Is it ethical for the prosecutor at the International Criminal Court to consider political factors, such as peace processes, in selecting situations to investigate or cases to prosecute? During the early years of the court, a number of documents and statements from the Office of the Prosecutor suggested that there were occasions when it was. Two OTP policy papers issued in 2003 recommended that the prosecutor assess “all circumstances prevailing in the country or region concerned, including the nature and stage (...) of the conflict and any intervention by the international community,” and whether prosecution might “exacerbate or otherwise destabilize a conflict situation.” In the same spirit, the ICC's chief prosecutor, Luis Moreno-Ocampo, referred to his decision-making as a “dialogue between many actors” with a “strategic dimension... [that] involves all stakeholders.” This language suggested a process of consultation and coordination with local and international actors involved in conflict resolution to adapt international criminal justice to on-the-ground political realities. (shrink)

The relationship between power, law and consent is a key feature of the Western debate on criminal law. On the one side, defining the legitimate ways of exercising the punitive power has been a critical question since the Enlightenment thought onwards and especially as to the rule of law doctrine. On the other side, the role played by public punishment in shaping consent and its communicative potential have been crucial questions for critical, as well as non-critical approaches to criminal law (...) in contemporary thought. These questions gain in strength and radicalism when it comes to international criminal law (ICL). In this case the filter of the state is not present anymore to mediate between power, law and consent, and the power to punish individuals is directly exercised by international institutions. This means, on the one hand, that traditional justifications of the power to punish and which are elaborated on in the domestic sphere are not useful anymore in legitimating international punishment. International criminal norms are not framed by an international democratically elected parliament, and their exercise is not controlled by the complex system of checks and balances typical of the rule of law. On the other hand, having not being created by a sovereign, international criminal law cannot be conceived as an instrument to build or consolidate consent around the sovereign. A double-sided dilemma therefore arises: traditional explanations are no longer apt to answer the question whether ICL is legitimate, while ICL itself can no longer be considered an instrument to build consent around the traditional power exercising it, namely the state. Although I consider both sides of the dilemma equally interesting and stimulating, I will focus here only on one side of the coin: the ability to build consent of the ICL institutions, and in particular the International Criminal Court (ICC). In other words, instead of asking whether the consent around the ICC is broad enough for the Court to be considered legitimate, I shall ask whether the ICC is able to build consent around the world order it embodies. (shrink)

The critics of the ICC in the Bush administration and its supporters within the human rights community have one thing in common: they assume that the ICC can evolve into an institution independent of states, either to constrain American power or to prosecute to end impunity for perpetrators.

Extortion and bribery are regularly identified as well–nigh insoluble ethical problems for business, especially on an international scale, yet there are many initiatives being steadily pursued to combat them. One of the most impressive is the work of the International Chamber of Commerce, which published an important Report on the subject in 1977, the first such document prepared by the business community. Now that Report has undergone an in‐depth revision which was published last year and is the subject of this (...) study. Professor Argandoña is Secretary General of IESE [the International Graduate School of Management of the University of Navarre], Av. Pearson 21, E–Barcelona, Spain , and an Associate Editor of this Review. The article is a revised version of the presentation made to the Nineth EBEN Annual Conference held in Frankfurt in September last year. (shrink)

Extortion and bribery are regularly identified as well–nigh insoluble ethical problems for business, especially on an international scale, yet there are many initiatives being steadily pursued to combat them. One of the most impressive is the work of the International Chamber of Commerce, which published an important Report on the subject in 1977, the first such document prepared by the business community. Now that Report has undergone an in‐depth revision which was published last year and is the subject of this (...) study. Professor Argandoña is Secretary General of IESE [the International Graduate School of Management of the University of Navarre], Av. Pearson 21, E–Barcelona, Spain (email: [email protected]), and an Associate Editor of this Review. The article is a revised version of the presentation made to the Nineth EBEN Annual Conference held in Frankfurt in September last year. (shrink)

DISCOURSE, INTERACTION, AND COMMUNICATION Co-organized by the Department of Logic and Philosophy of Science and the Institute for Logic, Cognition, Language, and Infonnation (ILCLI) both from the University of the Basque Country, tlle Fourth International Colloquium on Cognitive Science (ICCS-95) gathered at Donostia - San Sebastian ti'om May 3 to 6, 1995, with the following as its main topics: 1. Social Action and Cooperation. 2. Cognitive Approaches in Discourse Processing: Grammatical and Semantical Aspects. 3. Models of Infonnation in Communication Systems. (...) 4. Cognitive Simulation: Scope and Limits. More tllan one hundred researchers from all over the world exchanged their most recent contributions to Cognitive Science in an exceptionally fruitful annosphere. In this volume we include a small though representative sample of tlle main papers. They all were invited papers except the one by Peter Juel Henrichsen, a contributed paper tllat merited tlle IBERDROLA - Gipuzkoako Foru Aldundia: Best Paper Award, set up in ICCS-95 for the first time. (shrink)

Does the establishment of a permanent InternationalWar Crimes Tribunal (International Criminal Court - ICC) constitute a challenge to national sovereignty? According to previous US governments and several American observers, the answer is yes. Establishing a world court that acts independently of the states that gave birth to it renders the idea of sovereignty meaningless. This article analyzes the American objections to the ICC and the conception of sovereignty and international law underlying these objections. It first considers the structure and intent (...) behind the criminal court and attempts to unveil the logic hiding behind the idea of ‘America’s historical uniqueness.’ It touches on the diverging US and European conceptions of sovereignty and ends up arguing that governments that stick to traditional conceptions of sovereignty and international law in the employment of their foreign policy may lose the moral legitimacy that has proven increasingly important for winning the sympathy of allies and regaining world leadership. Keywords: The ICC; US opposition to the court; sovereignty; international law; exceptionalism (Published: 19 May 2009) Citation: Ethics & Global Politics, Vol. 2, No. 2, 2009, pp. 83-108. DOI: 10.3402/egp.v2i2.1973. (shrink)

Principle of equality of arms is part of fair trial concept, which encompasses several guarantees linked to the defence opportunities during the criminal procedure. The accused person is entitled to a fair trial. Balance of rights between the parties is bedrock for procedural fairness and the judge has to perform his competence in providing all necessary preconditions as for the trial to be fair. There are differences between interpretation and implementation of equality of arms in the jurisprudence of European court (...) on human rights and international criminal courts. Decisions of ECtHR are much more similar with domestic understanding of equality of arms as reasonable opportunity of the defence to present the case without disadvantages vis-à-vis the prosecutor, due to inherent inequity between the parties. When analyzing proceeding before the ad hoc Tribunals, there is “more liberal interpretation” of this principle, which allowed the Prosecutor to invoke equality of arms, as well. ICTY Trial Chamber in Aleksovski case concluded that application of the concept of a fair trial in favor of both parties is understandable because the Prosecution acts on behalf of and in the interests of the international community, including the interests of the victims of the offence charged and also has held that it is difficult to see how a trial could ever be considered to be fair where the accused is favored at the expense of the Prosecution. This interpretation has been justified with dependence of the international Tribunals on state cooperation and due to the fact that international criminal courts have no autonomous enforcement agencies at their disposal. Fortunately, ICC Statute considered equality of arms as solely afforded to the defence, or to the Prosecutor on the behalf of accused. (shrink)

The International Criminal Court's intervention into the ongoing civil war in northern Uganda evoked a chorus of confident predictions as to its capacity to bring peace and justice to the war-torn region. However, this optimism is unwarranted.

On 25 May 1993 the United Nations Security Council took the extraordinary and unprecedented step of deciding to establish the International Criminal Tribunal for the Former Yugoslavia as a mechanism for the restoration and maintenance of international peace and security. This was an extremely significant innovation in the use of mandatory enforcement powers by the Security Council, and the manifestation of an explicit link between peace and justice - politics and law. The establishment of ad hoc tribunals for the former (...) Yugoslavia and Rwanda was followed by the adoption of the Rome Statute of the ICC in July 1998, the arrest of General Augusto Pinochet in London in October 1998, and the establishment of ad hoc tribunals in Cambodia, Sierra Leone, and East Timor, all of which pointed to an emerging norm of international criminal justice. The key to understanding this is the relationship between the political mandate and the judicial function. The Tribunal was established as a tool of politics, but it was a judicial, not a political tool.This book provides a systematic examination of the Tribunal, what it is, why it was established, how it functions, and where its significance lies. The central question is whether an international judicial institution, such as the Tribunal, can operate in a highly politicized context and fulfill an explicit political purpose, without the judicial process becoming politicized. Separate chapters chart the origins of the court, the process of establishment, jurisdiction, procedure, state co-operation, including obtaining custody of accused, and the role and function of the Chief Prosecutor. This last element is the key to the Tribunal's success in maintaining a delicate balancing act so that its external political function does not impinge on its impartial judicial status, and instead enhances its effectiveness. The book concludes with an assessment of the conduct of the Milosevic case to date. (shrink)

The International Criminal Court (ICC) seems to have finally realized the ending legal globalists have long yearned for: a potentially universal, centralized and permanent court, able to enforce international humanitarian law without the mediation of the state. A legal system of mankind seems now more possible than ever before. The universalistic claim of the ICC, I contend in this article, is nevertheless potentially biased by a West-centric prejudice. Critically drawing on the transcivilizational perspective suggested by Onuma Yasuaki, I propose to (...) overcome the West-centric approach of the ICC by assuming the multiplicity of universalisms, thus relativising each of them. (shrink)

This article is a response to a call for a study of international criminal law as an economic phenomenon, going beyond addressing administrability, commensurability, and interpersonal comparison of utility, band instead focusing on problems of institutional choice. This approach differs from the typical methods of normative and descriptive scholarship of international criminal law. An institution like the International Criminal Court can be usefully examined as an international public good, and as such offering little incentives for states such as the United (...) States of America to join as they can enjoy benefits without costs. This article examines the economic basis for the US non-participation in the ICC and grapples with future prospectives. (shrink)

The recent proposal by the Independent Expert Panel of the Stop Ecocide initiative to include the crime of ecocide in the International Criminal Court's Rome Statute has raised expectations for preventing and remedying severe environmental harm through international prosecution. As alluring as this image is, we argue that ecocide prosecutions may be the most difficult, perhaps even impossible, in precisely the cases that the ICC would need to be concerned with; namely, the gravest global incidents of environmental harm, including those (...) associated with planetary climate change. We explore a series of questions about the panel's formulation of ecocide that resonate with longer debates around criminalizing environmental harm but take on new dimensions amid the Anthropocene and after twenty years of ICC trials. Ecocide must contend with the hard lessons learned concerning the ICC's limitations in realizing justice in a fraught international political context and also with fundamental challenges to knowledge and legitimacy arising from the uncertainty and dynamic socioenvironmental context of the Anthropocene. The proposed amendment, if adopted, risks ineffective prosecutions or even perverse outcomes for the environment itself. This risk, however, may characterize any effort to prosecute ecocide internationally in the Anthropocene unless the terms of international criminal law are fundamentally rethought. (shrink)

Using data from the International Civic and Citizenship Study, this quantitative study explores the potential for open classroom climates to foster political efficacy and civic knowledge among 8th grade students in 14 Western European countries. Findings show that an open classroom climate is associated with increased civic knowledge and political efficacy. In addition, civic knowledge and political efficacy are positively correlated with social movement citizenship. However, the relationships between both political efficacy and civic knowledge on social movement citizenship are strengthened (...) with presence of an open classroom climate. This study demonstrates the importance of an open classroom climate to develop students’ knowledge and efficacy related to active citizenship. (shrink)

With its express intention ‘to put an end to impunity’, the International Criminal Court (ICC) faces a substantial challenge in the shape of conditional amnesties granted in future national truth commissions (TCs)—a challenge that invokes fundamental considerations of criminal justice ethics. In this article, I give an account of the challenge, and I consider a possible solution to it presented by Declan Roche. According to this solution the ICC-prosecutor should respect national amnesties and prosecute and punish only those perpetrators who (...) have refused to cooperate with the TC. I argue, however, that this compromise is untenable. As a general rule, if we justify the ICC on grounds of deterrence we should not accept conditional amnesties granted in national TCs. (shrink)

For the traditional legalistic discourse on the International Criminal Court, “politics” is a bête noire that compromises the independence of the Court and thus needs to be avoided and overcome. In response to this legalistic approach, a burgeoning body of literature insists that the Court does not exist and operate “beyond politics”, arguing that the ICC is an institution where law and politics are intimately connected. The present article seeks to contribute to this “non-traditional” literature by addressing two of its (...) fundamental weaknesses: First, writers of the “non-traditional camp” often present a rather limited view of “politics”; in particular, they have shied away from taking the radical step of portraying and analysing the ICC as a “political actor”. This undermines both its critical and constructive potential. Secondly, these commentators offer a simplistic explanation as to why “traditionalists” treat politics as the ICC’s bête noire: Traditionalists, they claim, are “legalists” with scant interest in and understanding of politics. By focusing on the ICC’s nature as a political actor, this article does not only paint a more nuanced picture of the ICC but also demonstrates the constructive potential of this understanding of the ICC to shed light on the so-called “peace versus justice dilemma”. And secondly, it demonstrates that precisely because the ICC is and ought to be a prudent political actor, it must officially disavow politics. The “noble lie” of disavowing politics, therefore, is a prudential strategy to avoid dangerous moral and political consequences and, ultimately, to secure the continued existence of the ICC itself. (shrink)

The following Review Essay, inspired by Tracy Isaacs’ new book, Moral Responsibility in Collective Contexts, connects the philosophical literature on group agency with recent trends in international criminal law. Part I of the Essay sketches out the relevant philosophical positions, including collectivist and individualist accounts of group agency. Particular attention is paid to Kornhauser and Sager’s development of the doctrinal paradox, Philip Pettit’s deployment of the paradox towards a general argument for group rationality, and Michael Bratman’s account of shared or (...) joint intentions. Part II then analyzes, with cautious support, Isaacs’ two-level solution, which entails both individual and collective moral responsibility. Under this view, collective moral agency is a real phenomenon, though the existence of the collective neither obviates nor eliminates the moral responsibility of the individuals from which it is composed. My own evaluation of the proposed solution concentrates on Davidson’s Principle of Charity and whether behavior interpretation requires viewing such agents in particular ways so as to maximize rationality. By analogy to the distinctive rationality of long-term plans, where the rationality of an individual act can only be understood relative to its place in the rationally justified long-term plan of a single individual, I also consider the rationality of individual acts whose rationality can only be understood relative to the group endeavors of which they are a part. Finally, Part III traces some implications of the two-level solution for legal doctrine, in particular the role of collective organizations in the recent jurisprudence of the International Criminal Court. For example, I note that the ICC has recently become more and more focused on the role played by goal-oriented collectives, especially with regard to the plan or policy requirement for crimes against humanity and, in the context of modes of liability, indirect liability for crimes committed through an organization. (shrink)

Once commonly held, the claim that international prosecutions have a valuable role to play in transitional processes has in recent years come under attack. This attack has generally been grounded in the assertion that inter-national criminal prosecutions undermine reconciliation.I believe that the international criminal prosecutions in general and the International Criminal Court (ICC) in particular can play a meaningful role in sustaining peace and making transitional periods smoother and faster. However, the role the ICC can play in the transitional processes (...) is undermined by attempts to muddle the criminal process with reconciliatory and restorative aims . This muddling leads to problems not only in the way the ICC is understood and the way the Rome. (shrink)

The contributors to this issue focus on legal internationalism, including hybrid mixes with nationalist forms. They have provoked us as editors to think more about these sites and forms of engagement. Sankey shows how civic participation in the ECCC has played a key role in surfacing the gendered harms of separation and starvation. Turan highlights the problems with ICC exclusion of the experience of men and boys from sexual violence. Peroni expresses her hesitations over the Istanbul Convention given an association (...) between assumed vulnerability and migrant women, while admiring its uncoupling of violence and culture. Cruz’s interview with Wendy Brown contextualizes and expands on these themes as they consider, with other participants, the future of feminist theory in the context of neo-liberal capturing of rights and legal space. Thinking more about internationalism and commitment in this context also helps us hold a mirror up to ourselves as we reflect more critically on our own naming of FLS as an ‘international’ journal. Together these contributions, and the reviews of new work, play a role in fleshing out an editorial commitment to enacting the journal as a living thing that ‘hangs together somehow’ even as it is known differently in different places. (shrink)

BackgroundMeasuring the outcomes of palliative care plays an important role to improve the quality, efficiency, and availability of these services in patients with cancer. Using valid, reliable, and culturally appropriate tools has a considerable role to measure these outcomes. This study aimed to assess the psychometric properties of the translated version of the Palliative care Outcome Scale.MethodsThis methodological study was conducted in two outpatient clinics related to Shohada Tajrish and Baqiyatallah hospitals in Tehran in 2019–2020. The translation was done using (...) the Forward-Backward approach after gaining permission from the developer. Face validity was tested with 10 patients with cancer through cognitive interviewing, as well as content validity with four experts. Construct validity was performed by exploratory factor analysis and confirmation. To assess the reliability, internal consistency was assessed by using Cronbach's alpha coefficient, and relative stability was assessed using the interclass correlation coefficient. Furthermore, interpretability and ceiling and floor effects were assessed.ResultsA total of 353 patients with cancer under palliative care were included in the study. Then, three psychological, physical, and social factors with a cumulative variance of 54.34% were extracted in exploratory factor analysis. Confirmatory factor analysis showed that the model has a good fit of information. Cronbach's alpha coefficient for scale was 0.719. Furthermore, the ICC was 0.812. The scale was interpretable, and ceiling and floor effects were 0%.ConclusionPersian version of the POS was evaluated as a valid and reliable tool. Therefore, it can be used by the clinician to monitor the consequences of palliative care in Iranian cancer patients. (shrink)

An emerging consensus regards domestic amnesties for international crimes as generally inconsistent with international law. This legal consensus rests on a norm against impunity: the chief role of international criminal law, and of the fledgling International Criminal Court , is to end impunity for violators of the worst of criminal acts. But the anti-impunity norm, and the anti-amnesty consensus that has arisen from it, now face serious difficulties. The ICC's role in the ongoing conflict in Northern Uganda illustrates the deadlock (...) that has now emerged between countries wishing to retain the power to use domestic politics and criminal law as tools for negotiation with current or outgoing perpetrators, on the one side, and the ICC's determination to apply a consistent international anti-impunity norm, on the other. The paper argues that the anti-impunity norm itself is based on a narrowly retributivist conception of criminal justice. A broader norm for democratic accountability, by contrast, would continue to prefer prosecutions over amnesties in international law, less for the opportunity for deserved retribution for perpetrators than for the public enactment of the deliberative procedures associated with the rule of law.Keywords: amnesty; impunity; international law; international criminal court. (shrink)

Recent global efforts of the United States and England to withdraw from international institutions, along with recent challenges to human rights courts from Poland and Hungary, have been described as part of a growing global populist backlash against the liberal international order. Several scholars have even identified the recent threat of mass withdrawal of African states from the International Criminal Court (ICC) as part of this global populist backlash. Are the African challenges to the ICC part of a global populist (...) movement developing in Africa? More fundamentally, how are the African challenges to the ICC examples of populism, if at all? In this paper, I show that, while there is considerable overlap between the strategies used by particular African leaders to challenge the ICC and those typically considered populist, as well as a discernible thin populist ideology to sustain them, there is insufficient evidence of a larger anti-ICC populist movement in Africa. Although Africa is not as united against the ICC as the populist narrative suggests, the recent challenges to the Court from Africa pose a significant challenge to the Court, as the institution is still in the early stages of building its legitimacy. (shrink)

The world's first permanent international criminal tribunal for the prosecution and punishment of the world's most serious crimes was created in 2002. In Bringing Power to Justice? legal scholars, political scientists, and political philosophers respond to fundamental questions about the future of this court and international criminal justice. For instance, will the ICC be undermined by political constraints, given the opposition of major powers, including the United States? What are the implications of holding heads of state responsible for international crimes? (...) Are trials the best response to state crime or would other devices (such as truth commissions) be more suitable? Is retributive justice an appropriate response? The contributors offer indispensable and thoughtful assessment of the future of international criminal justice. (shrink)

The entry into force of the Rome Statute on 1 July 2002 establishing the International Criminal Court (ICC) has signified a shift in the goals pursued by international criminal law. Due to new types of warfare dynamics, international protection is in need of new orientations, particularly with regard to conflict deterrence aims. This urgency is widely documented by the normative action framework of the Responsibility to Protect (RtoP) and, more recently, by the UN Secretary-General 2012–2013 Reports for the RtoP’s implementation. (...) The scope of this study is twofold. On the one hand, it aims to explore theoretical overlapping between the jus post bellum and the RtoP with regard to deterrence effects of the ICC; on the other hand, it proposes to illustrate such dynamics by reference to Kenya’s post-electoral violence during the period 2007–2013. Kenya represents an instance of a post-conflict society whereby transitional justice actions have taken place under a de facto adoption of a RtoP framework. As a result, I defend a qualified correlation between ICC’s retribution and deterrence effects. I claim that the hypothesis of the ICC’s deterring effects accounts in Kenya is constructed upon a general condition of direct compliance by self-interested rational actors (such as high-ranking political candidates and their secretariat) as well as on unintended effects of ethnic stabilization. I further consider that this possibility is reinforced by systemic interdependencies with other national and international initiatives such as the Kenyan National Dialogue and Reconciliation (KNDR) mediation initiative, the Grand Coalition Government, the Panel of African Eminent Personalities led by Kofi Annan, and the findings of the Commission of Enquiry of Post-Election Violence (CIPEV). (shrink)

The United States is using the theme of rights to build its unilateralism. In order to transform this unilateralism into a convincing universalism, it needs to reinforce its “soft power,” appeal to its partners and convince them of the necessity of its initiatives. Aggressive or offensive rights and crude unilateral military interventions are dangerous per se; they might also endanger American power in the long run. Culturally, this challenge is rooted in America’s origins and in its enthusiastic desire to reform (...) the world. In that respect, the shaping of a so-called “world community,” America is challenging continental Europe and its hierarchical universal power rooted in Catholic verticality. On the contrary, the U.S. conception of power is based on a horizontal dynamic, inspired by the structure of the reformation movement. American coercive rights are defying a universal powerless law; Luther is certainly taking its revenge against Rome. Indeed, as for now, America’s universal competence turns out to be more effective than the ICC. However, if the United States does not take into account its own aspirations to define universal norms, it will be more and more difficult for the United States to justify the necessity of its military decisions. any step back to crude realism could be a fatal regression. It will be a mistake for the pursuit of America’s own interests; it would also most probably endanger the stability of the international system, as it would foster rivalries and hostile reactions. (shrink)

Over the last decade, theorists have persistently criticised the assumption that the International Criminal Court (ICC) can produce a noteworthy deterrent effect. Consequently, consensus has emerged that we should probably look for different ways to justify the ICC or else abandon the prestigious project entirely. In this paper, I argue that these claims are ill founded and rest primarily on misunderstandings as to the idea of deterrence through punishment. They tend to overstate both the epistemic certainty as to and the (...) size of the deterrent effect necessary in order to thus justify punishment. I argue that we should in general expect reasonably humane punitive institutions to lead to better consequences than if we abolish punishment entirely, and I show that, contrary to widespread assumption among critics of the ICC, we should not expect the conditions characteristically surrounding mass atrocity to undermine this presumption. Properly understood, the ICC equals adding another “slice of cheese” to our comprehensive crime preventive system modelled along the lines of James Reason’s Swiss cheese model of accident causation and risk management. Undoubtedly, some future perpetrators will elope through the holes in this layer too, but others will be deterred. (shrink)

Juries could bolster the ICC's legitimacy by promoting public trust, increasing procedural fairness, foregrounding deliberative reasoning, and embodying democratic values. ICC juries would present novel logistical, philosophical, and legal problems, but these could be overcome.

Recent case law on sexual violence crimes heard before the ad hoc international criminal tribunals and courts, that interpret them in connection with ethnic conflict, raises the question of which acts can be defined as sexual violence. The International Criminal Court, in the situation of Kenya, does not regard acts of forced nudity, forcible circumcision and penile amputation as sexual violence when they are motivated by ethnic prejudice and intended to demonstrate the cultural superiority of one tribe over another. The (...) Court argues that not every act of violence that targets parts of the body commonly associated with sexuality should be considered an act of sexual violence. This recent interpretation of what counts as sexual violence provides another example of the complicity of international criminal law institutions in the ongoing construction process of female subordination. The ICC, in the Kenya situation, implicitly confirms the mutilation of female agency by interpreting penile amputation as a kind of power game between males, and by instrumentalizing the male sexual organ as an indicator of masculinity and manhood. (shrink)

Over the last decade, theorists have persistently criticised the assumption that the International Criminal Court (ICC) can produce a noteworthy deterrent effect. Consequently, consensus has emerged that we should probably look for different ways to justify the ICC or else abandon the prestigious project entirely. In this paper, I argue that these claims are ill founded and rest primarily on misunderstandings as to the idea of deterrence through punishment. They tend to overstate both the epistemic certainty as to and the (...) size of the deterrent effect necessary in order to thus justify punishment. I argue that we should in general expect reasonably humane punitive institutions to lead to better consequences than if we abolish punishment entirely, and I show that, contrary to widespread assumption among critics of the ICC, we should not expect the conditions characteristically surrounding mass atrocity to undermine this presumption. Properly understood, the ICC equals adding another “slice of cheese” to our comprehensive crime preventive system modelled along the lines of James Reason’s Swiss cheese model of accident causation and risk management. Undoubtedly, some future perpetrators will elope through the holes in this layer too, but others will be deterred. (shrink)

The International Criminal Court (ICC) is responsible for prosecuting individuals for heinous crimes that take place during civil and/or international armed conflicts, including sexual violence. Prosecuting this crime relies primarily on survivor accounts, but witnesses often fear the psychological effects of giving such testimony, particularly because there is a high risk of retraumatization, a stigma associated with victimhood, and a fear of victim-blaming. Thus, the Court’s Victims and Witness Unit (VWU) puts forth provisions for questioning vulnerable witnesses, requiring, in part, (...) that questioners avoid embarrassing or offending witnesses. Using a discourse analytic approach, this paper examines transcripts from three recent ICC cases dealing with wartime sexual violence—_Bemba, Ongwen_, and _Katanga and Chui—_exploring the discursive strategies employed by prosecutors and defense attorneys in these trials as they navigate arguing their cases before the judges while also tailoring their questions to adhere to the VWU’s provisions. I show that adhering to the provisions often involves relying on euphemistic expressions to discuss rape—which enter the trial discourse through linguistic formulations and reformulations—even though these expressions reflect the language used to discuss consensual sex and not sexual violence. Thus, this method of adhering to the provisions can undermine the prosecution’s case while helping the defense’s. (shrink)

This article deals with the International Criminal Court (ICC) as a point of contention in US relations with Germany and Japan. Both countries rank among America's closest allies, but they have also been supporting the establishment and operation of the ICC, although each to a different extent. The article analyzes the reasons for the three countries-vis the US. It suggests that Berlin's idealistic position and full ICC support on the one hand, as well as Japan's cautious and pragmatic approach on (...) the other, are both rooted not only in their individual evaluations of the ICC's institutional design, but also the varying degrees of their bi/multilateral orientation and the extent of their on US security commitments. (shrink)

The most serious candidates for common causes that fail to screen off and thus violate the causal Markov condition refer to quantum phenomena. In her seminal debate with Hausman and Woodward, Cartwright early on focussed on unfortunate non-quantum examples. Especially, Hausman and Woodward’s redescriptions of quantum cases saving the CMC remain unchallenged. This paper takes up this lose end of the discussion and aims to resolve the debate in favour of Cartwright’s position. It systematically considers redescriptions of ICC structures, including (...) those by Hausman and Woodward, and explains why these are inappropriate, when quantum mechanics is true. It first shows that all cases of purported quantum ICCs are cases of entanglement and then, using the tools of causal modelling, it provides an analysis of the quantum mechanical formalism for the case that the collapse of entangled systems is best described as a causal model with an ICC. (shrink)

The war in the DRC has resulted in one of the world’s worst humanitarian crisis with over 3.4 million displaced persons scattered throughout the country. An estimated 4 million people have died as a result of the war. The most pressing need to be addressed is the question of justice and accountability for these human rights atrocities in order to achieve a durable peace in the country and also in the Great Lakes region. It is particularly true in post-conflict situations (...) where justice systems have been either partially or completely destroyed, that national courts are not capable of arriving at a uniform stance, or willing to provide justice for atrocities in the immediate future. As a result, international justice seems to be a crucial and last resort that must continue to be fortified against efforts to undermine it. However, even if the ICC achieves its full potential, it faces a number of challenges. Firstly, it is realistically not able to address all situations in which national courts are unwilling or unable to prosecute perpetrators. Secondly, there are temporal and other jurisdictional limitations on what cases the ICC can hear. Accordingly, the ICC will only have the power to try people accused of the gravest human rights violations committed after 1 July 2002; the date the Rome Statute which established the ICC took effect. As a result, only a small number of individuals responsible for the atrocities committed will be tried by this Court. Thirdly, is the establishment, of the Truth and Reconciliation Commission (TRC), one of the civilian institutions that emerged from the peace talks, meant to end impunity or to cover up gross violations of human rights committed in the DRC? It remains to be seen how it will function and interact with the courts. (shrink)

The present article discusses the “peace versus justice” dilemma in international criminal justice through the lenses of the respective legal theories of Judith Shklar and Hannah Arendt—two thinkers who have recently been described as theorists of international criminal law. The article claims that in interventions carried out by the International Criminal Court, there is an ever-present potentiality for the “peace versus justice” dilemma to occur. Unfortunately, there is no abstract solution to this problem, insofar as ICC interventions will in some (...) cases be conducive while in others, they will be deleterious to peace. If a tension between peace and justice arises in a particular case, the article asserts, the former must be prioritised over the latter. Such a prioritisation, however, requires a vision of the ICC as a flexible actor of world politics which is situated at the intersection of law, ethics and politics, rather than a strictly legalistic view of the court. Ultimately, then, the present article seeks to probe whether the legal and political theories of Shklar and Arendt—in isolation, but ultimately also in combination—support such a flexible vision of the ICC. (shrink)

The Colombian military and the United Self-Defense Forces of Colombia (AUC) have committed systematic attacks against the Colombian people that violate international law. One such heinous incident took place in May 2003 at the Betoyes Guahibo indigenous reserve in Colombia. Unlike other acts of terror, the attack at the Reserve is well documented. Because of this, the attack on the Reserve is an excellent case for International Criminal Court (ICC) prosecution. This article exposes acts of cruelty and makes a persuasive (...) moral case for ICC prosecution. The ICC has jurisdiction over the attack on the Betoyes people by the AUC and Colombian military. The article further discusses the potential legal exposure of the Colombian government, individual Colombians and US individuals through its military support and training of the Colombian military. (shrink)

There is an increasing recognition of the need to provide ways for people to raise concerns about suspected wrongdoing by promoting internal policies and procedures which offer proper safeguards to actual and potential whistleblowers. Many organisations in both the public and private sectors now have such measures and these display a wide variety of operating modalities: in-house or outsourced, anonymous/confidential/identified, multi or single tiered, specified or open subject matter, etc. As a result of this development, a number of guidelines and (...) policy documents have been produced by authoritative bodies. This article reviews the following five documents from a management perspective, the first two deal with the principles upon which legislation might be based and the others describing good management practice: the Council of Europe Resolution 1729 (COER); Transparency International ‘Recommended Principles for Whistleblowing Legislation’ (TI); European Union Article 29 Data Protection Working Party Opinion (EUWP); International Chamber of Commerce ‘Guidelines on Whistleblowing’ (ICC); and the British Standards Institute ‘Whistleblowing arrangements Code of Practice 2008 (BSI). (shrink)

The United States is using the theme of rights to build its unilateralism. In order to transform this unilateralism into a convincing universalism, it needs to reinforce its “soft power,” appeal to its partners and convince them of the necessity of its initiatives. Aggressive or offensive rights and crude unilateral military interventions are dangerous per se; they might also endanger American power in the long run. Culturally, this challenge is rooted in America’s origins and in its enthusiastic desire to reform (...) the world. In that respect, the shaping of a so-called “world community,” America is challenging continental Europe and its hierarchical universal power rooted in Catholic verticality. On the contrary, the U.S. conception of power is based on a horizontal dynamic, inspired by the structure of the reformation movement. American coercive rights are defying a universal powerless law; Luther is certainly taking its revenge against Rome. Indeed, as for now, America’s universal competence turns out to be more effective than the ICC. However, if the United States does not take into account its own aspirations to define universal norms, it will be more and more difficult for the United States to justify the necessity of its military decisions. any step back to crude realism could be a fatal regression. It will be a mistake for the pursuit of America’s own interests; it would also most probably endanger the stability of the international system, as it would foster rivalries and hostile reactions. (shrink)

Organ trafficking and trafficking in persons for the purpose of organ transplantation are recognized as significant international problems. Yet these forms of trafficking are largely left out of international criminal law regimes and to some extent of domestic criminal law regimes as well. Trafficking of organs or persons for their organs does not come within the jurisdiction of the ICC, except in very special cases such as when conducted in a manner that conforms to the definitions of genocide or crimes (...) against humanity. Although the United States Code characterizes trafficking as a transnational crime with national implications, (22 U.S.C. § 7101(b)(24) (2010)), trafficking is rarely prosecuted in domestic courts. It has thus functioned in practice largely as what might be judged a stateless offense, out of the purview of both international and national courts. Yet these forms of organ trafficking remain widespread—and devastating to those who are its victims. In this article, we begin by describing what is known about the extent of organ trafficking and trafficking in persons for the purpose of removal of organs. We then critically evaluate how and why such trafficking has remained largely unaddressed by both international and domestic criminal law regimes. This state of affairs, we argue, presents a missed chance for developing the legitimacy of international criminal law and an illustration of how far current international legal institutions remain from ideal justice. (shrink)

The purpose of this paper is to direct attention to a challenge—referred to as the threshold challenge —facing a non-absolutist retributivist view on international criminal justice. It is argued, on the one hand, that this challenge constitutes a practically pertinent problem for the retributivist approach to the punishment of mass crimes and, on the other, that it is very hard to imagine any principled way of meeting this challenge.

This book analyzes the implementation of CSR reporting and codes of business conduct and ethics in the legal systems of the USA, Austria and China and their enforcement in international supply chain arbitrations. The book demonstrates that long-term profit maximization is increasingly intertwined with corporate ethics and CSR policies. In order to prevent window-dressing and greenwashing, certain control mechanisms and legal standards are required along the entire supply chain. This book introduces an ethics and CSR system recommending a reward-based whistleblowing (...) mechanism, internal oversight by a CSR and Ethics Committee comprised of independent board members and at least one sustainability expert, and an external, independent and comprehensive assurance of CSR reports provided by auditing firms or newly formed governmental agencies consisting of certified CSR experts. The author emphasizes the significance for supply chain leaders to ensure contractual enforcement of their codes of business ethics and conduct along the supply chain. Against this background, the author created a comprehensive fictitious case scenario covering a supply chain dispute arising from the breach of the supply chain leader’s code of business conduct and ethics by a lower-tier supply chain member. The author acknowledges the fact that in most of the cases the governing law of international supply chain contracts is English law or law based on English law. Thus, the author discusses potential contractual claims for damages arising from a loss of profits caused by a loss of reputation resulting from violations of core provisions of the chain leader’s supplier code of conduct pursuant to English law. As international supply chain disputes usually involve more than two parties, and international arbitration is the ideal means for the resolution of these disputes, the book compares the arbitration rules for consolidations and joinders of some of the most significant international arbitration institutions: SIAC, ICC, AIAC, ICDR, VIAC, CIETAC and HKIAC. The book is directed at legal practitioners, legislators of various jurisdictions, board members of corporations, ethics and compliance officers, academics, researchers and students. It is the author’s main goal that the book serves as an inspirational source for the establishment or the improvement of a corporate ethics and CSR system preventing window-dressing and greenwashing and covering the entire supply chain. Furthermore, it is intended that students develop a deeper understanding for the enforcement of corporate ethics and CSR policies. (shrink)

Physical activity, and likely the motivation for it, varies throughout the day. The aim of this investigation was to create a short assessment (CRAVE: Cravings for Rest and Volitional Energy Expenditure) to measure motivation states (wants, desires, urges) for physical activity and sedentary behaviors. Five studies were conducted to develop and evaluate the construct validity and reliability of the scale, with 1,035 participants completing the scale a total of 1,697 times. In Study 1, 402 university students completed a questionnaire inquiring (...) about the want or desire to perform behaviors “at the present moment (right now).” Items related to physical activity (e.g., “move my body”) and sedentary behaviors (e.g., “do nothing active”). An exploratory structural equation model (ESEM) revealed that 10 items should be retained, loading onto two factors (5 each for Move and Rest). In Study 2, an independent sample (n= 444) confirmed these results and found that Move and Rest desires were associated with stage-of-change for exercise behavior. In Study 3, 127 community-residing participants completed the CRAVE at 6-month intervals over two years- two times each session. Across-session interclass correlations (ICC) for Move (ICC = 0.72–0.95) and Rest (ICC = 0.69–0.88) were higher than when they were measured across 24-months (Move: ICC = 0.53; Rest: ICC = 0.49), indicating wants/desires have state-like qualities. In Study 4, a maximal treadmill test was completed by 21 university students. The CRAVE was completed immediately pre and post. Move desires decreased 26% and Rest increased 74%. Changes in Move and Rest desires were moderately associated with changes in perceived physical fatigue and energy. In Study 5, 41 university students sat quietly during a 50-min lecture. They completed the CRAVE at 3 time points. Move increased 19.6% and Rest decreased 16.7%. Small correlations were detected between move and both perceived energy and tiredness, but not calmness or tension. In conclusion, the CRAVE scale has good psychometric properties. These data also support tenets of the WANT model of motivation states for movement and rest (Stults-Kolehmainen et al., 2020a). Future studies need to explore how desires to move/rest relate to dynamic changes in physical activity and sedentarism. (shrink)

In recent years, the phenomenal development and application of technology have given rise to new means and forms of international commercial dispute resolution. In particular, in the post-COVID era, the demand for efficient, flexible and cost-saving dispute resolution methods has increased significantly. Therefore, technology-enabled digital methods such as online arbitration, have become more widely accepted and applied. At the same time, globalisation has turned international commercial disputes increasingly complex, which often involves the interests of third parties. According to data released (...) by arbitral institutes, about 40% of arbitration cases worldwide involve more than two parties. As there is an increasing number of multi-party arbitration cases, multi-party dispute resolution mechanisms have played a more prominent role in such circumstances. Digitalisation and globalisation have facilitated multi-party projects, but they have also inevitably increased risks in multi-party disputes. For instance, arbitration is a business-friendly process, but the consensual nature of arbitration does not easily accommodate multi-party disputes. Although digitalisation in the conduction of arbitrations has made it more efficient and increased the access of multi-party commercial disputes to resolution, it still has not helped arbitration overcome the basis of party’s consent. This paper will examine the joinder mechanism in international commercial arbitration, focusing on its interaction with traditional theories and principles of arbitration, the joinder provisions in the rules of several leading arbitral institutions (e.g. ICC, LCIA, HKIAC and SCAI), and the value of the joinder mechanism in the context of digitalisation. (shrink)

Background: No studies have examined the underlying structure or predictive validity of the Cognitive Therapy Adherence and Competence Scale. Examining the structure of the CTACS is of great relevance because it could provide information on what constitutes competence in CBT, and whether some underlying factors are more important for predicting treatment outcomes than others. This study investigates the psychometric properties of the Norwegian version of CTACS and its associations with treatment outcomes in a sample of primary care clients who received (...) CBT for anxiety and/or depression.Method: Independent assessors rated audiotaped therapy sessions in a sample of 132 primary care clients, participating in the Prompt Mental Health Care trial. Outcomes were symptoms of anxiety and depression assessed by patient self-report questionnaires. Structural validity was examined by means of confirmatory and exploratory factor analyses, whereas longitudinal associations with treatment outcome were explored by adopting multilevel modeling.Results: No evidence was found for the divergent validity of the constructs competence and adherence as indicated by a very high correlation between these two subscales in CTACS. Regarding reliability, ICCs for the mean score of the full competence scale and its associated subscales were generally good to excellent, although the subscale measuring the quality of the therapeutic relationship was relatively low. Internal consistency was overall acceptable, but our CFA models did not provide an acceptable fit for the pre-specified one-factor and four-factor solutions. EFA results were difficult to interpret, with a sub-optimal three-factor solution providing best model fit and only two meaningful factors [CBT specific skills and session structure ]. Overall, the results indicated no evidence for the scales' predictive validity.Conclusion: Our findings point to several psychometric problems of the CTACS that may limit both its research and clinical utility. The importance of providing empirical evidence for both reliability and validity aspects of scales are discussed and suggestions for future research are provided. (shrink)

In lieu of an abstract, here is a brief excerpt of the content:HUME ON CONTINUED EXISTENCE AND THE IDENTITY OF CHANGING THINGS Most discussions of Hume's rather cursory treatment of coherence as a factor in generating belief in what he calls the continu' d existence of objects in Of Scepticism with Regard to the Senses, have taken a common line in interpreting the nature of the problem Hume's treatment is designed to solve. For instance, perhaps the two most ex2 3 (...) tensive discussions, those of Price and Gomberg seem to agree that the problem is: how do we fill in the gaps among our perceptions, complete sequences or series that are incomplete, and come to believe in the existence of a world of unperceived objects. At the same time such discussions have focussed on the issue of whether the inference from the coherence of our perceptions to belief in the continued existence of objects (ICCE) is, as Hume claims, distinguishable from causal inference. Hume is read in such a way that ICCE if not causal is at least quasi-causal; that is, the only difference for Hume between the two sorts of inference has been taken to be one concerning the evidence on which each is based — causal inferences on past constant conjunctions or uniformities, ICCE on something less. I believe that these discussions have invariably omitted a key factor in understanding Hume's treatment of coherence, one that I want to point out and develop in this paper. Hume's discussion of coherence, like his discussion of constancy, is bound up with the concept of identity; for belief in the continued existence of an object, which coherence generates, is a belief about its identity. Hence a causal inference is distinguished from ICCE by Hume as only the latter necessarily involves belief in the identity of an object over time. Once this is recognized, we can view Hume's discussion^of coherence as requiring an answer to the question: "How do we come to believe in the identity of changing things?" I want to consider two interpretations of 106. the exact nature of ICCE for Hume — one suggested by examples offered in his discussion of coherence, the other suggested by remarks about the concept of identity in other sections of Part Four of Book One of the Treatise — and to argue that neither satisfactorily answers this question. This failure raises doubts not only about ICCE but about the tenability of Hume's characterization of the "vulgar" view of perception and his view of identity. When Hume first answers the question, "What qualities of our impressions or perceptions lead us to attribute to them a distinct and continued existence,?" by isolating the qualities of constancy and coherence, I think it is clear that the former is invoked to account for objects which are, at least in a relative sense, unchanging, which have always appear 'd to me in the same order and return upon me without the least alteration (T194), while the latter is invoked especially, if not solely, to account for objects that underto rather large changes over time, things which after a little absence or interruption may become hardly knowable. (T195) Hume's example concerns a fire in his chamber, which undergoes great change from the moment he leaves (or perhaps the moment it is lighted) to the time he returns (or perhaps the time it is a bunch of glowing embers), but which, nevertheless, compared to other fires undergoes a like alteration...in a like time. (T195) Whatever more coherence can do, it is required, at least initially, to account for just those cases which cannot be subsumed under constancy, in other words, cases in which changing objects are taken to possess distinct and continued existence. In the famous paragraph following his initial comments on coherence, Hume seemingly proceeds to explain how coherence gives rise to belief in continued existence. The account runs basically as follows. Hume hears a noise, as of a door turning; he sees a porter coming toward him. But, Hume says, I never have observ' d3 that this noise could proceed from anything but the motion of a 107. door; and therefore conclude, that the present phaenomenon is a contradiction to all past experience... (shrink)

Many scholars and activists have argued that the International Criminal Court holds potential for advancing the rights of women and girls, leading to extensive feminist engagement with and investment in the Court. As the ICC enters its second decade of existence, this article offers a reflection on both the possibilities and the challenges facing feminists. Can the international criminal law really offer a site for enhancing the rights of women? And if so, how? To explore these questions I focus on (...) the interaction between feminist activism and international criminal law institutions in relation to crimes of sexual and gender-based violence. I argue that some of the feminist strategies deployed to get sexual violence onto the international agenda have resulted in perverse outcomes. This should lead us to greater critical reflection regarding how international law conceives of sexual violence and direct our future engagements with international legal institutions. In particular feminist activists and scholars need to move away from focusing on the number of prosecutions towards challenging the international criminal law to characterise the nature of the harm in accordance with a recognition of sexual rights. (shrink)