It is not often acknowledged that the great majority of African refugee movement happens within Africa rather than from Africa to the West. This book examines the specific characteristics and challenges of the refugee situation in Sub-Saharan Africa, offering a new and critical vision on the situation of asylum-seekers and refugees in the African continent. Cristiano d'Orsi considers the international, regional and domestic legal and institutional frameworks linked to refugee protection in Sub-Saharan Africa, and explores the contributions African refugee protection has brought to the cause on a global scale. Key issues covered in the book include the theory and the practice of non-refoulement, an analysis of the phenomenon of mass-influx, the concept of burden-sharing, and the role of freedom fighters. The book goes on to examine the expulsions of refugees and the historical role played by UNHCR in Sub-Saharan Africa. As a work which follows the persecution and legal challenges of those in search of a safe haven, this book will be of great interest and use to researchers and students of immigration and asylum law, international law, human rights, and African studies.

Each year, thousands of lesbian, gay, bisexual, transgender and intersex (LGBTI) asylum seekers apply for asylum in EU Member States.This book considers the position of LGBTI asylum seekers in European asylum law. Developing an encompassing approach to the topic, the book identifies and analyzes the main legal issues arising in relation to LGBTI people seeking asylum including: the underestimation of the relevance of criminalization of sexual orientation as well as the large scale violence against trans people in countries of origin by some European states; the requirement to seek State protection against violence even when they originate from countries where sexual orientation or gender identity is criminalized, or where the authorities are homophobic; the particular hurdles faced during credibility assessment on account of persisting stereotypes; and queer families and refugee law. The book gives a state of the art overview of law in Europe, both at the level of European legislation and at the level of Member State practice. While being largely focused on Europe, the book also takes into account asylum decisions from Australia, New Zealand, Canada, and the United States and is of relevance internationally, offering analysis of issues which are not specific to particular legal systems.

Taking as a starting point the widely accepted view that states confronted with terrorism must find a proper equilibrium between their respective obligations of preserving fundamental rights and fighting terrorism effectively, this book seeks to demonstrate how the design and enforcement of a human rights instrument may influence the result of that exercise. An attempt is made to answer the question how a legal order's approach to the limitation of rights may shape decision-making trade-offs between the demands of liberty and the need to guarantee individual and collective security. In doing so, special attention is given to the difference between the adjudicative methods of balancing and categorisation. The book challenges the conventional wisdom that individual rights, in times of crisis, are better served by the application of categorical rather than flexible models of limitation. In addition, the work considers the impact of a variety of other factors, including the discrepancies in enforcing an international convention as opposed to a national constitution and the use of emergency provisions permitting derogations from human rights obligations in time of war or a public emergency. The research questions are addressed through a comparative study of the terrorism-related restrictions on five fundamental rights protected under the European Convention on Human Rights and the United States Constitution: the right to freedom of expression, the right to freedom of association, the right to personal liberty, the right to privacy, and the right to a fair trial. The book offers both a theoretical account of the paradoxical relationship between terrorism and human rights and a comprehensive comparative survey of the major decisions of the highest courts on both sides of the Atlantic.

This book considers the issue of free speech in transitional democracies focusing on the socio-legal developments in the Czech Republic, Hungary, and Poland. In showing how these Central and Eastern European countries have engaged with free speech models imported from the Council of Europe / EU and the USA, the book offers valuable insights into the ways States have responded to challenges associated with transformation from communism to Western democracy. The book first explores freedom of expression in European and American law looking particularly at hate speech, historical revisionism, and pornography. It subsequently enquires into the role and perspectives of those European (mandatory) and US-American (persuasive) models for the constitutional debate in Central and Eastern Europe. The study offers an original interpretation of the "European" model of freedom of expression, beyond the mechanisms of the Council of Europe. It encompasses the relevant aspects of EU law (judgments of the Court of Justice and the harmonised EU instruments) as mandatory standards for courts and legislators, including those in transitional countries of Central and Eastern Europe. The book argues for de-criminalisation of historical revisionism and pornography, and illuminates topics such as genocide denial, the rise of Prague and Budapest as Europe's porno-capitals, anti-Semitism and anti-Gypsyism, religious obscurantism and homophobia, virulent Islamophobia, and the glorification of terrorism. The research methodology in this study combines a descriptive case law assessment (comparative constitutional, public international, and EU law) with a normative critique stemming from post-structuralist scrutiny, rhetoric, postmodern legal movements, legal history, history of ideas, and art criticism. This book will be of interest to students and scholars of, comparative constitutional law, law and society, human rights and European law as well as political philosophers.

Coercive Care asks probing and challenging questions regarding the use of coercion in health care and the social services. The book combines philosophical analysis with comparative studies of social policy and law in a large number of industrialized countries.

In times of increasing migration flows, Greece is often viewed as the gateway to Europe for significantly high numbers of asylum-seeking individuals, including unaccompanied minors. Between 2016 and 2020, under Greek law unaccompanied children were to be temporarily placed in a protective environment upon irregular entry, pending referral to suitable accommodation. However, in reality they were being subjected to detention procedures instead. Giving voice to migrant children and professionals throughout, the author combines legal analysis with criminology and unveils the discrepancy between the law and practice. The findings demonstrate that unaccompanied children in Greece are criminalised through detention processes, while being deprived of the right to be heard. This book promotes child-friendly practices in the international migration setting, with a view to safeguarding the fundamental rights of unaccompanied minors experiencing detention upon arrival in host countries.

Since the early 2010s, an increasing number of European countries have passed laws that prohibit the wearing of various kinds of Islamic veil in particular circumstances. This insightful book considers the arguments used to justify such laws and analyses the legitimacy of these arguments both generally and in regards to whether such laws can be seen as justified interferences with the rights of women who wish to wear such garments. This timely book considers the most recently passed European laws that target Islamic veiling. The author situates the justifications for anti-veiling laws in the context of a careful analysis of the reasons why women wear veils, and considers these justifications by reference to emerging debates surrounding the relative value of liberalism and human rights, multiculturalism, and the need to protect 'traditional values'. The book concludes that these laws are best viewed as symbolic strikes at a recognizable symbol of an ideological opponent, theorising that their principal purpose is to enable particular countries to reaffirm traditional values in a context of increased domestic opposition to multiculturalism. This engaging work will be valuable reading for students and scholars of human rights law, Islamic law and those interested specifically in the laws and regulations surrounding Islamic veiling around the world.

The highly anticipated U.S. Supreme Court decision in Fisher v. University of Texas placed a greater onus on higher education institutions to provide evidence supporting the need for affirmative action policies on their respective campuses. It is now more critical than ever that institutional leaders and scholars understand the evidence in support of race consideration in admissions as well as the challenges of the post-Fisher landscape. This important volume shares information documented for the Fisher case and provides empirical evidence to help inform scholarly conversation and institutions' decisions regarding race-conscious practices in higher education. With contributions from scholars and experts involved in the Fisher case, this edited volume documents and shares lessons learned from the collaborative efforts of the social science, educational, and legal communities. Affirmative Action and Racial Equity is a critical resource for higher education scholars and administrators to understand the nuances of the affirmative action legal debate and to identify the challenges and potential strategies toward racial equity and inclusion moving forward.

Since the adoption of the UN Convention on the Rights of the Child (1989) children's rights have assumed a central position in a wide variety of disciplines and policies. This handbook offers an engaging overview of the contemporary research landscape for those people in the theory and practice of children's rights. The volume offers a multidisciplinary approach to children's rights, as well as key thematic issues in children's rights at the intersection of global and local concerns. The main approaches and topics within the volume are: * Law, social work, and the sociology of childhood and anthropology * Geography, childhood studies, gender studies and citizenship studies * Participation, education and health * Juvenile justice and alternative care * Violence against children and female genital mutilation * Child labour, working children and child poverty * Migration, indigenous children and resource exploitation The specially commissioned chapters have been written by renowned scholars and researchers and come together to provide a critical and invaluable guide to the challenges and dilemmas currently facing children's rights.

Hate speech law can be found throughout the world. But it is also the subject of numerous principled arguments, both for and against. These principles invoke a host of morally relevant features (e.g., liberty, health, autonomy, security, non-subordination, the absence of oppression, human dignity, the discovery of truth, the acquisition of knowledge, self-realization, human excellence, civic dignity, cultural diversity and choice, recognition of cultural identity, intercultural dialogue, participation in democratic self-government, being subject only to legitimate rule) and practical considerations (e.g., efficacy, the least restrictive alternative, chilling effects). The book develops and then critically examines these various principled arguments. It also attempts to de-homogenize hate speech law into different clusters of laws/regulations/codes that constrain uses of hate speech, so as to facilitate a more nuanced examination of the principled arguments. Finally, it argues that it is morally fitting for judicial and legislative judgments about the overall warrant of hate speech law to reflect principled compromise. Principled compromise is characterized not merely by compromise over matters of principled concern but also by compromise which is itself governed by ideals of moral duty or civic virtue (e.g., reciprocity, equality, and mutual respect). The Open Access version of this book, available at https://doi.org/10.4324/9781315714899, has been made available under a Creative Commons Attribution-Non Commercial-No Derivatives 4.0 license.

This volume considers the way in which the focus on individual rights may constitute an obstacle to ensuring fairness in criminal proceedings. The increasingly cosmopolitan nature of criminal justice, forcing legal systems with different institutional forms and practices to interact with each other as they attempt to combat crime beyond national borders, has accentuated the need for systems to seek legitimacy beyond their domestic traditions. Fairness, expressed in terms of the right to a fair trial in provisions such as Article 6 of the European Convention on Human Rights, has emerged across Europe as the principal means of guaranteeing the legitimacy of criminal proceedings. The consequence of this is that criminal procedure doctrines are framed overwhelmingly in 'constitutional' terms - the protection of defence rights is necessary to restrict and legitimate the state's mandate to prosecute crime. Yet there are various problems with relying solely or predominantly on defence rights as a means of ensuring that proceedings are 'fair' or legitimate and these issues are rarely discussed in the academic literature. In this volume, scholars from the disciplines of law, philosophy and sociology challenge various normative assumptions underpinning our understanding of fairness in criminal proceedings.

This book brings together scholars from various disciplines to explore current issues and trends in the rethinking of migration and citizenship from the perspective of three major immigrant democracies - Australia, Canada, and the United States. These countries share a history of pronounced immigration and emigration, extensive experience with diasporic and mobile communities, and with integrating culturally diverse populations. They also share an approach to automatic citizenship based on the principle of jus soli (as opposed to the traditionally common jus sanguinis of continental Europe), and a comparatively open attitude towards naturalization. Some of these characteristics are now under pressure due to the "restrictive turn" in citizenship and migration worldwide. This volume explores the significance of political structures, political agents and political culture in shaping processes of inclusion and exclusion in these diverse societies. This book was originally published as a special issue of Citizenship Studies.

Over the last decades, provisions for direct democracy have increasingly been added to new constitutions around the world, including in the Baltic States of Estonia, Latvia and Lithuania. Using a comparative legal approach, this book identifies a large set of direct democratic instruments in the Baltics that are being activated either automatically, by public authorities or by the citizens. Although direct democracy should empower the people to share state power and to take political decisions over the heads of their representatives, the results of its practical use between 1991 and 2014 do not confirm these assumptions. Besides informal aspects there are many procedural obstacles in each country that restrict not only the use of such tools but also the chance that the referendum will pass.

This book focuses on the right to privacy in the digital age with a view to see how it is implemented across the globe in different jurisdictions. The right to privacy is one of the rights enshrined in international human rights law. It has been a topic of interest for both academic and non-academic audiences around the world. However, with the increasing digitalisation of modern life, protecting one's privacy has become more complicated. Both state and non-state organisations make frequent interventions in citizens' private lives. This edited volume aims to provide an overview of recent development pertaining to the protection of the right to privacy in the different judicial systems such as the European, South Asian, African and Inter-American legal systems. The chapters in this book were originally published as a special issue of The International Journal of Human Rights.

The management of religious and ideological diversity remains a key challenge of our time - deeply entangled with debates about the nature of liberal democracy, equality, social cohesion, minorities and nationalism, security and foreign policy. This book explores this challenge at the level of the workplace in Europe. People do not surrender their religion of belief at the gates of their workplace, nor should they be required to do so. But what are the limits of accommodating religious belief in the workplace, particularly when it clashes with other fundamental rights and freedoms? Using a comparative and socio-legal approach that emphasises the practical role of human rights, anti-discrimination law and employment protection, this book argues for an enforceable right to reasonable accommodation on the grounds of religion and belief in the workplace in Europe. In so doing, it draws on the case law of Europe's two supranational courts, three country studies -Belgium, the Netherlands and the UK - as well as developments in the US and Canada. By offering the first book-length treatment of the issue, it will be of significance to academics, students, policy-makers, business leaders and anyone interested in a deeper understanding of the potentials and limits of European and Western inclusion, freedom and equality in a multicultural context. Awarded an honourable mention from the International Academy of Comparative Law for the 2018 Canada Prize!

In 2015, the United Nations formulated 17 ambitious goals towards transforming our world the Sustainable Development Goals (SDG 2030). Their relation to public international law has been studied, but private law has received less attention in this context and private international law none at all. Yet development happens, not only through public action, but also through private action and such action is governed predominantly by private law and private international law. This book demonstrates an important, constructive role for private international law as an indispensable part of the global legal architecture needed to turn the SDGs into reality. Renowned and upcoming scholars from around the world analyse, for each of the 17 SDGs, what role private international law actually plays towards advancing these goals and how private international law could, or should, be reformed to advance them. Together, the chapters in the book bring to the fore the hitherto lacking private side of transforming our world.

This book offers a unique insight into the role of human rights lawyers in Chinese law and politics. In her extensive account, Eva Pils shows how these practitioners are important as legal advocates for victims of injustice and how bureaucratic systems of control operate to subdue and marginalise them. The book also discusses how human rights lawyers and the social forces they work for and with challenge the system. In conditions where organised political opposition is prohibited, rights lawyers have begun to articulate and coordinate demands for legal and political change. Drawing on hundreds of anonymised conversations, the book analyses in detail human rights lawyers' legal advocacy in the face of severe institutional limitations and their experiences of repression at the hands of the police and state security apparatus, along with the intellectual, political and moral resources lawyers draw upon to survive and resist. Key concerns include the interaction between the lawyers and their bureaucratic, professional and social environments and the forms and long term political impact of resistance. In addressing these issues, Pils offers a rare evaluative perspective on China's legal and political system, and proposes new ways to assess domestic advocacy's relationship with international human rights and rule of law promotion. This book will be of great interest and use to students and scholars of law, Chinese studies, socio-legal studies, political studies, international relations, and sociology. It is also of direct value to people working in the fields of human rights advocacy, law, politics, international relations, and journalism.

This book examines the rules governing the right to asylum in the European Union. Drawing on the 1951 United Nations Convention relating to the Status of Refugees, and the 1967 Protocol, Francesco Cherubini asks how asylum obligations under international refugee law have been incorporated into the European Union. The book draws from international law, EU law and the case law of the European Court of Human Rights, and focuses on the prohibition of refoulement; the main obligation the EU law must confront. Cherubini explores the dual nature of this principle, examining both the obligation to provide a fair procedure that determines the conditions of risk in the country of origin or destination, and the obligation to respond to a possible expulsion. Through this study the book sheds light on EU competence in asylum when regarding the different positions of Member States. The book will be of great use and interest to researchers and students of asylum and immigration law, EU law, and public international law.

The role of religion in various domains of the public sphere provokes much debate. One of the key areas where this debate is unfolding is in the secular workplace, where some employees strongly desire to express their religious beliefs in ways which may bring them into conflict with their employers. For example, a Sikh woman may wish to wear a kara bracelet contrary to an employer's uniform policy; or a Muslim may wish to take time out of required working hours for Friday prayers. Equally, some employees may feel compelled to object to particular aspects of their job role from which a crisis of conscience arises. For instance, a Christian registrar might object to registering a same-sex marriage or civil partnership; or a Muslim retail worker might object to handling alcohol. This addresses these conflicts and the role of law in resolving them. It considers what is meant by religious expression by individual employees, and the motives underlying it, and sets out the different ways it might have an impact on the workplace, in both uncontroversial and potentially controversial ways.The book identifies different principled responses to workplace religious expression within a liberal state. It then goes on to analyse to what extent the law in England and Wales reflects these differing responses, both at a legislative and policy level, and at a court and tribunal level. The book determines the extent to which freedom of religious expression for the individual enjoys legal protection in the workplace in England and Wales, and whether or not there is a case for changing the law to strengthen that protection.

In 1990, after the end of the Pinochet regime, the newly-elected democratic government of Chile established a Truth and Reconciliation Commission (TRC) to investigate and report on some of the worst human rights violations committed under the seventeen-year military dictatorship. The Chilean TRC was one of the first truth commissions established in the world. This book examines whether and how the work of the Chilean TRC contributed to the transition to democracy in Chile and to subsequent developments in accountability and transformation in that country. The book takes a long term view on the Chilean TRC asking to what extent and how the truth commission contributed to the development of the transitional justice measures that ensued, and how the relationship with those subsequent developments was established over time.It argues that, contrary to the views and expectations of those who considered that the Chilean TRC was of limited success, that the Chilean TRC has, in fact, over the longer term, played a key role as an enabler of justice and a means by which ethical and institutional transformation has occurred within Chile. With the benefit of this historical perspective, the book concludes that the impact of truth commissions in general needs to be carefully reviewed in light of the Chilean experience. This book will be of great interest and use to students and scholars of conflict resolution, criminal international law, and comparative legal systems in Latin America.

Taking a critical attitude of dissatisfaction towards rights, the central premise of this book is that rights are technologies of governmentality. They are a regulating discourse that is itself managed through governing tactics and techniques - hence governing (through) rights. Part I examines the 'problem of government' (through) rights. The opening chapter describes governmentality as a methodology that is then used to interrogate the relationship between rights and governance in three contexts: the international, regional and local. How rights regulate certain identities and conceptions of what is good governance is examined through the case study of non-state actors, specifically the NGO, in the international setting; through a case study of rights agencies, and the role of experts, indicators and the rights-based approach in the European Union or regional setting; and, in terms of the local, the challenge that the blossoming language of responsibility and community poses to rights in the name of less government (Big Society) is problematised. In Part II, on resisting government (through) rights, the book also asks what counter-conducts are possible using rights language (questioning rioting as resistance), and whether counter-conduct can be read as an ethos of the political, rights-bearing subject and as a new ethical right. Thus, the book bridges a divide between critical theory (ie Foucauldian understandings of power as governmentality) and human rights law.

Inside Immigration Law analyses the practice of implementing immigration law, examining the different political and organisational forces that influence the process. Based on unparalleled academic access to the German migration management system, this book provides new insights into the 'black box' of regulating immigration, revealing how the application of immigration law to individual cases can be chaotic, improvised and sometimes arbitrary, and either informed or distorted by the complex, politically laden and changeable nature of both German and EU immigration laws. Drawing on extensive empirical material, including participant observation, interviews and analyses of public as well as confidential documents in German immigration offices, Inside Immigration Law unveils the complex practices of decision-making and work organisation in a politically contested environment. A comparative, critical evaluation of the work of offices that examines the discretion and client interactions of bureaucrats, the management of legal knowledge and symbolism and the relationships between immigration offices and external political forces, this book will be of interest to sociologists, legal scholars and political scientists working in the areas of migration, integration and the study of work and organisations.

Human Rights, Power and Civic Action examines the interrelationship between struggles for human rights and the dynamics of power, focusing on situations of poverty and oppression in developing countries. It is argued that the concept of power is a relatively neglected one in the study of rights-based approaches to development, especially the ways in which structures and relations of power can limit human rights advocacy. Therefore this book focuses on how local and national struggles for rights have been constrained by power relations and structural inequalities, as well as the extent to which civic action has been able to challenge, alter or transform such power structures, and simultaneously to enhance protection of people's basic human rights. Contributors examine and compare struggles to advance human rights by non-governmental actors in Cambodia, China, Ghana, Kenya, South Africa and Zimbabwe. The country case-studies analyse structures of power responsible for the negation and denial of human rights, as well as how rights-promoting organisations challenge such structures. Utilising a comparative approach, the book provides empirically grounded studies leading to new theoretical understanding of the interrelationships between human rights struggles, power and poverty reduction. Human Rights, Power and Civic Action will be of interest to students and scholars of human rights politics, power, development, and governance.

In recent decades, asylum has emerged as a highly politicized European issue. The term 'asylum seeker' has suffered a negative perception and has been associated with notions of illegality and criminality in mainstream media. These misconceptions have been supported by politicians as a distraction from economic and political uncertainties with the result that asylum seekers have been deprived of significant rights. This book examines the effect of recent attempts of harmonization on the identification and protection of refugees. It considers the extent of obligations on the state to admit and protect refugees and examines the 1951 Refugee Convention. The motivations of European legislators and legislation concerning asylum procedures and reception conditions are also analysed. Proposals and initiatives for refugee movements and determinations are examined and assessed. The author makes suggestions for better protection of refugees while responding to the security concerns of States, and questions whether European law and policy is doing enough to uphold the fundamental right to seek and enjoy asylum as set out in the Universal Declaration of Human Rights. This book takes a bold look at a controversial issue and generates discussion for those involved in the fields of human rights, migrational and transnational studies, law and society and international law.

This book is a comprehensive assessment of regional responses to the crisis in the asylum/refugee system and critically examines how different regions tackle the problem. The chapters consider the fundamental challenges which undermine an effective asylum process as well as regional difficulties with the various circumstances surrounding African asylum seekers. With contributions on Africa, Europe, Latin America, South Asia and the Middle East, the collection strives to appreciate what informs each region's approach to the asylum process and asks if there are issues common to every region and if regions can learn from each other. Including a discussion on the protection of asylum seekers within the African human rights system, the book seeks an understanding of what legal regime exists for the protection of refugees and how regional institutions such as human rights commissions and regional courts enforce and adjudicate the law.The book will be valuable to those interested in international law, migration and human rights.