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Books > Law > International law
This book explores the activism promoted by organised networks of
civil society actors in opening up possibilities for more
democratic supranational governance. It examines the positive and
negative impact that such networks of civil society actors - named
"interlocutory coalitions" - may have on the convergence of
principles of administrative governance across the European legal
system and other supranational legal systems. The book takes two
main controversial aspects into account: the first relates to the
convergence between administrative rules pertaining to different
supranational regulatory systems. Traditionally, the spread of
methods of administrative governance has been depicted primarily
against the background of the interactions between the domestic and
the supranational arena, both from a top-down and bottom-up
perspective. However, the exploration of interactions occurring at
the supranational level between legal regimes is still not grounded
on adequate empirical evidence. The second controversial aspect
considered in this book consists of the role of civil society
actors operating at the supranational level. In its discussion of
the first aspect, the book focuses on the relations between the
European administrative law and the administrative principles of
law pertaining to other supranational regulatory regimes and
regulators, including the World Bank, the International Monetary
Fund, the World Trade Organization, the United Nations, the
Organization for Economic Cooperation and Development, the Asian
Development Bank, and the Council of Europe. The examination of the
second aspect involves the exploration of the still little
examined, but crucial, role of civil society organised networks in
shaping global administrative law. These "interlocutory coalitions"
include NGOs, think tanks, foundations, universities, and
occasionally activists with no formal connections to civil society
organisations. The book describes such interlocutory coalitions as
drivers of harmonized principles of participatory democracy at the
European and global levels. However, interlocutory coalitions show
a number of tensions (e.g. the governability of coalitions, the
competition among them) that may hamper the impact they have on the
reconfiguration of individuals' rights, entitlements and
responsibilities in the global arena.
This book is a contributed volume published by the Court of Justice
of the European Union on the occasion of its 60th anniversary. It
provides an insight to the 60 years of case-law of the Court of
Justice and its role in the progress of European Integration. The
book includes contributions from eminent jurists from almost all
the EU Member States. All the main areas of European Union are
covered in a systematic way. The contributions are regrouped in
four chapters dedicated respectively to the role of the Court of
Justice and the Judicial Architecture of the European Union, the
Constitutional Order of the European Union, the Area of EU Citizens
and the European Union in the World. The topics covered remain of
interest for several years to come. This unique book, a "must-have"
reference work for Judges and Courts of all EU Members States and
candidate countries, and academics and legal professionals who are
active in the field of EU law, is also valuable for Law Libraries
and Law Schools in Europe, the United States of America, Latin
America, Asia and Africa and law students who focus their research
and studies in EU law.
This book presents a critical analysis of the rules on the contents
and effects of contracts included in the proposal for a Common
European Sales Law (CESL). The European Commission published this
proposal in October 2011 and then withdrew it in December 2014,
notwithstanding the support the proposal had received from the
European Parliament in February 2014. On 6 May 2015, in its
Communication 'A Digital Single Market Strategy for Europe', the
Commission expressed its intention to "make an amended legislative
proposal (...) further harmonising the main rights and obligations
of the parties to a sales contract". The critical comments and
suggestions contained in this book, to be understood as lessons to
learn from the CESL, intend to help not only the Commission but
also other national and supranational actors, both public and
private (including courts, lawyers, stakeholders, contract parties,
academics and students) in dealing with present and future European
and national instruments in the field of contract law. The book is
structured into two parts. The first part contains five essays
exploring the origin, the ambitions and the possible future role of
the CESL and its rules on the contents and effects of contracts.
The second part contains specific comments to each of the model
rules on the contents and effects of contracts laid down in Chapter
7 CESL (Art. 66-78). Together, the essays and comments in this
volume contribute to answering the question of whether and to what
extent rules such as those laid down in Art. 66-78 CESL could
improve or worsen the position of consumers and businesses in
comparison to the correspondent provisions of national contract
law. The volume adopts a comparative perspective focusing mainly,
but not exclusively, on German and Dutch law.
Banking Regulation and World Trade Law concerns the legal aspects
of the interaction between banking regulation and international
trade in financial services. The author studies the internal
banking market of the European Union, the liberalisation of
financial services trade in the World Trade Organization, the
accords of the Basel Committee on Banking Supervision and the
European Central Bank. The book focuses on the balancing between
banking regulation and international trade law. It discusses
discrimination and proportionality in national banking regulation,
the allocation of prudential regulation and supervision between
home and host country, and international financial law-making. The
author questions decentralised/nation-based banking regulation and
supervision as a foundation for a sustainable liberalisation of
international trade in financial services. The book considers
various reforms of the international financial architecture, such
as the incorporation of the Basel processes and accords into the
WTO system, and the setting up of new international institutions by
building on the Basel Committees or the IMF structures. The role of
central banking in designing the international financial
architecture is also explored: the book reviews the ECB's
competence over foreign exchange policy and its function as lender
of last resort, and treats price stability, banking soundness and
representation as critical concepts. The analysis also reveals that
the concept of 'prudential', despite its extensive use in banking
regulation, has not been defined with adequate precision. In
seeking to delineate the interface between international economic
law and banking regulation, Dr Panourgias builds on the rich
European scholarship on institutional financial issues and the US
interdisciplinary approach to world trade law. He also entertains
the notion of international financial law as a distinct field. The
book will be of particular interest to those concerned with
financial law and international banking.
In many countries, citizens allege that trade policies undermine
specific rights such as labor rights, the right to health, or the
right to political participation. However, in some countries,
policy makers use trade policies to promote human rights. Although
scholars, policy makers, and activists have long debated this
relationship, in truth we know very little about it. This book
enters this murky territory with three goals. First, it aims to
provide readers with greater insights into the relationship between
human rights and trade. Second, it includes the first study of how
South Africa, Brazil, the United States, and the European Union
coordinate trade and human rights objectives and resolve conflicts.
It also looks at how human rights issues are seeping into the WTO.
Finally, it provides suggestions to policy makers for making their
trade and human rights policies more coherent.
The complex question of the sovereignty of the Falkland Islands
remains far from resolved, even after the military and political
events that took place from April to June 1982. The first scholarly
work of its kind, this broad and dispassionate study of the causes
of the South Atlantic war between Britain and Argentina addresses
the larger issues raised by the Falkland crisis and untangles a web
of events and attitudes that stretch back over the past century.
The book begins with a close evaluation of the two pivotal
arguments: Argentina's stance that international law supports their
historical right to the islands, and Britain's position that the
length of their occupation of the Falklands, together with the
principles of self-determination, legalized their de facto control.
Gustafson then discusses how potential off-shore oil reserves,
diplomacy, domestic politics, and the use of force entered into the
sovereignty dispute; analyzes the effects of war on international
relations; and considers possible future approaches to handling the
dispute.
This volume presents the first comprehensive examination of the
legal issues surrounding international debt recovery on claims
against Iraqi oil and gas. In addition to presenting a snapshot
view of Iraq's outstanding debt obligations and an analysis of the
significance of the theory of odious debt in the context of the
Iraqi situation, the list of legal issues examined includes
relevant provisions of the Iraqi Constitution of 2005, controlling
Security Council resolutions, pertinent articles of the KRG oil and
gas law (No. 22) of 2007 and the many nuanced and technical
questions raised thereby, legal pronouncements aimed at protecting
Iraqi oil and gas and those adopted in selected other nations, and
general problems associated with recognition and enforcement of
awards or judgments that may involve such oil and gas or revenues
from the sale thereof. Also discussed are the lessons learned by
the handling of the Iraq debt experience and the transferability of
those lessons to future situations.
This book is a unique collection of high quality articles analysing
legal issues with particular regard to small states. The small
states of the world differ considerably in their geography,
history, political structures, legal systems and wealth.
Nevertheless, because of their size, small states face a set of
common challenges including vulnerability to external economic
impacts such as changing trade regimes and limited ability to
diversify economic activity; limited public and private sector
capacity, including the legal and judicial infrastructure; a need
for regional co-operation; a vulnerability to environmental changes
as well as a limited ability to engage with supranational bodies
and the forces of globalisation. This is the first volume of an
exciting and unique new series, The World of Small States. In this
work, legal experts from small jurisdictions and those with a
particular interest in legal issues facing small states explore
inter alia ethics in small jurisdictions, legal education and the
profession in small states, the challenges facing small states with
mixed legal systems, the constitutional arrangements in small
states, small states as tax havens, and intellectual property and
competition law issues.
In recent decades there has been a considerable growth in the
activities of international tribunals and the establishment of new
tribunals. Furthermore, supervisory bodies established to control
compliance with treaty obligations have adopted decisions in an
increasing number of cases. National courts further add to the
practice of adjudication of claims based on international law.
While this increasing practice of courts and supervisory bodies
strengthens the adjudicatory process in international law, it also
poses challenges to the unity of international law. Most of these
courts operate within their own special regime (functional,
regional, or national) and will primarily interpret and apply
international law within the framework of that particular regime.
The role of domestic courts poses special challenges, as the powers
of such courts to give effect to international law, as well as
their actual practice in applying such law, largely will be
determined by national law. At the same time, both international
and national courts have recognised that they do not operate in
isolation from the larger international legal system, and have
found various ways to counteract the process of fragmentation that
may result from their jurisdictional limitations. This book
explores how international and national courts can, and do,
mitigate fragmentation of international law. It contains case
studies from international regimes (including the WTO, the IMF,
investment arbitration and the ECtHR) and from various national
jurisdictions (including Japan, Norway, Switzerland and the UK),
providing a basis for conclusions to be drawn in the final chapter.
This book offers theoretical analysis on the context and on the
dual function of military technology, as well as case studies on
the third generation of nuclear weapons, on the Biological Weapons
Convention Review Conference, on the driving forces of chemical
armament and on the military use of nuclear energy as a possible
propellant for bombers and in outer space. Five chapters written by
three physicists from the USA, USSR and UK and two peace
researchers from Japan and West Germany focus on SDI: its technical
foundations, consequences for strategic stability and war as well
as on its contradictions and on a case of armament dynamics theory.
The book concludes with three chapters on the implications of the
military use of outer space for international law from a Western,
an Eastern and a Third World perspective, with views from West
Germany, Hungary and Barbados, respectively.
The dramatic uprisings that ousted the long-standing leaders of
several countries in the Arab region set in motion an unprecedented
period of social, political and legal transformation. The
prosecution of political leaders took centre stage in the pursuit
of transitional justice following the 'Arab Spring'. Through a
comparative case study of Egypt, Libya, Tunisia and Yemen, this
book argues that transitional justice in the Arab region presents
the strongest challenge yet to the transitional justice paradigm.
This paradigm is built on the underlying assumption that
transitions constitute a shift from non-liberal to liberal
democratic regimes, where often legal measures are taken to address
atrocities committed during the prior regime. The book is guided by
two principal questions: first, what trigger and driving factors
led to the decision of whether or not to prosecute former political
leaders? And second, what shaping factors affected the content and
extent of decisions regarding prosecution? In answering these
questions, the book enhances our understanding of how transitional
justice is pursued by different actors in varied contexts. In doing
so, it challenges the predominant understanding that transitional
justice uniformly occurs in liberalising contexts and calls for a
re-thinking of transitional justice theory and practice. Using
original findings generated from almost 50 interviews across 4
countries, this research builds on the growing critical literature
that claims that transitional justice is an under-theorised field
and needs to be developed to take into account non-liberal and
complex transitions. It will be stimulating and thought-provoking
reading for all those interested in transitional justice and the
'Arab Spring'.
Trade policy has played a vital role in the decline of European
electronics business. The events that resulted in the disappearance
of the European television industry, of a European and Japanese
video recorder format and of other European consumer electronics
are directly related to market structures in exporting countries
and business practices. In this book, factual business data shows
and economic models explain how restrictive trade practices result
in elimination of efficient competitors in export markets. It deals
with the memorable case how a videocassette recorder format was
established by dumping and how politics enabled it. An innovative
tariff increase for CD players was invalidated by heavy dumping,
causing closure of production in Europe. European CTV industry
succumbed under permanent dumping and a series of biases - as the
interest of a state-owned company - and serious errors making trade
instruments void and rules irreconcilable with international
agreements. Practical and theoretical examples and explanations,
some in detail, of trade rules are provided. The book sketches
events - carelessness, prejudice or special interests, arbitrary
and false application of trade instruments and fraud - resulting in
disappearance of various European electronics business segments.
It is widely understood today that nothing is more urgently needed
than international agreement on the scale, application, and
enforcement of environmental law. This outstanding book - a major
contribution to the debate - demonstrates that existing
international judicial bodies have already taken giant steps toward
overcoming the insufficiency of international law enforcement with
standards, compliance mechanisms, and new law development in the
field of environmental law. The author not only presents a detailed
analysis of a wealth of relevant case law, but also outlines a
model suggesting that a commitment to international judicial
control can be used to contain deviance within acceptable limits,
ensure harmonized interaction among regimes, and clarify the
meaning and application of environmental norms. With pervasive
attention to the differing demands of inter-State relations and
State-individual relations, and of the varieties of 'soft' and
'hard' control, the book considers the ways in which the proposed
judicial control could move powerfully toward minimizing damage in
such legal environmental areas as the following: ‒ conservation of
marine living resources; ‒ obligation not to cause transfrontier
pollution harm; ‒ the human rights challenge to state sovereignty; ‒ |