scholarly journals The Dynamic Evolution of International Law – The Case for the More Purposeful Development of Customary International Law

2018 ◽  
Vol 49 (4) ◽  
pp. 561
Author(s):  
Bill Campbell
Keyword(s):  
International Law ◽  
New Technology ◽  
Islamic State ◽  
New Developments ◽  
Customary International Law ◽  
The Public ◽  
Number Of Factors ◽  
The Subject ◽  
The Law ◽  
Self Defence

A fundamental underpinning of the ongoing relevance of international law is that of its ability to adapt and change to meet new developments and challenges including new technology, new (or newly developing) threats to both the public and the international order and newly developed practices, for example trans-border corporate and taxation practices. How then to effect that change? The timely negotiation of treaties to deal with the subject matter of these new developments and challenges would be ideal but can be difficult due to a number of factors. The answer could lie in the more purposeful and expeditious development of customary international law – that is, by taking coordinated action, and by publicising that action and its legal basis.This will not result in changes to the law of the detail that might be expected in a treaty, but it could address particular issues of moment. Indeed, individual states may well see themselves as having no option but to take action to meet time sensitive and critical aspects of new developments and global challenges either alone or in concert with others with a view to the development of a more widespread custom. Initial characterisation of some such action as "illegal but justified" (or words along those lines), whilst a contradiction in terms, does at the very least point to a real need for a change in the law. An example of such purposeful action may well be the development of the customary international law of self-defence to support the use of force against non-state actors in certain circumstances – such as the force used by a number of states against the Islamic State of Iraq and the Levant (ISIL) in Syria on the basis of the collective self-defence of Iraq.

Down the Danube: The Vienna Convention on the Law of Treaties and the Case Concerning the GabcïKovo-Nagymaros Project

1998 ◽  
Vol 47 (4) ◽  
pp. 837-854 ◽  
Author(s):  
Daniel Reichert-Facilides
Keyword(s):  
International Law ◽  
Practical Importance ◽  
Vienna Convention ◽  
International Court Of Justice ◽  
Customary International Law ◽  
National Courts ◽  
International Court ◽  
Scope Of Application ◽  
The Subject ◽  
The Law

Over the last 30 years, the Vienna Convention on the Law of Treaties1 has emerged as one of the most influential instruments of modern international law. The Convention, which was adopted at the UN Conference on the Law of Treaties on 23 May 1969, entered into force on 27 January 1980 and has meanwhile been ratified by more than 80 States.2 Yet, as it does not operate retroactively,3 the scope of application is growing only slowly and its practical importance stems, rather, from the fact that the Convention is widely considered a restatement of customary international law. As early as 1971 the International Court of Justice referred to the articles governing termination for breach of treaty as a codification of the existing law on the subject.4 Since then both international tribunals and national courts have more and more habitually relied on the material provisions of the Convention to ascertain traditional rules of the law of treaties.5

New Foundations of the Law of Expropriation of Alien Property

1981 ◽  
Vol 75 (3) ◽  
pp. 553-589 ◽  
Author(s):  
Rudolf Dolzer
Keyword(s):  
International Law ◽  
Academic Writing ◽  
Customary Law ◽  
Customary International Law ◽  
Negotiated Settlements ◽  
Continuous Stream ◽  
The Subject ◽  
Un General Assembly ◽  
The Law ◽  
Gray Areas

The continuous stream of resolutions of the UN General Assembly and much academic writing on the subject notwithstanding, the present state of customary international law regarding expropriation of alien property has remained obscure in its basic aspects; this is true in particular for expropriations in the context of North-South (still better described as “West-South”) relations, to which this article is primarily, but not exclusively, addressed. International courts have had no occasion to rule on fundamental issues of expropriation law in the past decades, even though these issues have been relevant to various disputes settled out of court. Eventually, however, the courts will be confronted with cases involving expropriation of alien property: given the continuing and rising importance of foreign investment, the parties involved probably will not invariably prefer negotiated settlements. It must also be recalled here that customary law has occasionally served as a reference standard in treaties and contracts. If an expropriation case were brought before an international tribunal, it could not simply rule that the law governing expropriation of alien property is in dispute and therefore no law at all is applicable. The very notion of international law precludes an argument that acknowledges the existence of “gray areas” in that law: a court could not rule that some law exists, but that it cannot be identified by judicial means.

The Squire Law Library at Cambridge: the Historical Development and Current Status of the International Law Collections

2017 ◽  
Vol 17 (2) ◽  
pp. 78-91 ◽  
Author(s):  
Lesley Dingle
Keyword(s):  
International Law ◽  
Historical Development ◽  
Detailed Account ◽  
Current Status ◽  
Public International Law ◽  
The Public ◽  
The Subject ◽  
Law Library

AbstractIn this paper Lesley Dingle provides a detailed account of the historical development of the public international law collections at the Squire Law Library in Cambridge. She explains the close involvement of the academic lawyers and the librarians, past and present, in developing an important collection which reflects the significance of the subject at Cambridge's Faculty of Law. Finally, she brings things up-to-date by detailing the extent of the electronic provision which benefits the modern scholar in this discipline.

(Dis)solving the Chronological Paradox in Customary International Law: A Hartian Approach

2008 ◽  
Vol 21 (1) ◽  
pp. 129-148 ◽  
Author(s):  
David Lefkowitz
Keyword(s):  
International Law ◽  
Legal System ◽  
Resolution Function ◽  
Customary International Law ◽  
International Legal System ◽  
The Creation ◽  
The Law ◽  
Normative Standard

As traditionally conceived, the creation of a new rule of customary international law requires that states believe the law to already require the conduct specified in the rule. Distinguishing the process whereby a customary rule comes to exist from the process whereby that customary rule becomes law dissolves this chronological paradox. Creation of a customary rule requires only that states come to believe that there exists a normative standard to which they ought to adhere, not that this standard is law. What makes the customary rule law is adherence by officials in the international legal system to a rule of recognition that treats custom as a source of valid law. Confusion over this distinction arises because in the international legal system the same agents whose beliefs give rise to a customary rule are the legal officials whose adherence to the rule of recognition leads them to deem that rule legally valid. The proposed solution to the chronological paradox employs H.L.A. Hart’s analysis of the concepts of law and a legal system, and in particular, the idea of a rule of recognition. Yet Hart famously denies the existence of a rule of recognition for international law. Hart’s denial rests on a failure to distinguish between the ontological and authoritative resolution functions of a rule of recognition, however. Once such a distinction is drawn, it can be argued that customary international law rests on a rule of recognition that serves the ontological function of making customary norms legal, though not the authoritative resolution function of settling disputes over the alleged legality of particular norms.

Case Analysis: The Gabčíkovo-Nagymaros Case: The Law of Treaties

1998 ◽  
Vol 11 (2) ◽  
pp. 321-344 ◽  
Author(s):  
Malgosia Fitzmaurice
Keyword(s):  
International Law ◽  
Legal Status ◽  
Case Analysis ◽  
Vienna Convention ◽  
Fundamental Change ◽  
Unilateral Termination ◽  
The Subject ◽  
The Law ◽  
International Law Commission ◽  
Law Commission

The subject-matter of this article are the issues of treaty law as expounded in the Judgment in the Gabčíkovo-Nagymaros case. The following problems are discussed: unilateral suspension and abandonment of obligations deriving from the binding treaty; the principle of fundamental change of circumstances; unilateral termination of a treaty; applicability of the 1969 Vienna Convention on the Law of Treaties in this case; legal status of so-called ‘provisional solution’; impossibility of performance and material breach of treaty; the application of the principle of ‘approximate application’; and the principle pacta sunt servanda. The issues arc discussed at the background of the Drafts of the International Law Commission.

COVID-19 și posibilele apărări în dreptul internațional: ar putea forța majoră și schimbarea fundamentetnală a circumstanțelor să justifice neexecutarea obligațiilor internaționale?

2020 ◽  
Vol 2020 (2020) ◽  
pp. 186-202
Author(s):  
Ion GÂLEA ◽  
Keyword(s):  
Public Opinion ◽  
International Law ◽  
Common Sense ◽  
Prima Facie ◽  
Fundamental Change ◽  
The Public ◽  
Force Majeure ◽  
International Obligations ◽  
International Responsibility ◽  
The Law

The study examines possible defences that States could invoke in order to justify or excuse measures designed to respond to the COVID-19 crisis, which prima facie might not be in conformity with certain international obligations. The study examines only defences available in general international law – beside certain exceptions that might be provided by the clauses of the respective treaties. Two grounds for suspending international obligations, stemming from the law of treaties – impossibility of performance and rebus sic stantibus – and three circumstances precluding wrongfulness, stemming from the law of international responsibility – force majeure, distress and state of necessity – are subject to examination. The study argues that, even if “common sense” might draw the public opinion towards the plausibility of invoking force majeure, impossibility of performance or fundamental change of circumstances, such a conclusion does not reflect general international law. In reality, the “best candidate” as a justification or excuse is distress, while the “second best candidate” might be represented by the state of necessity.

scholarly journals Tax Sanctions as the Institutions Conditioning Efficiency of Collecting Tax Information – Limits of Legal Regulations

2020 ◽  
Vol 29 (4) ◽  
pp. 189
Author(s):  
Paweł Majka
Keyword(s):  
International Law ◽  
Degree Of Saturation ◽  
Tax Law ◽  
Legal Regulations ◽  
Legal Norms ◽  
The Subject ◽  
The Law ◽  
Principle Of Proportionality

<p>The subject of the study is to outline the boundaries within the legislator may sanction the obligations to provide information to tax authorities using tax sanctions. The author analyzes tax sanctions as instruments guaranteeing the effectiveness of legal norms related to information obligations in the light of the protection of the taxpayer’s rights. In the author’s opinion, there is a clear outline of the possible shape of the sanction, which limits the legislator in excessive interference with the rights of taxpayers. These limits, both in national and international law, are determined primarily by the principle of proportionality, which is decisive for the degree of discomfort associated with the application of sanctions. It should be indicated that the shape limits of these sanctions, characterized in this study, guarantee, in turn, the protection of the rights of these entities. At the same time, it should be emphasized that tax sanctions are, in principle, a complementary element of the system of the guarantees of the law effectiveness and the legislator deciding on their wider use should properly balance the degree of “saturation” of tax law with sanctions taking into account its nature.</p>

scholarly journals THE APPEARANCE OF THE PENAL INTERNATIONAL LAW AS A BRANCH OF THE PUBLIC INTERNATIONAL LAW

2014 ◽  
Vol 8 (1) ◽  
pp. 122-126
Author(s):  
Daniel Ştefan Paraschiv ◽  
Elena Paraschiv
Keyword(s):  
International Relations ◽  
International Law ◽  
Human Values ◽  
Public International Law ◽  
The Public ◽  
Peace And Security ◽  
The Law

From the oldest times, there appeared certain norms of penal international law meantto prevent the committing of serious offenses, as well as for sanctioning them. This distinctbranch of the public international law is called upon to protect - by sanctioning personsguilty of committing serious offenses - peace and security of the whole humanity, thedevelopment in conformity with the norms of the law and moral of the international relations,the existence and perenniality of fundamental human values.

Does the Name of a Case Matter?

2021 ◽  
Vol 20 (3) ◽  
pp. 469-489
Author(s):  
Haris Jamil
Keyword(s):  
International Law ◽  
Subject Matter ◽  
Fishing Vessel ◽  
International Commerce ◽  
Arbitral Award ◽  
The Subject ◽  
The Law ◽  
A Company

Abstract The arbitral award in The “Enrica Lexie” Incident (Italy v. India) brings to the fore the issue of assigning a name to a case. To contextualise India’s contention regarding the name, The “Enrica Lexie” Incident, in this article, I outline the law and practice regarding assigning names to cases by different international judicial bodies (ICJ, ITLOS, WTO and PCA). Examining India’s objection to the name, I argue that the name of the case does not capture the subject matter of the dispute accurately and emanates from the mainstream view of international law. The name prioritises an Italian flagged vessel, owned by a company engaged in international commerce and navigating under the protection of the Italian navy, over a fishing vessel owned by private individuals. The name reinforces a state-centric view of international law in which the victims of the incident do not picture.

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