Read On! Cosmopolitan Justice

(Delighted to welcome alumna Cecilia Marcela Bailliet, who contributes this guest post)

Many thanks to the IntlLawGrrls for the opportunity to announce Routledge's publication this month of Cosmopolitan Justice and its Discontents, the volume that I co-edited with my University of Oslo colleague, Professor of Criminology Katja Franko Aas.
This book:
► Seeks to fill a lacuna with respect to critical and legal perspectives within the field of cosmopolitanism, which has largely been dominated by positive literature within sociology, political science or philosophy.
► Highlights the importance of international economic and investment law and its institutions when assessing the evolution of cosmopolitan norms. Included is a presentation of the Council of Ethics of the Norwegian Government Pension Fund, as an empirical example.
► Contains five chapters by women scholars. Utrecht Professor Chrisje Brants addresses dilemmas related to collective guilt and International Criminal Law; Lucerne Senior Researcher Kyriaki Topidi discusses the process of European Union constitutionalization in Turkey and resulting tensions relating to the values tolerance and diversity; Central Lancashire Professor Barbara Hudson and Oslo Professor Katja Franko Aas both explain ironies related to migration and counter-terrorist policies and practices; and yours truly, Cecilia Marcela Bailliet, seeks to explore how a single act of conscientious objection by an individual American soldier revealed a complex network of cosmopolitan federalism.

Dispatch from Oslo

As Beth van Schaack posted earlier today, the University of Oslo is currently hosting The Creation of International Law: An Exploration of Normative Innovation, Contextual Application, and Interpretation in a Time of Flux. This two day conference brings together acclaimed women scholars from around the world to explore challenges relating to the creation and elaboration of international law.
Catharine MacKinnon (left) began the conference with a brilliant keynote address focusing on the trajectory of the crime of rape from its conceptual origin as a crime against an individual into a gender-based crime into an international crime. She gave a brilliant exposition of the reflexive relationship between conceptions of gender in domestic and international law. Organized by Prof. Cecilia Bailliet, an IntLawGrrls guest/alumna, the conference has been a showcase for IntLawGrrl talent.
IntLawGrrls Fiona de Londras, Karima Bennoune and Beth van Schaack presented papers today on varying aspects of international criminal law. On tomorrow's roster are IntLawGrrls Hari M. Osofsky and me, Rebecca Bratspies, both speaking about international environmental law.
The papers from the conference will be published.

Guest Blogger: Cecilia Marcela Bailliet

It's IntLawGrrls' great pleasure today to welcome Dr. Cecilia Marcela Bailliet (left) as today's guest blogger.
Cecilia is a member of the Faculty of Law at the University of Oslo in Norway, where she's Professor, Deputy Director of the Department of Public and International Law, and Director of the Masters Program in Public International Law. Born in Buenos Aires, Argentina, she earned her doctorate at Oslo, based on her thesis entitled "Between Conflict and Consensus: Conciliating Land Disputes in Guatemala, A Study in Preventing and Resolving Internal Displacement." Cecilia also holds a combined J.D./M.A. degree, with honors, from the School of Law and the Elliott School of International Affairs, George Washington University, Washington, D.C.
Her fields of research and teaching include International Public Law -- her guest post below considers that subject in relation to the global phenomenon of kidnapping -- Human Rights, Women's Rights, Refugee Law, Counter-Terrorism, and Democracy and Constitutionalism, and Refugee Law. Among her many publications is Security: A Multidisciplinary Normative Approach (Brill 2009), an essay collection that Cecilia edited, authors of which include IntLawGrrls' own Naomi Cahn.
Cecilia dedicates her guest post to a woman about whom we've posted before, the French feminist and philosopher Simone de Beauvoir (below right). Cecilia writes of Beauvoir:

Her novels and autobiographies provide profound reflection on the life experiences of women, highlighting the importance of intellectually intimate connections between individuals (irrespective of gender), and the urgency of engagement in times of political and societal upheaval. The books that I hold most dear: All Men are Mortal, The Mandarins, Memoirs of a Dutiful Daughter, The Prime of Life, and The Second Sex.
In the last book mentioned, Beauvoir characterizes the dilemmas facing women as such: "Thus woman may fail to lay claim to the status of subject because she lacks definite resources, because she feels the necessary bond that ties her to man regardless of reciprocity, and because she is often very well pleased with her role as the Other."

Heartfelt welcome!

Towards holistic transnational protection against kidnapping: public law approaches

(Thank you to IntLawGrrls for the invitation to provide a guest post based on a forthcoming article of mine)

My most recent area of research is the global criminal phenomenon of kidnapping as it relates to an increased presentation of asylum claims in the United States, Canada, Belgium, France, United Kingdom and New Zealand.
This most striking aspect of this problem is that the private market is both part of its origin and part of its solution.
Inequitable enjoyment of socio-economic resources and the exclusion from participation in formal markets prompt marginalized individuals to pursue the criminal market of kidnapping, in which the human body becomes the ultimate commodity. In turn, corrupt and ineffective judicial bodies and police leave family members little choice but to employ private security and insurance companies. This creates a growth industry based on safe return of victims.
At the international level, there has been increased attention, not only from the UN Economic and Social Council, but also from UN Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon (above right), who declared in 2009:

Kidnapping is an inhumane and unjustifiable crime, as well as a gross violation of international human rights and humanitarian law.

Among the related human rights at stake, one may cite:
► guarantees of liberty, physical integrity and security, and the prohibition of arbitrary detention, as detailed in Article 9 of the International Covenant on Civil and Political Rights;
► the right to life, as in Article 6 of the ICCPR;
► the prohibition against torture, in Article 7;
the ban on interference with family, Article 17; and
► protection against sexual violence, established in, for example, the November 16, 2009, judgment (available in Spanish) by the Inter-American Court of Human Rights in Gonzalez et. al. v. Mexico.
Indeed, the most relevant case law has emerged at the regional level, where the focus is on state responsibility for investigating and punishing kidnappers.
The Inter-American Court thus issued 2 notable provisional orders, in:
► In the Matter of the Communities of Jiguamiandó and Curbaradó, a case involving the kidnapping and murder of a manm allegedly via complicity by police and paramilitary; the order called for State investigation, identification of perpetrators, and punishment; and
► In the Matter of the United States of Mexico Digna Ochoa y Plácido et. al., in which the order called upon the State to protect the lives of human rights activists who had been subject to kidnapping.
Similarly, the Inter-American Commission on Human Rights has repeatedly condemned kidnapping by nonstate actors in countries including Colombia, Guatemala, El Salvador, Venezuela, and Brazil.
In like manner are decisions of the European Court of Human Rights:
► In the case of Avsar v. Turkey, the Court held Turkey to be in violation of Articles 2 (right to life) and 13 (effective remedy) of the European Convention on Human Rights, for failing to carry out adequate and effective investigation in a case involving the kidnapping and killing of a man by village guards with complicity by the state.
► The Court held Russia liable for violation of the same articles in Elmurzayev and others v. Russia and Khadzhialiyev and others v. Russia, cases involving kidnappings by “unidentified armed men” and subsequent delays by the state in investigation and proceedings respecting those crimes.
In large part, the international community’s response to the global threat of kidnapping is reflected in the innovative institutional trend towards horizontal and vertical cooperation across the public-private divide. Initiatives to combat the spread of kidnapping include assistance in border control, intelligence-sharing, police training, and management (seeking transparency, accountability, and professionalization), telecommunication interception, assistance in legislative amendments, extradition, and overview of financial transactions.
Furthermore, there are increased calls for strengthening citizen and community participation in the implementation of security plans. The European Council issued Recommendation 2007/562/EC of 12 June 2007, which requires states to share information in all terrorist kidnappings. Similarly, the need for international cooperation to address crime (including kidnapping) has been promoted by the Organization of American States Permanent Council’s Special Committee on Transnational Organized Crime and the Ministers Responsible for Public Security.

It is important to note issues of continuing concern:
► We still await the establishment of implementation mechanisms for the UN Convention Against Transnational Organized Crime; and
► None of these initiatives highlights the importance of asylum, for victims and their families, as an element of holistic protection.