Immigration has been a controversial and contentious area of public policy since the Commonwealth Immigration Act ended most primary immigration in 1962. This study looks in detail at the work of practioners in the court-system that hears appeals from immigrants and asylum seekers against decisions made by the British Government. The book contains chapters about decision making in primary purpose and the asylum appeals, the administrative problems faced by successive British governments, and the perspectives of pressure groups and politicians. The British Immigration Courts transforms our understanding of immigration as a political issue through preserving a sense of routine work in the courts, civil service and political process which is ignored or idealised by other approaches. It is essential reading for practioners, academics and students interested in current debates about policy.

The only book of its kind, Introduction to South Pacific Law provides an overview of law in the South Pacific. It sets out the framework of South Pacific legal systems and also describes the substantive law on a broad range of topics.Examining both state laws and customary law, the book highlights common patterns and explains some of the principal differences between the laws and legal systems of the countries of the region.The introductory chapter looks at the development of South Pacific law and at South Pacific jurisprudence. Individual chapters are devoted to state laws, customary law, constitutional law, administrative law, criminal law, family law, contract law, torts law, land law, and court systems. The book makes extensive reference to legislative provisions and case law of individual jurisdictions.Including a discussion of recent changes in the law, this new edition of Introduction to South Pacific Law is a useful and up-to-date resource for all those interested in the law of the region.

The concept of learning to 'think like a lawyer' is one of the cornerstones of legal education in the United States and beyond. In this book, Jeffrey Lipshaw provides a critique of the traditional views of 'thinking like a lawyer' or 'pure lawyering' aimed at lawyers, law professors, and students who want to understand lawyering beyond the traditional warrior metaphor. Drawing on his extensive experience at the intersection of real world law and business issues, Professor Lipshaw presents a sophisticated philosophical argument that the "pure lawyering" of traditional legal education is agnostic to either truth or moral value of outcomes. He demonstrates pure lawyering's potential both for illusions of certainty and cynical instrumentalism, and the consequences of both when lawyers are called on as dealmakers, policymakers, and counsellors. This book offers an avenue for getting beyond (or unlearning) merely how to think like a lawyer. It combines legal theory, philosophy of knowledge, and doctrine with an appreciation of real-life judgment calls that multi-disciplinary lawyers are called upon to make. The book will be of great interest to scholars of legal education, legal language and reasoning as well as professors who teach both doctrine and thinking and writing skills in the first year law school curriculum; and for anyone who is interested in seeking a perspective on 'thinking like a lawyer' beyond the litigation arena.

The Developing World of Arbitration studies the recent emergence of Asia Pacific jurisdictions as regional or international arbitration centres, thanks to various reform efforts and initiatives. This book provides an up-to-date and comprehensive analysis of the ways in which arbitration law and practice have recently been reformed in Asia Pacific jurisdictions. Leading contributors across the Asia Pacific region analyse twelve major jurisdictions representing varying patterns and degrees of development, whether driven from top down, bottom up, or by some hybrid impetus. Setting the arbitration systems and reforms of each investigated jurisdiction in the context of its economic, political, and judicial dynamics, this book presents, for the first-time, a cross-jurisdiction comparative and contextual study of the developing world of arbitration in the Asia Pacific and contributes to comparative international arbitration literature from an Eastern perspective. It also aims to identify an Asia Pacific model of arbitration modernisation, one that may be distinct from a Western model, and predicts future trajectories of development and challenge in light of the ever increasing competition between Eastern- and Western-based arbitration centres. This edited collection will be an invaluable addition to the libraries of academics and practitioners in the field of international commercial arbitration.

On July 27,2000 the House of Lords delivered a decision where, for the first time in English law, it explicitly recognised that damages for civil wrongs can be assessed by reference to a defendant (wrongdoer)'s gain rather than a claimant's loss. The circumstances in which such gain-based damages might be available were left for development incrementally. This book considers the nature of gain-based damages and explains when they have historically been available and why, and provides a framework for appreciating the operation of such damages awards. The first part of the book justifies the existence of these damages, which focus upon a defendant wrongdoer's gain made as a result of a civil wrong, explaining the nature and need for such a remedy and the scope of civil wrongs. The core thesis of the book is that two different forms of such gain-based damages exist: the first is concerned with restitution of a defendant's gains wrongfully transferred from a claimant; the second is concerned only with stripping profits from the defendant's hands. Once these two gain-based damages awards are separated they can be shown to be based upon different rationales and the basis for their availability can be easily understood. The second part of the book considers and applies this approach, demonstrating its operation throughout the cases of civil wrongs. The operation of the two forms of gain-based damages is demonstrated in cases in the area of tort (chapter 4), contract (chapter 5), equitable wrongs (chapter 6) and intellectual property wrongs (chapter 7). It is shown that these gain-based damages awards have long been available in these areas and their operation has conformed to clear principle. The difficulty that has obscured the principle is the nomenclature which has hidden the true gain-based nature of many of these damages awards.

This book offers the first theoretical approach to rules of evidence and the practice of judicial proof in China written in English by a Chinese professor. As Prof. He's first representative work, based on over three decades of studying and researching evidence law, it clarifies concepts relevant to evidence law, highlights the value of studying evidence law, re-examines the domain of presumption, reviews central problems in obtaining evidence, and discusses the reasons for misjudged cases. In brief, the book not only presents all major aspects of Chinese rules of evidence in criminal justice, but also introduces readers to the latest developments from a global perspective.

Although European scholars have called U.S. punitive damages an "(undesired) peculiarity of American law " and the "Trojan horse of the Americanisation of continental law", the European Union cannot close its eyes to this important feature of U.S. law. Despite being under constant scrutiny, punitive damages have a strong foothold on the other side of the ocean. Moreover, due to increased globalisation, transnational litigation is arguably on the rise. In cross-border law suits, it is inevitable that a jurisdiction will encounter legal institutions that are alien to the substantive law of the forumThis book examines the private international law treatment of American punitive damages in the European Union. It poses the crucial question whether U.S. punitive damages (should) penetrate the borders of the European Union through the backdoor of private international law. More specifically, three areas of private international law are analysed: service of process, applicable law and enforcement of judgments.In addition to describing the current positions in case law and scholarship, the book takes a normative perspective and attempts to formulate concrete guiding principles that can be used when the European legal order faces U.S. punitive damages. It, therefore, provides an invaluable resource for practitioners, judges and authorities confronted with this controversial remedy. Furthermore, as a nation's private international law attitude indicates the country's level of tolerance towards a foreign concept unknown in its own legal system, the book can form an essential building block for discussions amongst legislators surrounding the introduction of the remedy of punitive damages in substantive law.

A fresh look at one of the most important landmarks in the passage of the Ottoman Middle East to modernity during the late nineteenth century, this book explores the "Nizamiye" court system. The author offers an innovative conceptualization to serve as an alternative to common--yet poorly grounded--wisdoms about legal change in the modern Middle East. Employing a socio-legal approach, this study is focused on "law in action," as experienced in and outside the "Nizamiye" courts of law.

A collective overview of contemporary developments affecting court organization and judicial procedures. From Perry Mason to Judge Lance Ito courts are among the least understood institutions in American society. They are shrouded in myth; they fascinate us with the special atmosphere, the complicated rules, the legal rituals, and the confrontations. That's the mystique, here's the reality: an authoritative and comprehensive survey and a critique of the American court system. America has a long history of sensationalized trials and infamous lawyers and judges, but what is the truth about how our system of jurisprudence really works? Courts and Trials: A Reference Handbook makes the subject accessible by presenting an overview of the organization of courts and the procedures used in criminal and civil cases, with special emphasis on contemporary developments. The book analyzes specific issues: methods of selecting judges, the capacity of citizen-jurors to make appropriate decisions, cameras in the courtroom, three strikes laws, and the prosecution of juveniles as adults. The discussions illuminate competing perspectives on controversies that influence new initiatives and reforms a

Although the influence and opinions of political elites, civil society, and the general public vary widely, the death penalty is universally in decline throughout Sub-Saharan Africa. Today, the death penalty is a site of accommodation and resistance to international human rights norms between African governments and the Global North. As in debates over membership in the International Criminal Court and legal protections for sexual minorities, some leaders resist death penalty abolition as "imposed" by the Global North, though the modern death penalty in Africa is a product of European colonialism. However, Sub-Saharan Africa is not a passive subject of global death penalty abolition driven by Europe. Courts around the continent have made important contributions to global death penalty jurisprudence and members of civil society have engaged in novel and successful strategies against the death penalty. In addition, precolonial notions of punishment and criminal responsibility in Africa have influenced debates over the death penalty, including whether to provide compensation to victims of crime.This book explores the African contribution to the global death penalty debate and lessons for the international death penalty abolition movement.

Most people believe that criminal justice in Colombia is rife with impunity and corruption. Elvira María Restrepo delves beneath such beliefs to reveal a system driven at a fundamental level by fear and distrust from outside the system itself. With the present difficulties in the country tantamount to a state of irregular war, the judiciary is in crisis. It has to contribute to the construction of peace and the reconstruction of trust, or perish.

The Court of Justice of the European Union has often been characterised both as a motor of integration and a judicial law-maker. To what extent is this a fair description of the Court's jurisprudence over more than half a century? The book is divided into two parts. Part one develops a new heuristic theory of legal reasoning which argues that legal uncertainty is a pervasive and inescapable feature of primary legal material and judicial reasoning alike, which has its origin in a combination of linguistic vagueness, value pluralism and rule instability associated with precedent. Part two examines the jurisprudence of the Court of Justice of the EU against this theoretical framework. The author demonstrates that the ECJ's interpretative reasoning is best understood in terms of a tripartite approach whereby the Court justifies its decisions in terms of the cumulative weight of purposive, systemic and literal arguments. That approach is more in line with orthodox legal reasoning in other legal systems than is commonly acknowledged and differs from the approach of other higher, especially constitutional courts, more in degree than in kind. It nevertheless leaves the Court considerable discretion in determining the relative weight and ranking of the various interpretative criteria from one case to another. The Court's exercise of its discretion is best understood in terms of the constraints imposed by the accepted justificatory discourse and certain extra-legal steadying factors of legal reasoning, which include a range of political factors such as sensitivity to Member States' interests, political fashion and deference to the 'EU legislator'. In conclusion, the Court of Justice of the EU has used the flexibility inherent in its interpretative approach and the choice it usually enjoys in determining the relative weight and order of the interpretative criteria at its disposal, to resolve legal uncertainty in the EU primary legal materials in a broadly communautaire fashion subject, however, to i) regard to the political, constitutional and budgetary sensitivities of Member States, ii) depending on the constraints and extent of interpretative manoeuvre afforded by the degree of linguistic vagueness of the provisions in question, the relative status of and degree of potential conflict between the applicable norms, and the range and clarity of the interpretative topoi available to resolve first-order legal uncertainty, and, finally, iii) bearing in mind the largely unpredictable personal element in all adjudication. Only in exceptional cases which the Court perceives to go to the heart of the integration process and threaten its acquis communautaire, is the Court of Justice likely not to feel constrained by either the wording of the norms in issue or by the ordinary conventions of interpretative argumentation, and to adopt a strongly communautaire position, if need be in disregard of what the written laws says but subject to the proviso that the Court is assured of the express or tacit approval or acquiescence of national governments and courts.

Despite the fact that the case-law of the European Court of Justice on employment related issues has become increasingly erratic of late,there is no denying the centrality of the Court's role in the development of EC employment law. Though concentration on the work of the Court of Justice may no longer be in vogue, this book examines its contribution in the employment law field in its political and economic context, as well as with reference to the juridical structures within which the Community's judicial arm is obliged to operate. The objective is not simply to critique the employment jurisprudence of the Court but also to examine the procedural, operational and structural context in which the Court of Justice is obliged to work and to reflect on how this context may affect the jurisprudential outcome. The book focuses, in particular, on the shortcomings of the preliminary reference procedure. When the Court of Justice hands down decisions in the employment law field, Article 234 EC dictates a particular type of judicial dialogue between it and the national referring courts. It is contended that the dual dispute resolution/public interest nature of the Court's role in the preliminary reference procedure goes some way to explaining why its answers are often regarded as unsatisfactory from the perspective of the referring court and "users" of EC law generally. The book further outlines the developing Community policy on employment and reflects on the effect which this nascent policy may have on the balancing exercises which the Court is inevitably called upon to perform in a variety of social policy contexts. Finally, part two of the book examines specific substantive areas of EC employment law. The policy considerations at play in the case-law of the Court are discussed in detail, as is the coherence of this case-law with the Community's political stance on employment.

"The Pursuit of Justice" is a realistic yet hopeful analysis of how the law works in practice rather than in theory. The multi-chapter discussion recognizes that decision makers in the law -- judges, lawyers, juries, police, forensic experts and more -- respond systematically to the incentive structures with which they are confronted. In turn, incentives are a function of economic and institutional design. While these chapters shed light on how perverse incentives result in adverse outcomes, each chapter also suggests institutional reforms that would create better incentives within the legal system.

This book on the EU Private Damages Directive (PDD) offers an in-depth discussion of selected issues of interpretation of the PDD. The Directive sets out certain rules necessary to ensure that anyone who has suffered harm caused by an infringement of competition law by an undertaking or by an association of undertakings, can effectively claim full compensation for that harm from that undertaking or association.Each section corresponds with a chapter of the PDD and commences with a description of the general context within which the specific questions must be placed and understood. The outcome of the actual discussion is then provided in a Q&A format. The chapters are the result of a Closed Workshop organised on 21 May 2015 in Brussels, Belgium and which was attended by a group of competition law specialists from the majority of the EU Member States.

George W. Niven was a lawyer and con-man who cheated his victims, all incarcerated prostitutes, pickpockets and other petty criminals, by promising legal help and taking their meager property in exchange. Since it involved a corrupt lawyer, criminals and venal jailors, his trial was a perfect subject for a trial report, one of the most popular genres of antebellum literature. This trial, frequently cited in later histories of American law, is equally important as an early source for the history of legal malpractice litigation in the U.S. and its description of the practice of a lawyer at the margins of the profession. The affidavits of Niven's victims also provides a great deal of vital information about the daily lives of prisoners in the early decades of the Republic. William Sampson 1764-1836] was an Irish rights activist whose part in the Uprising of 1798 led to his relocation to New York, where he engaged in a successful law career.

The study of language and law has seen explosive growth in the past twenty-five years. Research on police interrogations, trial examination, jury deliberation, plea bargains, same sex marriage, to name a few, has shown the central role of written and oral forms of language in the construction of legal meaning. However, there is another side of language that has rarely been analyzed in legal settings: the role of gesture and how it integrates with language in the law. This is the first book-length investigation of language and multimodal conduct in the law. Using audio-video tapes from a famous rape trial, Matoesian and Gilbert examine legal identity and impression management in the sociocultural performance of precedent, expert testimony, closing argument, exhibits, reported speech and trial examination. Drawing on insights from Jakobson and Silverstein, the authors show how the poetic function inheres not only in language but multimodal conduct generally. Their analysis opens up new empirical territory for both forensic linguistics and gesture studies.

Solimine and Walker provide a comprehensive examination of all the major issues revolving around judicial federalism- the sharing of judicial power between the 50 states and the federal government. They make the case that the existence and operation of this system is healthy for the development of law and the protection of liberty.

This theme is developed through a discussion of the major issues in the literature of judicial federalism: federalism and rights, the parity of the state and federal courts, the civil litigation system, state court interpretations of their own constitutions, and the relationship of ideology to judicial federalism. Recognizing that there are and always have been serious shortcomings in this system, the author points out that these problem areas can be remedied; the start of this remedial process necessitates a respect for the judicial institutions of the state. Solimine and Walker envision the beginning of a dialogue among practitioners, academics, and concerned citizens on how best to improve the current system in order to halt the threats to diversity posed by increasing federal domination of the judicial system.

John Appleton was a prominent American lawyer who practiced in and around Bangor, Maine, beginning in the early 1820s and earned a national reputation as Chief Justice of Maine's supreme court. Through a study of Appleton's life and thought, Gold shows how the commitment to individual liberty and personal responsibility helped shape nineteenth-century American law. By tracing Appleton's life and law practice, the book addresses an aspect of early American culture that has received little attention--the nature of American individualism as embodied in the law. The book contributes to American legal historiography in other ways. It is one of just a handful of serious studies of state judges. It adds to the current revisionist interpretation of laissez-faire constitutionalism. Finally, it sheds light on some little studied areas of legal history, in particular the history of the law of evidence. Recently some historians have recognized that law in the nineteenth century incorporated broadly held social values or world-views, and a few have written on the relationship between law and individualism. Gold contends these scholars have associated American individualism with self-reliance in the nineteenth century and nonconformity in the twentieth. Gold shows there is another side to individualism with self-reliance in the nineteenth century and nonconformity in the twentieth. Americans lived in society, therefore, their relations with one another had to be ordered. While they believed in freedom of action, they also believed that individuals had to be responsible for the effects of their actions on others. The book is ideal reading for all students of American legal history in particular and American history in general.

The Japanese legal system is at a crossroads. The contributors to this book explore the most important features of the adversary process as it works in the Japanese criminal justice system. Topics include the right to remain silent, wire tapping, the role of defense counsel, plea bargaining, the power of prosecutors, juvenile justice and judicial independence. Many of the essays seek comparison with practices in Anglo-American countries.

This book, one of the very first monographs on the Hungarian Constitutional Court available in English, is a unique study of the birth of a new legal system after the collapse of communism in Central and Eastern Europe. It shows that the genesis of the new legal order was determined by massive Western involvement and an unprecedented movement of export/import of law. Anchored in a detailed comparative study of German and Hungarian constitutional case law on human dignity, this book argues that law importation was a deliberate strategy carried out by the Hungarian Court in the early years of its operation. It explains how the circumstances of the transition and the background of the importers determined the choice of German case law as a model and how the Court used it to construct its own version of the right to human dignity. It highlights the Hungarian Court's instrumentalization of imported law in order to lay the foundations of a new conception of fundamental rights. While focusing on the Hungarian experience, this book engages with international debates and provides an original theoretical framework for approaching the movement of law from the importers' perspective.

While it is easy to assume that the system of criminal justice in nineteenth-century England was not unlike the modern one, in many ways it was very different, particularly before the series of Victorian reforms that gradually codified a system dependent on judge-made precedent. In the first half of the century capital cases often tried almost summarily, with the accused not being adequately represented and without a system of appeal. There were also fundamental differences in procedure and in the rules of evidence, as indeed there were in attitudes towards crime and criminals. David Bentley has provided an account of the nineteenth-century criminal justice system as a whole, from the crimes committed and the classification of offences to the different courts and their procedure. He describes the stages of criminal prosecution -- committal, indictment, trial, verdict and punishment -- and the judges, lawyers and juries, highlighting significant changes in the rules of evidence during the century. He looks at the reform of the old system and assesses how far it was brought about by lawyers themselves and how far by external forces. Finally, he considers the fairness of the system, both as seen by contemporaries and in modern terms.