent residence rights, and the legal ability to pass on membership of a particular state to one’s children. Some forms of migration control are automated and may also be undertaken by private actors, including for profit companies. Others may involve determination or adjudication by individual officials or judges. What unites this broad set of practices is that they comprise important public functions with profound implications for both “outsiders” and “insiders.” As Chandran Kukathas argues, migration controls pose a threat to equality within states, challenging the notion that these practices primarily affect imagined “outsiders.”1 Migration controls impact both “without” and “within” the state. This introductory essay explores discrimination in migration control and discusses how such treatment may be approached from an international legal perspective. We introduce the symposium’s contributors and essays and establish the need for further research on this topic.
In this contribution, we explore evolution and stasis in EU asylum law and policy. We identify two tensions at the heart of the CEAS, between the commitment to protection and deflection of protection obligations, and between internal mobility within the EU and the immobilization of asylum seekers and refugees. We note the role of these foundational tensions in generating and exacerbating the ‘refugee crisis’ of 2015/16. This chapter is premised on a widely-shared understanding of the role of EU asylum policy in that crisis, namely that by illegalizing the travel of asylum seekers and refugees in search of protection, it contributes to the dangerous mass flight, which in turn generates humanitarian and political crises. We then analyse four key dimensions of EU asylum policy in light of these tensions: access to asylum, responsibility-allocation, legislative harmonisation, and institutionalised practical co-operation. Across these four fields, we identify the limits of EU law, and its general stasis, in spite of changes in Treaty telos, law-making processes, and EU enlargement. We briefly consider the role of the CJEU, still very much in the shadow of the ECtHR in asylum, in spite of its numerous rulings on the CEAS. Overall, we demonstrate its fairly minimalist approach in this area, avoidance of controversial cases by dubious use of inadmissibility findings, and failure to catalyse policy changes. Against this backdrop of legislative, political and judicial caution and inertia, we identify two key trends: a move towards greater institutional cooperation, including through the creation of a dedicated agency, the European Asylum Support Office (EASO), and a general flight from law in this policy field. We conclude by considering the likely impact of these trends on EU asylum law.
This article investigates whether Article 18 judgments of the European Court of Human Rights, indicating that the state authorities pursued ulterior and illegitimate motives when violating the Convention, receive the seriousness and the urgency that they call for at the execution phase. By way of an analysis of the responses of the Committee of Ministers and states on the receiving end of Article 18 judgments between 2004 and June 2021, this article finds that the collective responsiveness of the Committee of Ministers to Article 18 judgments has increased over time, especially with respect to individual measures required to implement Article 18 judgments. So far, the responsiveness of individual states to their Article 18 judgments does, however, vary significantly, ranging from taking concrete steps to implement the judgments to outright resistance and no response, posing a significant risk to the Convention system’s ability to respond to the decay of rule of law.
The chapter examines article 31 of the Convention relating to the Status of Refugees (Refugee Convention), the provision which purports to protect refugees from penalization for ‘illegal entry and stay’. The chapter draws on the previous work by the authors for UNHCR, including a review of national caselaw and practice on article 31 from over forty States. It reflects on the crucial role of the provision in safeguarding the right to seek asylum and argues that non-penalization constitutes one of the objects and purposes of the Refugee Convention. As a result, the chapter considers the distinct obligation on States to refrain from any acts frustrating the treaty’s object and purpose. Beyond article 31 of the Refugee Convention, the chapter explores international human rights law as a potentially wider source of protection. It examines whether the criminalization of irregular migration itself may be regarded as a human rights violation, thereby opening up a new avenue for legal research and advocacy. Finally, the chapter argues that aside from treaty obligations under international refugee and human rights law there is an emerging general principle of law relating to non-penalization of refugees and some other migrants.
The Oxford Handbook of International Refugee Law is a comprehensive, critical work, which analyses the state of research across the refugee law regime as a whole. Drawing together leading and emerging scholars, the Handbook provides both doctrinal and theoretical analyses of international refugee law and practice. It critiques existing law from a variety of normative positions, with several chapters identifying foundational flaws that open up space for radical rethinking. Many authors work directly in the field, and their contributions demonstrate how scholarship and practice can mutually inform each other.
Contributions assess a wide range of international legal instruments relevant to refugee protection, including from international human rights law, international humanitarian law, international migration law, the law of the sea, and international and transnational criminal law. Geographically, contributors examine regional and domestic laws and practices from around the world, with 10 chapters focused on specific regions. This Handbook provides an account, as well as a critique, of the status quo, and in so doing it sets the agenda for future academic research in international refugee law.
Upon request by the LIBE committee, this study examines the workings of the Common European Asylum System (CEAS), in order to assess the need and potential for new approaches to ensure access to protection for people seeking it in the EU, including joint processing and distribution of asylum seekers. Rather than advocating the addition of further complexity and coercion to the CEAS, the study proposes a focus on front-line reception and streamlined refugee status determination, in order to mitigate the asylum challenges facing Member States, and guarantee the rights of asylum seekers and refugees according to the EU acquis and international legal standards.
Upon request by the LIBE committee, this study examines the reasons why the Dublin system of allocation of responsibility for asylum seekers does not work effectively from the viewpoint of Member States or asylum-seekers. It argues that as long as it is based on the use of coercion against asylum seekers, it cannot serve as an effective tool to address existing imbalances in the allocation of responsibilities among Member States. The EU is faced with two substantial challenges: first, how to prevent unsafe journeys and risks to the lives of people seeking international protection in the EU; and secondly, how to organise the distribution of related responsibilities and costs among the Member States. This study addresses these issues with recommendations aimed at resolving current practical, legal and policy problems.
This study, commissioned by the European Parliament’s Policy Department for Citizens' Rights and Constitutional Affairs at the request of the LIBE Committee, examines the EU’s mechanism of relocation of asylum seekers from Greece and Italy to other Member States. It examines the scheme in the context of the Dublin System, the hotspot approach, and the EU-Turkey Statement, recommending that asylum seekers’ interests, and rights be duly taken into account, as it is only through their full engagement that relocation will be successful. Relocation can become a system that provides flexibility for Member States and local host communities, as well as accommodating the agency and dignity of asylumseekers. This requires greater cooperation from receiving States, and a clearer role for a single EU legal and institutional framework to organise preference matching and rationalise efforts and resources overall.
This issue paper examines family reunification for refugees as a pressing human rights issue. Without it, refugees are denied their right to respect for family life, have vastly diminished integration prospects and endure great additional unnecessary suffering, as do their family members. The Commissioner for Human Rights calls on all Council of Europe member states to uphold their human rights obligations and ensure the practical effectiveness of the right to family reunification for refugees and other international protection beneficiaries. To do so, states should (re-)examine their laws, policies and practices relating to family reunification for refugees. This issue paper contains 36 recommendations to that end.
The aim of this paper is to clarify the correct interpretation of Article 31 of the 1951 Convention Relating to the Status of Refugees (the 1951 Refugee Convention). The interpretation proposed is based on the binding international precepts relating to treaty interpretation, as reflected in Articles 31 to 33 of the Vienna Convention on the Law of Treaties (VCLT).
Developing countries account for a large majority of global refugee reception. 3.5 million out of Syria's 4 million refugees have sought refuge in three countries - Turkey, Lebanon and Jordan. Is it possible to achieve a fair distribution of protection seekers? This Delmi report examines the division of responsibilities for those in need of protection from a global perspective. It analyses past and present models and discusses its feasibility in practice.
The Courts
(2001)
Recent research in Toronto and Geneva indicates that asylum seekers and refugees are predisposed to be cooperative with the refugee status determination (RSD) system and other immigration procedures, and that the design of alternatives to detention can create, foster and support this cooperative predisposition – or can undermine or even demolish it.
This report examines the human rights protection systems of the United Nations, the Council of Europe and the European Union. It explores the substantive rights, protection mechanisms, modes of engagement within, and the interactions between each system. The report also outlines the protection of minority rights, and the political processes through which human rights and institutions evolve and interact. A series of recommendations are made on how to advance the EU human rights system.
There are important shortcomings in terms of quality and consistency of the asylum decisions taken in the Council of Europe member states. As evidence of this, in 2007 acceptance rates varied considerably between 1% and 39% in countries receiving significant numbers of asylum seekers. The situation was even more dramatic when looking at certain specific groups of asylum seekers. For example, again in 2007, the acceptance rates for Iraqis seeking protection in Europe varied between 0 and 81%. The very low recognition rates in certain countries, or for certain groups of asylum seekers, may be due to difficulties in accessing the asylum process, poor procedural safeguards in the asylum proceedings, restrictive and divergent interpretation of eligibility criteria, lack of objective and reliable country of origin information, poor evidential assessment, in particular the culture of disbelief in asylum adjudication, political pressure, lack of training of the relevant authorities and their personnel, or a combination of these factors. The Committee of Ministers of the Council of Europe should be invited to prepare guidelines to address the difficulties outlined above. These guidelines should encourage Council of Europe member states to develop higher standards of protection, based on their own domestic standards of human rights or humanitarian impulse, reflecting the nature of the European Convention on Human Rights as a pan-European minimum standard. Furthermore the Committee of Ministers should consider a mechanism for monitoring the quality and consistency of asylum decisions, and to facilitate this task, consider guidelines on harmonisation of asylum data across Council of Europe member states, taking into account work already carried out at by the European Union. The Committee of Ministers should also review the asylum curriculum in member states and develop training programmes, tools and data-bases of jurisprudence of asylum decisions across Europe. Finally, there is a pressing need for the Committee of Ministers to establish a new inter-governmentalCommittee with a permanent mandate to examine asylum and refugee issues to replace the work formerly carried out by the Ad hoc Committee of experts on the legal aspects of territorial asylum, refugees and stateless persons (CAHAR).