Technology has had a prevalent impact on nearly all social domains, one being the judicial system. Advancements such as computer-generated demonstrations and electronic filing can enhance presentations and give a clearer, well-organized case.""E-Justice: Using Information Communication Technologies in the Court System"" presents the most relevant experiences and best practices concerning the use and impact of ICTs in the courtroom. This groundbreaking title draws upon the leading academic and practicing perspectives from around the globe to provide academics and professionals throughout the legal system with the most comprehensive overview of present developments in e-justice.

The central argument of this book explores the disillusionment that Australians feel with regard to the way politics is conducted. The book explores causes of that disillusionment, and argues that because these are ultimately traceable to defects in the constitution, it is only through constitutional reform that government can be improved. This book argues that the current approach to constitutional debate suffers from the flaw of being anti-theoretical, in the sense that it is not grounded in any set of values, and is afflicted by a tendency to consider practical objections to reform before considering the moral case for it. This book argues that instead of accepting the constitution as it is, it is time we began to discuss how it ought to be, taking human dignity as the fundamental value upon which a constitution should be based. It then puts the case for change in a number of areas, including reform of the electoral system, enhanced parliamentary scrutiny of the executive, the inclusion in the constitution of a full bill of rights, the abolition of the federal system, realisation of the rights of Indigenous people, codification of constitutional conventions either in conjunction with or separately from an Australian republic, reform of the rules of standing in constitutional matters and, finally, the need to improve civics education. This book is designed to be provocative in the way that it directly challenges current academic orthodoxy. This book also outlines a proposed draft new constitution. This book will be of interest to anyone who is concerned about how Australia is governed and why it has been so difficult to achieve constitutional reform.

How do judges sentence? In particular, how important is judicial discretion in sentencing? Sentencing guidelines are often said to promote consistency, but is consistency in sentencing achievable or even desirable? Whilst the passing of a sentence is arguably the most public stage of the criminal justice process, there have been few attempts to examine judicial perceptions of, and attitudes towards, the sentencing process. Through interviews with Scottish judges and by presenting a comprehensive review and analysis of recent scholarship on sentencing - including a comparative study of UK, Irish and Commonwealth sentencing jurisprudence - this book explores these issues to present a systematic theory of sentencing. Through an integration of the concept of equity as particularised justice, the Aristotelian concept of phronesis (or 'practical wisdom'), the concept of value pluralism, and the focus of appellate courts throughout the Commonwealth on sentencing by way of 'instinctive synthesis', it is argued that judicial sentencing methodology is best viewed in terms of a phronetic synthesis of the relevant facts and circumstances of the particular case. The author concludes that sentencing is best conceptualised as a form of case-orientated, concrete and intuitive decision making; one that seeks individualisation through judicial recognition of the profoundly contextualised nature of the process.

Meet Thaddeus Sikorski, a herculean third-generation American, courageous, persevering, and surprisingly steadfast father of this tragic odyssey to love and protect his angel children. After losing his first love, 18-year-old Thad enlist, and goes on to become a Vietnam War combatant, a San Francisco progressive street revolutionary, a graduate business student, an Internet-related technology visionary, husband, and a global business leader. In between entrepreneurial misadventures, he manages to save the life of an American President, struggles with a psychopathy attorney and murderer, discovers the truth about Silicon Valley's justice system, experiences the economic hollowing out brought on by the outsourcing of Silicon Valley technologies, and survives the emotions of remaining true to his love for his children. This extraordinary journey travels through three decades of the American technology and cultural landscape. Author Richard Kusiolek paid much attention to the details of everyday life of an entrepreneur in Silicon Valley. Angels in the Silicon encapsulates the experience of living in Silicon Valley for three decades of rapid technology progress, economic change, and a politically correct progressive judiciary. The novel, "Angels in the Silicon," has a powerful American story to tell. You will learn the naked truth of living in Northern California's Silicon Valley.

'Reforming Justice' calls for justice to be repositioned more centrally in evolving notions of equitable development. Justice is fundamental to human well being and essential to development. Over the past fifty years, however, overseas development assistance - foreign aid - has grappled with the challenge of improving 'the rule of law' with underwhelming and often dismal results around the world. Development agencies have supported legal and judicial reforms in order to improve economic growth and good governance, but are yet to address mounting concerns about equity and distribution. Building on new evidence from Asia, Livingston Armytage argues that it is now time to realign the approach to promote justice as fairness and equity.

This two-volume set investigates the concept, institutionalization, models and mechanism of mediation, an important form of alternative dispute resolution within China’s legal system. Grounded in traditional dispute resolution practices throughout Chinese history, mediation is born out of the Chinese legal tradition and considered to be “Eastern� in nature. Seeking to explore how mediation has developed in order to function in a modernized society, the first volume looks into the legal foundations of Chinese mediation as well as paths to the institutionalization and professionalization of mediation. The second volume examines the development of diversified dispute resolution via the elucidation of eight major types of mediation in China. By reviewing its history and enquiring into trends and prospects, the authors seek to establish a mediation system that incorporates diversified models, institutionalized and noninstitutionalized approaches, changing contexts, and a range of dimensions for society. This title will serve as a crucial reference for scholars, students and related professionals interested in alternative dispute resolution, civil litigation, and especially China’s dispute resolution policy, law, and practice.

As social practices now frequently extend beyond national boundaries, experiences and expectations about fair and legitimate politics have become increasingly fragmented. Our ability to understand and interpret others and to tolerate difference, rather than overcome diversity, is therefore at risk. This book focuses on the contested meanings of norms in a world of increasing international encounters. The author argues that cultural practices are less visible than organisational practices, but are constitutive for politics and need to be understood and empirically 'accounted' for. Comparing four elite groups in Europe, Antje Wiener shows how this invisible constitution of politics matters. By comparing individual interpretations of norms such as democracy and human rights, she shows how they can mean different things, even to frequently travelling elite groups.

This book examines circumstantial evidence in the context of its utility in investigation and prosecution of corruption cases in Tanzania. Circumstantial evidence has not been given the due prominence it deserves under traditional common law. In this book, the author expounds and articulates the efficacy of circumstantial evidence in the dispensation of corruption cases in courts of law. The emerging approach of circumstantial evidence is intended to cure the current weaknesses of investigation and prosecution of corruption cases--a daunting task for all law enforcements and courts who regard direct evidence paradigm as more reliable than circumstantial evidence. The book provides a strong case for circumstantial evidence approaches to improve the effectiveness and contribution of the legal system in the fight against corruption.

This book explores victims' views of plea negotiations and the level of input that they desire. It draws on the empirical findings of the first in-depth study of victims and plea negotiations conducted in Australia. Over the last 50 years, the criminal justice system has seen major changes in both the role that victims play in the justice process and in how the vast majority of criminal cases are finalised. Guilty pleas have become the norm, and many of these result from negotiations between the prosecutor and the defence. The extent to which the victim is one of the participating parties in plea negotiations however, is a question of law and of practice. Drawing from focus groups and surveys with victims of crime, Victims and Plea Negotiations seeks to privilege victims' voices and lived experiences of plea negotiations, to present their perspectives on five options for enhanced participation in this legal process. This book appeals to academics and students in the areas of law, criminology, sociology, victimology and legal studies, those who practice in the criminal justice system generally, those who work with victims, and policy makers.

This book offers a new interpretation of judicial review in England and Wales as being concerned with the advancement of justice and good governance, as opposed to being concerned primarily with ultra vires or common law constitutionalism. It is developed both from examining the functions and values that ought to be served by judicial review, and from analysis of empirical 'social' facts about judicial review primarily as experienced in the Administrative Court. Based on ground-up case law analysis it constructs a new taxonomy on the grounds of judicial review: mistake, procedural impropriety, ordinary common law statutory interpretation, discretionary impropriety, relevant/irrelevant considerations, breach of an ECHR protected right or equality duty, and constitutional allocation of powers, constitutional rights, or other complex constitutional principles. It explains each of these grounds, what academic and judicial support there might be for them outside case law analysis, and their similarities and differences when viewed against popular existing taxonomies. It concludes that Administrative Court judges are engaged in ordinary common law statutory interpretation in approximately half of all cases, and that where discretionary judgement is involved on the part of the initial decision-maker, judges do indeed consider their task to be one of determining whether the challenged decision was justified by reasoning of adequate quality. It finds that judges apply ordinary common law principles of statutory interpretation with historical pedigrees, including assessing the initial decision-maker's reasoning with reference to statutory purpose, and sifting relevant from irrelevant considerations, including moral considerations. The result is a ground-breaking reassessment of the grounds of judicial review in England and Wales and the practice of the Administrative Court.

Lawyers involved in international commercial transactions know well that that unforeseen events affecting the performance of a party often arise. Not surprisingly, exemptions for non-performance are dealt with in a significant number of arbitral awards. This very useful book thoroughly analyzes contemporary approaches, particularly as manifested in case law, to the scope and content of the principles of exemption for non-performance which are commonly referred to as A force majeure A| and A hardship. A| The author shows that the A general principles of law A| approach addresses this concern most effectively. Generally accepted and understood by the business world at large, this approach encompasses principles of international commercial contracts derived from a variety of legal codes. Its most important A restatements A| are found in the 1980 United Nations Convention on Contracts for the International Sale of Goods (CISG) and two A soft law A| codifications of international commercial contract law: the UNIDROIT Principles of International Commercial Contracts and the European Principles of Contract Law (PECL).Establishing specific standards and A case groups A| for the exemptions under review, the analysis treats such recurring elements and claims as the following:A { impossibility of performance;A { frustration of contract;A { impracticability;A { interference by the other party;A { contractual risk allocations;A { unforeseeability of an impediment;A { third party responsibility;A { effect of mandatory rules;A { excluded rights;A { threshold tests; andA { irreconcilable differences. The book is a major contribution to the development of the use of general principles of law in international commercial arbitration. In addition, as an insightful investigation into the fundamental question of the borderlines of the principle of sanctity of contracts, this book is sure to capture the attention of business lawyers and interested academics everywhere.

For decades it seemed clear that EC competition law was enforceable effectively at the national level, and ECJ case law has continued to bear this out. In recent years, however, the Commission has been proposing harmonization of national rules of procedure in competition cases, implying that procedural autonomy is insufficient on its own to produce an effective enforcement system in this area. As the authors of this book clearly demonstrate, this suggests a binary system governing the enforcement of EC Articles 81 and 82: namely, that led by the Commission through directives and eventual regulations, and that built on ECJ principles in areas not dealt with by such Community instruments. This book describes and analyzes not only the specific Commission recommendations, but also the manner and extent to which these recommendations are or may be implemented in civil procedure. In particular, the authors consider changes which may be required if these recommendations are incorporated into Dutch and English rules of civil procedure. Also addressed are elements of procedure not mentioned by the Commission but which might usefully be considered in the context of ECJ principles of effectiveness, equivalence and effective judicial protection of rights. At the heart of the study is a detailed analysis of the Commission White Paper on Damages Actions and the Commission Staff Working Paper, both issued early in 2009. The in-depth analysis ranges over procedural aspects of such elements as the following: - standing; - disclosure and access to evidence; - burden of proof; - fault/no fault; - costs of damages actions; - injunctions; - civil versus administrative enforcement; - limitations; - leniency programmes; - collective actions; - confidentiality; and - forms of compensation. Anticipating as it does a looming impasse in European competition law, this remarkable book sheds defining light on the real implications of EC competition law for parties to damages actions, not only in the national systems studied but for all Member States. For practitioners and jurists it offers a particularly useful approach to the handling of cases involving European competition law, and also serves as a guide to current trends and as a clarification of doctrine.

The first full-scale historical account of the rise and growth of the jury system in England. The American edition adds a number of notes, as well as making several corrections to American references.

Prison studies has experienced a period of great creativity in recent years, and this collection draws together some of the field's most exciting and innovative contemporary critical writers in order to engage directly with one of the most profound questions in penology - why prison? In addressing this question, the authors connect contemporary penological thought with an enquiry that has received the attention of some of the greatest thinkers on punishment in the past. Through critical exploration of the theories, policies and practices of imprisonment, the authors analyse why prison persists and why prisoner populations are rapidly rising in many countries. Collectively, the chapters provide not only a sophisticated diagnosis and critique of global hyper-incarceration but also suggest principles and strategies that could be adopted to radically reduce our reliance upon imprisonment.

This book examines how alcohol intoxication impacts upon the memory of rape victims and provides recommendations for how best to investigate and prosecute such rape complaints. An estimated 75% of victims are under the influence of alcohol during a sexual assault and yet there is surprisingly little guidance on conducting interviews with complainants who were alcohol-intoxicated during the attack. This book will provide a distinctive, rigorous and important contribution to knowledge by reviewing the evidence base on the effects of alcohol on memory performance. The book brings together a range of academics from various disciplines, including psychology, law and criminology, and it discusses the implications for practice based on consultation with various criminal justice practitioners, including police officers, barristers who defend and prosecute rape cases and policy makers.

Increasingly, and to a greater degree than most national jurisdictions, France encourages and favours private arbitration as the normal and usual method for the resolution of disputes arising from international economic relations. In this new edition of the standard English-language work on French arbitration law and practice, the authors examine this trend as rules and practices developed in international arbitration have taken hold in French domestic arbitration and vice versa. Accordingly, the authors present the French arbitral process as one entire system of dispute resolution, which consists of various stages from the formation of the arbitration agreement to enforcement of the award, without dividing the subject into the formally distinct parts of domestic and international arbitration. The new edition highlights such features of this dynamic body of arbitration law as the following: - characterization of international arbitration by French courts; - cases which require decisions by a national court or authority; - cases where inarbitrability arises from protection of the weaker party to a contract; - cases where the decision sought would infringe a general rule of public policy; - authority and duties of the arbitral tribunal; - rights, obligations and liabilities of arbitrators; - the time factor in the conduct of arbitral proceedings; - tender and reception of evidence; - prescribed substantive rules of law; - the immediate effect and consequences of the arbitral award; - enforcement of the award in France (exequatur); - contesting orders of the juge de l'exequatur; - grounds common to annulment of awards; and - enforceability of awards pending challenge. At each stage the authors emphasize variations arising in international arbitration. The presentation also takes account, with comments at relevant points, of the influential 2006 Draft Reform of the Comite Francais de l'Arbitrage, which proposes to write into the Code de Procedure civile some of the arbitration-related matters which have been the subject of national court decisions. A highly useful annex reprints relevant French legislation, as well as the texts of major international arbitration conventions and an extensive bibliography. The objective of the book is to present a modern and efficient arbitration system, not only to readers who are encountering it for the first time, but also to those who, although well-versed in it, might benefit from a text in English, with the comparisons to common law provisions such an undertaking entails. Any practitioner or academic interested in the field of international arbitration and the enforcement of foreign awards will welcome this very useful and informative work.

Judges don't just discover the law, they create it. A renowned and much-used analysis of the process of judicial decision-making, now in a library-quality cloth edition with modern formatting and presentation. Includes embedded page numbers from the original 1921 edition for continuity of citations and syllabi. Features a new, explanatory Foreword by Justice Cardozo's premier biographer, Andrew L. Kaufman, senior professor at Harvard Law School and author of "Cardozo" (Harvard Univ. Press, 1998).Justice Benjamin Nathan Cardozo (1870-1938) offered the world a candid and self-conscious study of how judges decide cases and the law - they are lawmakers and not just law-appliers, he knew - all drawn from his insights and experience on the bench in a way that no judge had done before. Asked the basic questions, "What is it that I do when I decide a case? To what sources of information do I appeal for guidance?," Cardozo answered them in his methodical, rich, and timeless prose, explaining the proper use of such decisional tools as logic and analogy to precedent; analysis of history and tradition; application of public policy, community mores, and sociology; and even the subconscious forces that drive judges' decisions. This book has impacted the introspective examination of the lawmaking process of the courts in a way no other book has had. It continues to be read today by lawyers and judges, law students and scholars, historians and political scientists, and philosophers - among others interested in how judges really think and the tools they employ.Judges are people, and lawmakers, too. "The great tides and currents which engulf the rest of men, do not turn aside in their course, and pass the judges by. We like to figure to ourselves the processes of justice as coldly objective and impersonal. The law, conceived of as a real existence, dwelling apart and alone, speaks, through the voices of priests and ministers, the words which they have no choice except to utter. ...It has a lofty sound; it is well and finely said; but it can never be more than partly true." Beyond precedential cases and tradition, judges make choices, using methods of analysis and biases that ought to be examined.Famous at the time for his trenchant and fluid opinions as a Justice on New York's highest court - he is still studied on questions of torts, contracts, and business law - and later a Justice of the U.S. Supreme Court, Cardozo filled the lecture hall at Yale when he finally answered the frank query into what judges do and how do they do it. The lectures became a landmark book and a source for all other studies of the ways of a judge. Brought to a new generation by Professor Kaufman, and presented as part of the properly formatted Legal Legends Series of Quid Pro Books, this edition is the understandable and usable rendition of a classic work of law and politics.

This book analyzes the implementation of CSR reporting and codes of business conduct and ethics in the legal systems of the USA, Austria and China and their enforcement in international supply chain arbitrations. The book demonstrates that long-term profit maximization is increasingly intertwined with corporate ethics and CSR policies. In order to prevent window-dressing and greenwashing, certain control mechanisms and legal standards are required along the entire supply chain. This book introduces an ethics and CSR system recommending a reward-based whistleblowing mechanism, internal oversight by a CSR and Ethics Committee comprised of independent board members and at least one sustainability expert, and an external, independent and comprehensive assurance of CSR reports provided by auditing firms or newly formed governmental agencies consisting of certified CSR experts. The author emphasizes the significance for supply chain leaders to ensure contractual enforcement of their codes of business ethics and conduct along the supply chain. Against this background, the author created a comprehensive fictitious case scenario covering a supply chain dispute arising from the breach of the supply chain leader's code of business conduct and ethics by a lower-tier supply chain member. The author acknowledges the fact that in most of the cases the governing law of international supply chain contracts is English law or law based on English law. Thus, the author discusses potential contractual claims for damages arising from a loss of profits caused by a loss of reputation resulting from violations of core provisions of the chain leader's supplier code of conduct pursuant to English law. As international supply chain disputes usually involve more than two parties, and international arbitration is the ideal means for the resolution of these disputes, the book compares the arbitration rules for consolidations and joinders of some of the most significant international arbitration institutions: SIAC, ICC, AIAC, ICDR, VIAC, CIETAC and HKIAC. The book is directed at legal practitioners, legislators of various jurisdictions, board members of corporations, ethics and compliance officers, academics, researchers and students. It is the author's main goal that the book serves as an inspirational source for the establishment or the improvement of a corporate ethics and CSR system preventing window-dressing and greenwashing and covering the entire supply chain. Furthermore, it is intended that students develop a deeper understanding for the enforcement of corporate ethics and CSR policies.

The book systematically describes the theory and practice of ICSID annulment proceedings by thoroughly analyzing this mechanism in light of the annulment decisions rendered so far as well as the publications on the issue.
Organized to suit the needs of the practitioner, it outlines the recent trends in the area, providing the most up to date analysis of the subject. It also addresses key topics involving ICSID annulment such as the procedural issues which frequently arise in this type of proceedings, for example admissability of new evidence and arguments in annulment proceedings, res judicata in resubmitted cases.
The sections on each ground for annulment include an analysis of the applicable standard as well as a detailed description and study of each annulment decision that addressed the respective ground, creating an authoritative and complete resource.