Crimes Against the Sovereign Order: Rethinking International Criminal Justice

2019 ◽  
Vol 113 (4) ◽  
pp. 727-771 ◽  
Author(s):  
Ryan Liss
Keyword(s):  
Criminal Justice ◽  
Criminal Law ◽  
International Criminal ◽  
The State ◽  
International Criminal Justice ◽  
Criminal Jurisdiction ◽  
International Crimes ◽  
Fundamental Challenge ◽  
The Way

AbstractThe scope of international criminal jurisdiction poses a fundamental challenge for criminal law theory. Prevailing justifications for the state's authority to punish crime assume the existence of connections between the state and either the criminal or the crime that are not always present in the international criminal context. Recognizing this gap, this Article introduces a new theory of what distinguishes international crimes from domestic crimes and justifies the unusual scope of international criminal jurisdiction. As this Article explains, international crimes are unique in the way they undermine international society's structure as a system of sovereign states.

Principles of International Criminal Law

2020 ◽  
Author(s):  
Werle Gerhard ◽  
Jeßberger Florian
Keyword(s):  
Criminal Justice ◽  
Criminal Law ◽  
Systematic Approach ◽  
International Criminal ◽  
War Crimes ◽  
Criminal Court ◽  
International Criminal Law ◽  
Crimes Against Humanity ◽  
International Criminal Justice ◽  
International Crimes

This book is one of the most influential textbooks in the field of international criminal justice. It offers a systematic and comprehensive analysis of the foundations and general principles of substantive international criminal law, including thorough discussion of its core crimes. It provides a detailed understanding of the general principles, sources, and evolution of international criminal law, demonstrating how it has developed, and how its application has changed. After establishing the general principles, the book assesses the four key international crimes as defined by the statute of the International Criminal Court: genocide, crimes against humanity, war crimes, and the crime of aggression. This new edition revises and updates the work with developments in international criminal justice since 2014. The book retains its systematic approach and consistent methodology, making it essential reading for both students and scholars of international criminal law, as well as for practitioners and judges working in the field.

Bridging the Gap between Criminological Theory and Penal Theory within the International Criminal Justice System

2014 ◽  
Vol 22 (3) ◽  
pp. 249-279 ◽  
Author(s):  
Athanasios Chouliaras
Keyword(s):  
Criminal Justice ◽  
Criminal Justice System ◽  
Criminal Law ◽  
Justice System ◽  
International Criminal ◽  
State Crime ◽  
Criminological Theory ◽  
International Criminal Law ◽  
International Criminal Justice ◽  
International Crimes

The main objective of this article is to put forward a critical analysis of the emergent international criminal justice system, epitomized by the creation of the permanent International Criminal Court (icc). Such an endeavour is warranted on the assertion that international criminal justice scholarship has entered into a ‘reflective’ phase, the hallmark of which lies in the re-evaluation of the institutions of international criminal law in the light of the distinctive traits of international criminality derived from the combination of the criminological theory of state crime and the rising theory of international crime in the domain of international criminal law. In this context, the article summarizes the basic points and the epistemological premises of the criminological theory of state crime, while seeks to delimit the subject matter by alluding to the concept of core international crimes arising from the normative system of the icc. The core aim of such a combined approach is not to downplay the existing differences between the criminological concept of state crime and the penal concept of core international crimes, but to highlight common points in order to draw tentative conclusions and make some preliminary suggestions from a criminal policy perspective.

Introduction

2020 ◽  
Author(s):  
Heller Kevin ◽  
Mégret Frédéric ◽  
Nouwen Sarah ◽  
Ohlin Jens ◽  
Robinson Darryl
Keyword(s):  
Criminal Justice ◽  
Criminal Law ◽  
International Criminal ◽  
The State ◽  
International Criminal Law ◽  
International Criminal Justice ◽  
The Status ◽  
Over Time

This introductory chapter considers the state of contemporary international criminal law (ICL). It shows that, on some level, ICL is merely a technique for criminalizing the violation of certain norms and may not have much of a comprehensive project of its own. Indeed, over time ICL has been associated with a variety of substantive projects, such as fighting terrorism, protecting peace, and punishing atrocities. It is impossible, moreover, to discuss ICL without discussing international criminal justice more generally. Furthermore, although ICL has edged ever further towards completeness, tremendous disagreement persists about not just the discipline’s norms, but even its very founding assumptions. The growing implementation of ICL has generated countless dilemmas of its own, after all. In fact, one might even argue that the status of ICL has become more uncertain following, and perhaps as a result of, the proliferation of opportunities—international and domestic—to enforce its normative promise through liberal-legal judicial mechanisms.

Coherence in International Criminal Justice: A Victimological Perspective

2015 ◽  
Vol 15 (2) ◽  
pp. 339-368 ◽  
Author(s):  
A. Pemberton ◽  
R.M. Letschert ◽  
A.-M. de Brouwer ◽  
R.H. Haveman
Keyword(s):  
Criminal Justice ◽  
International Criminal ◽  
Government Agencies ◽  
International Criminal Justice ◽  
International Crimes ◽  
Large Numbers

This article develops a victimological perspective on international criminal justice, based on a review of the main victimological characteristics of international crimes: the complicity of government agencies, the large numbers of victims involved and the peculiar position of victims of international crimes, who at the time of the commission of the crimes are viewed as perpetrators and/or beyond the moral sphere, rather than as victims. Key elements of the framework concern the external coherence of the criminal justice reaction – the interlinking of criminal justice with other reparative efforts – as well as its internal coherence – the extent to which the procedures of international criminal justice are aligned with what it realistically can and should achieve. This latter aspect of coherence is used in an examination of victims’ rights in international criminal justice procedures.

A Strategic Choice: The State Policy Requirement in Core International Crimes

2015 ◽  
Vol 28 (4) ◽  
pp. 953-975 ◽  
Author(s):  
ATHANASIOS CHOULIARAS
Keyword(s):  
Criminal Law ◽  
State Policy ◽  
International Criminal ◽  
Criminal Policy ◽  
The State ◽  
International Criminal Law ◽  
Controversial Issues ◽  
Policy Perspective ◽  
International Crimes ◽  
Definition Of

AbstractThe article focuses on one of the most intriguing and, at the same time, controversial issues of international criminal law: whether the state policy requirement should be considered as a constitutive element in core international crimes. Adopting a criminal policy perspective, my intention is to contribute to the ongoing discussion by offering a doctrinal and criminological corroboration of the position that answers in the affirmative. Nevertheless, I am not necessarily promoting a normative choice entailing the amendment of the definition of core international crimes, but I rather call for a policy choice of focusing on cases that presume a state policy component.

‘Cosmopolitan Citizenship’, Territorial Borders, and Bringing Denationalized Terrorists to Justice

2021 ◽  
Author(s):  
Matthew Seet
Keyword(s):  
Criminal Justice ◽  
International Criminal ◽  
International Criminal Law ◽  
International Criminal Justice ◽  
International Crimes ◽  
Territorial State ◽  
International Obligations ◽  
Cosmopolitan Citizenship ◽  
Globalized World

Abstract This article challenges scholarly claims that a post-national ‘cosmopolitan citizenship’ — an expanded and less territorially bounded belonging of ‘humanity’ — has been emerging in the international criminal justice context. In examining the contemporary denationalization of terrorists from the under-explored angle of criminal justice, this article argues that states’ territorial borders prevent denationalized terrorists — deemed enemies of ‘humanity’ — from being brought to justice. Some states strip citizenship from terrorists without holding them accountable for terrorist offences and international crimes, subsequently deporting them to — or leaving them stranded in — states which are, according to international criminal law, ‘unable’ or ‘unwilling’ to prosecute. As such, states’ territorial borders serve as a ‘shield’ which not only enable denationalized terrorists to avoid accountability for their terrorist offences and international crimes, but which also enable states to avoid their international obligations to bring terrorists to justice. This case study of denationalized terrorists not only demonstrates the enduring relevance of territoriality to international criminal justice but also broadly demonstrates how post-national ‘citizenship’ remains tied to the territorial state in a globalized world.

Victimological Imaginations

2019 ◽  
pp. 155-185
Author(s):  
Kjersti Lohne
Keyword(s):  
Criminal Justice ◽  
International Criminal ◽  
Moral Authority ◽  
International Criminal Justice ◽  
Gender Based Violence ◽  
Individual Level ◽  
International Crimes ◽  
Global North ◽  
Gender Based ◽  
And Gender

The figure of the victim is the sine qua non of the fight against impunity for international crimes. Engaging the victimological imagination of international criminal justice, the chapter shows how victims are represented, and how justice for victims is imagined. The first part focuses on imaginations of ‘justice for victims’, and argues that the ICC represents a form of hybrid justice by incorporating ‘restorative’ and ‘transformative’ rationales for justice. Unlike ordinary courts, the ICC incorporates what can be thought of as both ‘punitive’ and ‘reparative’ arms. Part of the latter is the Rome Statute’s provisions for victims’ rights to participation and reparation. However, a closer look at the implementation of these processes reveal a conspicuous discrepancy between ideologies and realities. The second part of the chapter situates victims as a source of moral authority, and one that is claimed in representational practices by both human rights NGOs and international criminal justice generally. The chapter explores suffering as a type of ‘currency’, both on an individual level for victims’ advocates, as their source of ‘purpose’, and on a broader cultural level as the source of ‘global’ moral outcry. The chapter demonstrates how the victim is culturally represented through imaginations from the global North and becomes universalized as a symbol of humanity, of which the gendered and racialized victim of sexual and gender-based violence provides particularly powerful victim imagery. In this way, the image of the victim of international crimes is characterized by her essential ‘otherness’: it is humanity that suffers.

International Criminal Justice History Writing as Anachronism

2019 ◽  
pp. 72-89
Author(s):  
Frédéric Mégret
Keyword(s):  
Human Rights ◽  
Criminal Justice ◽  
International Law ◽  
Criminal Law ◽  
International Criminal ◽  
Criminal Responsibility ◽  
International Criminal Justice ◽  
History Writing ◽  
Long Time ◽  
Individual Accountability

This chapter focuses on the extent to which the contemporary project of international criminal justice cannot easily lay claim to what it imagines to be its past, because that past, despite superficial similarities, often exhibited fundamentally different concerns. It highlights three areas in which international criminal justice today is arguably dramatically different from how it was understood up to the 1990s. First, international criminal justice was for a long time much less obsessed with the criminalization of international law prohibitions specifically, and much more interested in the transnational dimensions of the criminal law. Second, it was much less committed to a strict model of individual accountability under international law and much more willing to see the state as the central pivot of international criminal responsibility. Third, it was intimately linked to peace projects whereas it has become intimately associated to the fight against atrocities and mass human rights violations.

Can We Be Friends? Offering an Amicus Curiae Brief on Sexual Violence to the EAC

2020 ◽  
pp. 134-141
Author(s):  
Kim Thuy Seelinger ◽  
Naomi Fenwick ◽  
Khaled Alrabe
Keyword(s):  
Criminal Justice ◽  
Sexual Violence ◽  
International Criminal ◽  
International Criminal Justice ◽  
Amicus Curiae ◽  
Sexual Slavery ◽  
Sexual Crimes ◽  
International Crimes ◽  
Life Sentence ◽  
Game Changer

This chapter details the preparation and submission of the amicus curiae brief on sexual violence to the Extraordinary African Chambers (EAC). The amicus curiae brief offered by over a dozen experts on the prosecution of sexual violence under international law may have been a game changer for the Hissène Habré trial, both in terms of its relevance as a mechanism of international criminal justice, as well as in highlighting the EAC's power to address crimes of sexual violence despite their omission from original charges. Among other international crimes, Habré had been convicted of rape and sexual slavery as a crime against humanity and as a form of torture. The affirmation of Habré's life sentence for massive sexual violence committed by his Documentation and Security Directorate (DDS) agents was hailed as a tremendous victory for international criminal justice and the rights of sexual violence survivors. However, the conviction for sexual crimes was not complete and its path was not linear.

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