International human rights law Part 40

Subsidiarity as a Structural Principle of International human rights law
Paolo G. Carozza
American Journal of International Law
Volume 97, Number 1, January 2003 p.38

Thanks to its capacity to embrace a conception of common good, consonant with human rights, while still affirming and protecting the pluralism of the global community, the idea of subsidiarity, more than classic notions of state sovereignty, can help to understand and evaluate the fundamental structure of international human rights law.

The Doctrine of Double Jeopardy in International Criminal and Human Rights Law
Mohamed El Zeidy
Mediterranean Journal of Human Rights
Volume 6, Double Issue, 2002

The 1st ‘Advanced Academy on International Studies in Human Rights and Humanitarian Law’ on Robben Island, Cape Town (S.A.)
Florian Hoffmann
German Law Journal
Volume 3, Number 6, June 2002

The influence of international human rights law upon criminal justice systems
Javaid Rehman
Journal of Criminal Law
Volume 66, Number 6, December 2002 p.510

OVERLEGALIZING HUMAN RIGHTS: INTERNATIONAL RELATIONS THEORY AND THE COMMONWEALTH CARIBBEAN BACKLASH AGAINST HUMAN RIGHTS REGIMES
Laurence R. Helfer
Columbia Law Review
Volume 102, Number 7, November 2002 p.1832

As the ratification of human rights Treaties increases and the use of supranational adjudication to challenge human rights violations becomes more widespread, international legal scholars and international relations theorists alike have started to examine the effects of the increasing legalization of human rights norms. This Article raises the claim that international human rights law can become overlegalized, and it draws upon international relations theory and new empirical evidence to explore a recent case study of overlegalization. The Article seeks to understand why, in the late 1990s, three Commonwealth Caribbean governments denounced human rights agreements and withdrew from the jurisdiction of international human rights tribunals. It concludes that, while the denunciations can be viewed as arising from certain features unique to the Caribbean-in particular a dispute over capital punishment or judicial imperialism by the region’s highest appellate court-they can also be understood as a response to the overlegalization of the governments’ human rights commitments. In addition, the Article reassesses realist, ideational, and liberal international relations theories of treaty formation and compliance in light of the Caribbean case study, concluding that the notion of overlegalization adds nuance to the predictive power of these three theories.

Rachel Murray, The African Commission On Human and Peoples’ Rights and International Law (Hart Publishing, Oxford, 2000, xxiii + 316pp.) ISBN 1-84113-122-9 (h-b)
Mashood A. Baderin
Human Rights Law Review
Volume 2, Number 2, Autumn 2002 p.350-356

SYMPOSIUM: DEATH PENALTY FROM AN INTERNATIONAL AND HUMAN RIGHTS LAW PERSPECTIVE
Danielle Mitterrand
Santa Clara Law Review
Volume 42, Number 4, 2002 p.1031

Keynote Address at the Symposium on the Death Penalty from an International and Human Rights Law Perspective, held on March 15, 2002, at Santa Clara University. Madame Danielle Mitterrand is the founder and President of France Libertés Foundation, a foundation that promotes, among other international human rights issues, the universal abolition of the death penalty. In the address, Mme. Mitterrand discussed her experience as a First Lady with the abolition of the death penalty in 1981, and the foundation’s human rights efforts in other countries. Mme. Mitterrand took part in the Resistance movement during World War II and was France’s First Lady from 1981 to 1995, the period of François Mitterrand’s two presidential terms of office.

AMICI CURIAE URGE THE U.S. SUPREME COURT TO CONSIDER INTERNATIONAL HUMAN RIGHTS LAW IN JUVENILE DEATH PENALTY CASE
Connie de la Vega
Santa Clara Law Review
Volume 42, Number 4, 2002 p.1041

This article puts forth the argument made in an amicus curiae brief filed in the case of Napoleon Beazley, a seventeen year-old offender sentenced to death in Texas. Amici urge the United States Supreme Court to grant his petition for writ of certiorari so that it might consider whether the prohibition against executing offenders who were younger than eighteen at the time of their crime has attained the status of Customary International Law and even a peremptory norm of international law. If so, then the reservation to article 6(5) of the International Covenant on Civil and Political Rights , a treaty ratified by the United States, is invalid and that provision can be applied directly in the United States. Amici also argue that the non-self-executing declaration does not apply when the treaty is being used defensively, and that because the provision itself is self-executing, it should be applied directly by the Court. Finally, amici urge that at a minimum the Court should provide meaningful guidance in construing the Eighth Amendment of the United States Constitution.

Author: international

Mentioned in these Entries

Columbia Law Review, Customary International Law, International Covenant on Civil and Political Rights, International human rights law, Treaties, United States Supreme Court.