CIAO DATE: 08/2009
Volume: 20, Issue: 1
February 2009
Editorial (PDF)
Preface (PDF)
The Concept of 'Law' in Global Administrative Law
Benedict Kingsbury
What constitutes ‘law' in the efflorescent field of ‘global administrative law'? This article argues for a ‘social fact' conception of law, emphasizing sources and recognition criteria, but it extends this Hartian positivism to incorporate requirements of ‘publicness' in law. ‘Publicness' is immanent in public law in national democratic jurisprudence, and increasingly in global governance, where it applies to public entities rather than to identifiable global publics. Principles relevant to publicness include the entity's adherence to legality, rationality, proportionality, rule of law, and some human rights. This article traces the growing use of publicness criteria in practices of judicial-type review of the acts of global governance entities, in requirements of reason-giving, and in practices concerning publicity and transparency. Adherence to requirements of publicness becomes greater, the less the entity is able to rely on firmly established sources of law and legal recognition. ‘Private ordering' comes within this concept of law only through engagement with public institutions. While there is no single unifying rule of recognition covering all of GAL, there is a workable concept of law in GAL.
National Courts, Domestic Democracy, and the Evolution of International Law (PDF)
Eyal Benvenisti, George W. Downs
National courts are gradually abandoning their traditional policy of deference to their executive branches in the fi eld of foreign policy and beginning more aggressively to engage in the interpretation and application of international law. This change has been precipitated by the recognition of courts in democratic states that continued passivity in the face of a rapidly expanding international regulatory apparatus raises constitutionally-related concerns about excessive executive power and risks further erosion in the effective scope of judicial review. To avoid this, national courts have begun to exploit the expanding scope and fragmented character of international regulation to create opportunities to act collectively by engaging in a loose form of inter-judicial co-ordination. Such collective action increases their ability to resist external pressures on their respective governments, and reduces the likelihood that any particular court or country that it represents will be singled out and punished as an outlier by either domestic or foreign actors. Should this strategy continue to be refi ned and developed, it holds out the promise of enabling national courts not only to safeguard their role domestically but to function as full partners with international courts in creating a more coherent international regulatory apparatus.
No Longer a Weak Department of Power? Reflections on the Emergence of a New International Judiciary (PDF)
Yuval Shany
The article assesses some of the theoretical and practical implications arising out of some recent changes in the fi eld of international dispute settlement: the rise in the number of international courts, the expansion of their jurisdictional powers, their increased invocation by state and nonstate parties, and the growing inclination of national courts to apply international law. Arguably, these developments point to the emergence of a new judiciary the operation of which is governed by a new ethos (international norm-advancement and the maintenance of co-operative international arrangements), which is different from the traditional ethos of international courts (confl ict resolution). The article then moves on to discuss some of the ‘ blind spots ’ of the present judicial institutional landscape, which includes a consideration of the remaining diffi culties associated with addressing politically-charged confl icts before international courts (especially those relating to war and terror), and problems relating to the enforcement of judicial orders and judgments. While national courts can, in theory, fi ll some of these remaining gaps, their actual ability to do so remains unclear. In addition, the article addresses in brief some concerns that the emergence of the new institutional judiciary may actually exacerbate: co-ordination problems, and concerns relating to the effectiveness and legitimacy of international adjudication.
The State Strikes Back: Immigration Policy in the European Union
Martin A. Schain
Scholars have argued that the dynamics of immigration control have changed. Unlike previous waves of immigration which were controlled by national law and administration, this wave would be more difficult to control. Because of the constraints imposed by international agreements, international institutions, and national judicial authorities, controls would be embedded in international institutions and law that were assumed to be inclined to be less restrictive than national institutions and law. Looking at these patterns over the past 20 years, it now appears that international constraints on immigration control have been highly exaggerated. Indeed, international relations have become an important context for understanding the enhanced ability of states to control immigration, and to develop more muscular policies for integration. For this reason, international constraints may be less important for understanding the development of immigration policy than neo-nationalism, enhanced through intergovernmental relations in the international system. Therefore, what began as a scholarly discussion of the limits on restrictionist policies because of international constraints has developed into a discussion of the use of international relations to strengthen the effectiveness of restrictionist policies.
Settling Self-determination Conflicts: Recent Developments
Self-determination conflicts outside the colonial context have previously appeared virtually impossible to settle. Long-running and very destructive internal armed conflicts have been the result. Since the termination of the Cold War, however, there has been a veritable wave of self-determination settlements. While some of these trade the claim to secession for internal autonomy in order to safeguard the territorial unity of the state, a number of innovative solutions have been adopted, going beyond this traditional approach. This article reviews over 40 settlements and draft settlements in order to identify an emerging post-modern pattern of practice of settling self-determination disputes. The article also assesses the impact of this practice on the classical, restrictive understanding of the doctrine of self-determination.
Mónica García-Salmones
The use of experts ’ power in global networks is often concealed by describing it in the register of scientifi c truths. This text seeks to illustrate the phenomenon by reference to the recent article by Cooney and Lang, ‘ Taking Uncertainty Seriously: Adaptive Governance and International Trade ’ , which appeared in this journal. The account those authors give of WTO law goes beyond a purely legitimacy-based structure focused on effectiveness. Instead, the question is framed in terms of cognitive achievements by regulators in the member states. The present article uses Cooney and Lang’s project and the same example of the WTO in order to evaluate global governance. In so doing it analyses the functionalist style of public law, together with neofunctionalism and the historical phenomena by which increasing areas in the public sphere are attributed to regulators, both national and international. With this article, the author hopes to contribute to the debate about the tensions caused by the legal activity of international organizations in a world of equal sovereigns with unequal access to power. In conclusion it is suggested that, so far as contemporary global governance is concerned, the distribution of jurisdiction through regulation is the sphere in which the usual political struggles between international actors take place.
The European Courts and the Security Council: Between Dédoublement Fonctionnel and Balancing of Values
Pasquale De Sena, Maria Chiara Vitucci
The recent case law of various international tribunals facing questions related to UN Security Council resolutions shows the clear tendency to grant primacy to the UN legal order. This trend, far from being well founded on formal arguments, appears to be a tribute to a legal order perceived as superior, and, at the same time, is revealing of the ‘value oriented' approach followed by the courts. Such an approach can be categorized from a theoretical perspective in the light of Scelle's theory of relations between legal orders, whereby the courts implement in their respective legal orders values stemming from the UN legal order. Various critical remarks can be advanced in relation to this attitude. Basically, when different legal values are at stake, the need arises to strike a balance between them, as the ECJ has recently done in the appeal decision in the Yusuf and Kadi cases. Such a tendency, if consistently followed, could serve as a valuable instrument to find the correct equilibrium between the security interest and the need for respect of human rights.
La jurisprudence de la Cour Internationale de Justice (PDF)
Karin Oellers-Frahm
Human Rights and the WTO: The Case of Patents and Access to Medicines (PDF)
Duncan Matthews
The Fair and Equitable Treatment Standard in the International Law of Foreign Investment (PDF)
Stephan W. Schill
Books Received (PDF)