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Caribbean States organised in CARICOM recently brought forward reparation claims against several European States to compensate slavery and (native) genocides in the Caribbean and even threatened to approach the International Court of Justice. The paper provides for an analysis of the facts behind the CARICOM claim and asks whether the law of state responsibility is able to provide for the demanded compensation. As the intertemporal principle generally prohibits retroactive application of today’s international rules, the paper argues that the complete claim must be based on the law of state responsibility governing in the time of the respective conduct. An inquiry into the history of primary (prohibition of slavery and genocide) as well as secondary rules of State responsibility reveals that both sets of rules were underdeveloped or non-existent at the times of slavery and alleged (native) genocides. Therefore, the author concludes that the CARICOM claim is legally flawed but nevertheless worth the attention as it once again exposes imperial and colonial injustices of the past and their legitimization by historical international law and international/natural lawyers.
This article re-examines the relationship between Africa and the International Criminal Court (ICC). It traces the successive changes of the African attitude towards this Court, from states' euphoria, to hostility against its work, to regional counter-initiatives through the umbrella of the African Union (AU). The main argument goes beyond the idea of "the Court that Africa wants" in order to identify concrete reasons behind such a formal argument which may have fostered, if not enticed, the majority of African states to become ICC members and actively cooperate with it, when paradoxically some great powers have decided to stay outside its jurisdiction. It also seeks to understand, from a political and legal viewpoint, which parameters have changed since then to provoke that hostile attitude against the Court's work and the entrance of the AU into the debate through the African Common Position on the ICC. Lastly, this article explores African alternatives to the contested ICC justice system. It examines the need to reform the Rome Statute in order to give more independence, credibility and legitimacy to the ICC and its duplication to some extent by the new "Criminal Court of the African Union". Particular attention is paid to the resistance against this idea to reform the ICC justice system.
The paper undertakes a preliminary assessment of current developments of international law for the purpose of mapping the ground for a larger research project. The research project pursues the goal of determining whether public international law, as it has developed since the end of the Cold War, is continuing its progressive move towards a more human-rights- and multi-actor-oriented order, or whether we are seeing a renewed emphasis of more classical elements of international law. In this context the term “international rule of law” is chosen to designate the more recent and “thicker” understanding of international law. The paper discusses how it can be determined whether this form of international law continues to unfold, and whether we are witnessing challenges to this order which could give rise to more fundamental reassessments.
This book provides for an extensive legal analysis of the international drug control system in light of the growing challenges and criticism that this system faces. In the current debate on global drug policy, the central pillars of the international drug control system – the UN Drug Conventions as well as its institutions – are portrayed as outdated, suppressive and seen as an obstacle to necessary changes. The book’s objective is to provide an in-depth and positivist insight into drug control’s present legal framework and thus provide for a better understanding of the normative assumptions upon which drug control is currently based. This is attained by clarifying the objectives of the international drug control system and the premises by which these objectives are to be achieved.
The objective of the current global framework of international drug control is the limitation of drugs to medical and scientific purposes. The meaning of this objective and its concrete implications for States’ parties as well as its problems from the perspective of other regimes of international law, most notably international human rights law, are extensively analysed. Additionally, the book focuses on how the international drug control system attempts to reach the objective of confining drugs to medical and scientific purposes, i.e. by setting up a universal system that exercises a rigid control on drug supply. The consequences of this heavy focus on the reduction of drug supply are outlined, and the book concludes by making suggestions on how the international drug control system could be reformed in the near future in order to better meet the existing challenges.
The analysis occurs from a general international law perspective. It aims to map the international drug control system within a wider context of international law and to understand whether the problems that the international drug control system faces are exemplary for the difficulties that institutionalized systems of global scope face in the twenty-first century.
Article 15bis: Exercise of jurisdiction over the crime of aggression (State referal, proprio motu)
(2016)
Comparative literature on institutional reforms in multi-level systems proceeds from a global trend towards the decentralization of state functions. However, there is only scarce knowledge about the impact that decentralization has had, in particular, upon the sub-central governments involved. How does it affect regional and local governments? Do these reforms also have unintended outcomes on the sub-central level and how can this be explained? This article aims to develop a conceptual framework to assess the impacts of decentralization on the sub-central level from a comparative and policyoriented perspective. This framework is intended to outline the major patterns and models of decentralization and the theoretical assumptions regarding de-/re-centralization impacts, as well as pertinent cross-country approaches meant to evaluate and compare institutional reforms. It will also serve as an analytical guideline and a structural basis for all the country-related articles in this Special Issue.