United Kingdom ∙ The National Security and Investment Act 2021

2021 ◽  
Vol 5 (4) ◽  
pp. 416-422
Author(s):  
K. S. Desai
Author(s):  
Juan E Falconi Puig

This chapter addresses some of the controversial issues relating to the inviolability of mission premises. The Yvonne Fletcher incident of 1984 led to debates about the need to upgrade or reform the VCDR in that regard; and the United Kingdom, as a direct consequence of the incident, adopted the ‘Diplomatic and Consular Premises Act 1987’ to be able to adopt unilateral measures to remove premises immunity where threats to national security, to public integrity and/or the need of urban planning exist. Domestic legislation of this kind, however, also provides ground for conflicts with the VCDR. This chapter explores conflicts between property immunity and issues such as access to justice, human rights, and terrorism and examines ways of overcoming such difficulties through mechanisms which safeguard diplomatic privileges and immunity to allow the pursuit of diplomatic functions.


Author(s):  
Liz Campbell

This article problematizes the growing tendency to characterize organized crime as a national security threat, referring primarily to the situation in the United Kingdom but also drawing on international and comparative examples. Three distinct arguments are presented contesting this comparison. First, it is questionable whether either concept is sufficiently clear in a definitional sense for the comparison to be meaningful analytically. The second empirical argument suggests that organized crime, as it is defined and encountered usually in the United Kingdom, does not yet constitute such a threat. Third, and regardless of the validity of the preceding arguments, it is argued in a normative sense that such a comparison should be resisted to the greatest extent possible, given the extraordinary legal consequences it entails. These claims indicate how caution must be exercized in making such a connection.


2019 ◽  
Vol 111 (2) ◽  
pp. 71-84
Author(s):  
Ales BINAR

The Czechoslovak (Munich) Crisis of 1938 was concluded by an international conference that took place in Munich on 29-30 September 1938. The decision of the participating powers, i.e. France, Germany, Italy, and the United Kingdom, was made without any respect for Czechoslovakia and its representatives. The aim of this paper is to examine the role of the defence sector, i.e. the representatives of the ministry of defence and the Czechoslovak armed forces during the Czechoslovak (Munich) Crisis in the period from mid-March to the beginning of October 1938. There is also a question as to, whether there are similarities between the position then and the present-day position of the army in the decision-making process.


Author(s):  
Ashley S. Deeks

The lack of certainty about the precise status of various intelligence activities in international law fosters conditions under which states can choose—and have chosen—different paths through the thicket. This chapter compares how certain states’ intelligence communities (ICs) approach their international law obligations. The United Kingdom asserts that its IC’s activities comply with international law. The United States, in contrast, implies that certain IC actions may violate international law, though it avoids specific public statements about such deviations. This chapter identifies and analyzes the problems and benefits posed by the competing approaches and offers lessons about the capacity of international law to constrain core national security activities.


2016 ◽  
Vol 48 (2) ◽  
pp. 119-132 ◽  
Author(s):  
Tom Christensen ◽  
Martin Lodge

Societal security poses fundamental challenges for the doctrines of accountability and transparency in government. At least some of the national security state’s effectiveness requires a degree of non-transparency, raising questions about legitimacy. This article explores in cross-national and cross-sectoral perspective, how organizations seek to manage their reputation by accounting for their activities. This article contributes in three main ways. First, it highlights how distinct tasks facilitate and constrain certain reputation management strategies. Second, it suggests that these reputational considerations shape the way in which organizations can give account. Third, it considers three domains associated with societal security, namely intelligence, flood defense, and food safety, in five European countries with different state traditions—the United Kingdom, Germany, Denmark, Sweden, and Norway. By using a “web census,” this article investigates cross-sectoral and cross-national variation in the way organizations seek to account for their activities and manage their reputation. This article finds variation across tasks to be more dominant than national variation.


2020 ◽  
Vol 69 (2) ◽  
pp. 365-395
Author(s):  
Paul F. Scott

AbstractThis article, on the basis of a consideration of the development of the law relating to the use of passports as a tool of national security in the United Kingdom, Canada, Australia and New Zealand, challenges the common law conception of passports, arguing that passports effectively confer rights and so, consequentially, that the refusal or withdrawal of a passport represents a denial of rights. From this conclusion a number of points flow. Though these consequences are most acute for the United Kingdom and Canada, in which passports remain regulated by, and are issued under, prerogative powers, there are also a number of points of significance for Australia and New Zealand, where passports have a statutory basis.


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