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5691. Humanity's Law

Author:
Gerd Hankel
Publication Date:
05-2012
Content Type:
Journal Article
Abstract:
In Ruti Teitel's view there is absolutely no doubt that we live in a world in which legal relationships are undergoing ever more significant change, a fact of which she informs the reader right at the beginning of her book. States alone are no longer the main actors; instead persons and peoples are assuming greater prominence. Their interests and needs for protection increasingly dictate the content of international law which is becoming humanity's law as a result.

5692. Complicity and the Law of State Responsibility

Author:
Michael Byers
Publication Date:
05-2012
Content Type:
Journal Article
Abstract:
International law has long been seen as a 'primitive legal order' lacking key components such as a generally applicable enforcement mechanism.1 There is some truth to this view, as evidenced by the long absence of another component that is common to developed legal systems, namely responsibility for actors who deliberately aid, assist, or are otherwise complicit in illegal acts.

5693. International Humanitarian Law and International Human Rights Law

Author:
Marina Mancini
Publication Date:
05-2012
Content Type:
Journal Article
Abstract:
In order to make 'headway' in one of the most intractable debates in our field – the nature and workings of customary international law – authors seem to employ one of three tactics. One is to repeat and rehash the same narrow, doctrinal debates that scholars have been having for the last forty-odd years. Another and far more courageous approach is for the author to seek to completely re-imagine (and remake) customary international law. A third, finally, is to reflect on the nature of customary law more widely and to include insights from jurisprudence/legal theory, legal history, and moral/political philosophy.

5694. The Nature of Customary Law. Legal, Historical and Philosophical Perspectives

Author:
Jörg Kammerhofer
Publication Date:
05-2012
Content Type:
Journal Article
Abstract:
In order to make 'headway' in one of the most intractable debates in our field – the nature and workings of customary international law – authors seem to employ one of three tactics. One is to repeat and rehash the same narrow, doctrinal debates that scholars have been having for the last forty-odd years. Another and far more courageous approach is for the author to seek to completely re-imagine (and remake) customary international law. A third, finally, is to reflect on the nature of customary law more widely and to include insights from jurisprudence/legal theory, legal history, and moral/political philosophy.

5695. Multi-Sourced Equivalent Norms in International Law

Author:
Filippo Fontanelli
Publication Date:
05-2012
Content Type:
Journal Article
Abstract:
Many scholars have struggled to try to figure out ways to preserve a unitary perspective on international law in light of, and more frequently going beyond, the conservative guidelines formulated by Martti Koskenniemi and his ILC Working Group, collected in the 2006 Report on Fragmentation.

5696. Nocturnal Vision

Author:
Kiron K. Skinne
Publication Date:
05-2012
Content Type:
Journal Article
Abstract:
Footlessly the ghost of her ghost thumps through the emptiness quaking in the quilted nothingness of maternal night before there was or there was not nihilating nothing in dusk of moonlight neither human nor angelic the animal divine treacherously trembling in tumult of time between river and rock the radiance secretes seed of immortal sap the cloudless destiny elapsed before dawn unfurled as the future in gleaming presence of everlasting past drifting like darts of dust with no reason to trust the passing of this night.

5697. Testing the Surge: Why Did Violence Decline in Iraq in 2007?

Author:
Stephen Biddle, Jacob N. Shapiro, and Jeffrey A. Friedman
Publication Date:
07-2012
Content Type:
Journal Article
Journal:
International Security
Institution:
Belfer Center for Science and International Affairs, Harvard University
Abstract:
From 2004 to mid- 2007, Iraq was extremely violent: civilian fatalities averaged more than 1,500 a month by August 2006, and by late fall, the U.S. military was suffering a monthly toll of almost 100 dead and 700 wounded. Then something changed. By the end of 2007, U.S. military fatalities had declined from their wartime monthly peak of 126 in May of that year to just 23 by December. From June 2008 to June 2011, monthly U.S. military fatalities averaged fewer than 11, a rate less than 15 percent of the 2004 through mid-2007 average and an order of magnitude smaller than their maximum. Monthly civilian fatalities fell from more than 1,700 in May 2007 to around 500 by December; from June 2008 to June 2011, these averaged around 200, or about one-tenth of the rate for the last half of 2006.
Political Geography:
United States and Iraq

5698. When Duty Calls: A Pragmatic Standard of Humanitarian Intervention

Author:
Robert A. Pape
Publication Date:
07-2012
Content Type:
Journal Article
Journal:
International Security
Institution:
Belfer Center for Science and International Affairs, Harvard University
Abstract:
On March 18, 2011, President Barack Obama announced the U.S. government's commitment to an international military intervention in Libya, declaring, "We're protecting innocent civilians within Libya" from Muammar Qaddafi's forces to prevent "a humanitarian crisis." Within days, an international coalition of Western and Arab states launched air strikes that halted the Libyan government forces' offensive against the rebel stronghold of Benghazi and the roughly 2 million people living in the eastern region of the country. Within weeks, major international economic resources began ºowing to rebel-controlled areas to help strengthen their ability to remain independent from Qaddafi's control. Within months, Qaddafi's grip on the western portions of the country crumbled. Now, many policymakers and scholars recognize the Libyan mission as a significant success for international humanitarian intervention according to the main yardstick of saving many lives with no loss of life among the interveners.
Topic:
Economics
Political Geography:
United States and Libya

5699. The Terrorism Delusion: America's Overwrought Response to September 11

Author:
John Mueller and Mark G. Stewart
Publication Date:
07-2012
Content Type:
Journal Article
Journal:
International Security
Institution:
Belfer Center for Science and International Affairs, Harvard University
Abstract:
On November 22, 1963, Lee Harvey Oswald, a deluded little man with grandiose visions of his own importance, managed, largely because of luck, to assassinate President John F. Kennedy. Since then, many people have contended that such a monumental event could not have been accomplished by such a trivial person. Some of these disbelievers have undertaken elaborate efforts to uncover a bigger conspiracy behind the deed.
Topic:
Terrorism
Political Geography:
America

5700. The Jihad Paradox: Pakistan and Islamist Militancy in South Asia

Author:
Sumit Ganguly and S. Paul Kapur
Publication Date:
07-2012
Content Type:
Journal Article
Journal:
International Security
Institution:
Belfer Center for Science and International Affairs, Harvard University
Abstract:
Islamist militants based in Pakistan have repeatedly been involved in major terrorist incidents throughout the world, such as the September 11, 2001, attacks on New York and Washington and the 2005 London subway bombings. They regularly strike government, coalition, and civilian targets in Afghanistan, hampering efforts to stabilize the country. Also, they frequently target India, threatening to incite an Indo-Pakistani conflict that could potentially escalate to the nuclear level. Pakistan-based militancy thus severely undermines regional and international security.
Political Geography:
Pakistan, Afghanistan, New York, South Asia, and Washington