Human Rights

The Rights of Roma in European Courts: Strategic Litigation and the Boundaries of Human Rights

The abundance of Roma rights cases before international and European courts reflects the Roma's systemic marginalization as well as their resolve to push the boundaries of human rights law. The Roma have increasingly raised concerns through strategic litigation, urging the courts to develop their jurisprudence and adjust the scope of human rights applications. This edited volume examines these cases, exploring the extent to which strategic litigation can and does push the boundaries of human rights. Adopting a long-needed yet untested approach, the volume situates Roma rights within the broader human rights edifice and identifies its key contributions. The volume focuses on the (quasi) jurisprudence of the European Court of Human Rights, the Court of Justice of the EU, and the European Committee of Social Rights, with several chapters also drawing parallels with jurisdictions beyond Europe. Its contributing authors span a broad range of disciplines, including human rights law, political science, climate justice, and ethnology. Combining rich doctrinal and socio-legal analysis, The Rights of Roma in European Courts is an unparalleled resource for scholars and practitioners seeking to understand the systemic discrimination faced by the Roma and explore legal solutions for countering it.

Violence against Women and Regimes of Exception: Undoing Discrimination in Migration Law

Violence against Women and Regimes of Exception provides a wide-ranging examination of how migration law discriminates against women, heightening their risk of being subjected to violence and intensifying their experiences of it. Catherine Briddick identifies patterns of disadvantage, scrutinizes justifications for differential treatment, and delineates legal obligations relating to violence against women. Structured around the legal challenges that migrant women have brought to the regimes determining their status, this book reveals the devastating impact of flawed rules that increase vulnerability to violence, deny effective protection, and render victims at risk of destitution, detention, and deportation. Integrating doctrinal, empirical, and theoretical material, it explores the difference that migration status makes to an experience of violence, investigates where existing regimes fall short, and establishes how the resulting compounded disadvantage should be remedied. The analysis begins in the UK and with the European Convention on Human Rights, broadening to connect with European Union law and the Council of Europe's Trafficking and Istanbul Conventions. This approach provides valuable insights into the role and ability of national courts, the European Court of Human Rights, and the Court of Justice of the European Union to scrutinize different forms of discriminatory treatment. By bringing together distinct responses to violence experienced in the context of migration control, the book outlines a new framework for their evaluation and determines how rights and protection could better be secured. A groundbreaking work that centres the experiences of those marginalized by migration law, this is essential reading for anyone interested in the intersection of violence, gender, and migration.

Facial Recognition Surveillance: Policing and Human Rights in the Age of Artificial Intelligence

Scanning millions of faces each year, facial recognition technology (FRT) has become one of today's fastest growing and most controversial AI-driven surveillance technologies. Based on rare ethnographic access to police FRT deployments, Facial Recognition Surveillance: Policing and Human Rights in the Age of Artificial Intelligence delves into the profound impact of FRT on policing practices, surveillance capabilities, and human rights protections. It reveals how this technology shapes, and is also shaped by, the complex environments in which it is deployed, dramatically reshaping police-citizen interactions. This book exposes the selective scientific and legal narratives that justify the expansion of AI-driven surveillance. It draws on cutting-edge human rights theory to propose a due diligence framework tailored to police use of FRT and introduces the concept of 'compound human rights harm' to capture the multifaceted impact of surveillance. Integrating insights from the sociology of policing, science and technology studies, and human rights scholarship, this book advances a theoretically novel and empirically informed perspective that positions FRT as a socio-technical system capable of altering the fundamental nature of policing.

Protecting the World's Children: Public Health, Human Rights, Capabilities

This book explores the protection of children in our increasingly tumultuous world. It examines ways to effectively shield children from harm and vulnerabilities. Experts address the myriad challenges children face, including migration, child labor, war, violence, adoption, foster care, natural disasters, resource distribution, and systemic failures. The discussions also delve into societal norms that shape both the protection of children and those that perpetuate harmful practices like corporal punishment, child marriage, and female genital mutilation and cutting. Uniquely, this volume seeks to unify the fragmented field of child protection by proposing a new global framework. This framework emphasizes the interconnectedness of child rights, public health, and children’s capabilities. The editors argue that children endure harm—and its lasting impacts—in similar ways across a variety of contexts. Many of these harmful contexts cross national and regional borders. Factors such as nationality, class, and culture provide no reliable safeguard for children. Protecting the World’s Children is a practical, solution-focused book. It highlights and discusses the serious effects of climate change, poverty, conflict, and social exclusion on children, making it timely and relevant. The book offers valuable insights for professionals, as well as activists and advocates dedicated to promoting children's rights. Creating a safer world for children is the ultimate aim.

Reproductive Rights and the Law

This book examines reproductive rights and their complex interaction with the law and with society, exploring differing perspectives and placing these in their respective cultural, social and religious contexts. Kerry O'Halloran explores the socially divisive question of abortion and, using examples from both developing and developed countries, considers how context determines the legal position. He also addresses a plethora of issues surrounding related reproductive rights including maternity care, IVF, adoption and surrogacy, genetic engineering and establishing the reproductive rights of trans persons. In navigating all of these, O'Halloran reflects on fundamental questions such as where the public and private divide lies in exercising one's right to autonomy, and how reproductive rights have contributed to the progression of gender parity. The book carefully identifies internationally established legal benchmarks with references to key principles, policies and case law, and explores future developments in reproductive health, such as the rights of men giving birth and pioneering ways of determining foetal sentience. Reproductive Rights and the Law is an essential guide for scholars and students in health law, family law and legal theory. Its practical insights will also greatly benefit policy makers and practising lawyers, as well as healthcare professionals, social workers and NGOs.

Between Rights and Rightfulness: Regulating Gender and Violence in the Pacific Islands

For decades, activists have drawn attention to gender violence across the Pacific Islands and successfully argued for improved state responses. While reforms have been institutionalised in law and government policy, ongoing violence shows that these have limited effectiveness. In Between Rights and Rightfulness, Nicole George investigates how gender violence is regulated in Pacific Island countries, the factors that impede regulatory effectiveness, and women's own efforts and expertise in decreasing gender violence. Incorporating comparative fieldwork in Fiji, Bougainville, and within Kanak communities in New Caledonia, George assesses how gender violence is enabled and constrained by regulations created within and beyond the state. Importantly, the book engages directly with the women affected by systems of gendered regulation to understand how they interpret and navigate the regulatory complex that impacts their security. Drawing on feminist institutional theory and feminist theories of scale, George argues that the regulation of gender and gender violence occurs at a range of scales, and that efforts to enhance women's security require a clear and contextualised understanding of this regulatory complexity. This includes identifying the role of rule takers--actors who make determinations on which rules should be rightfully followed and those that they treat as more contestable. As George argues, women themselves must also be treated as active, but often marginalized, rule takers with knowledge and expertise on rule appropriateness. Providing a novel lens on the logics of rulemaking, Between Rights and Rightfulness offers important insights into how gendered security can be improved and made more meaningful to women who are vulnerable to violence.

Appearance, Disability and the Law

People with disfigurements often face prejudice, exclusion and discrimination in employment and across other life contexts. Law's response to this evidence is flawed both by its own limited and illogical scope and its failure to understand the perspectives of those people who may need to use it. Drawing on interviews with both people with lived experience of disfigurement and employers, the book sketches out different approaches to the complex social problem of discrimination against people with visible differences. It also asks whether, in our changing social context, law should widen its protection beyond disfigurement. Would a protected characteristic of appearance offer viable legal rights to the many millions of us who do not have a disfigurement but who are prone to a few spots, whose ears stick out more than we would like, or who are carrying an extra stone in weight?

Realising Protection from Age Discrimination

This timely book presents a considered analysis of age discrimination provisions and outlines constructive guidance as to how they might be reformed. It highlights the prevalence of age discrimination for all age groups but especially against older persons, demonstrating the importance of effective legal protection for this cohort - especially when age discrimination intersects with other grounds. Helen Meenan and Christa Tobler bring together expert scholars and legal practitioners to critically analyse how older persons are protected from age discrimination in legal frameworks internationally, regionally and nationally, appraising strengths and weaknesses in each system. In addition, the contributors to this volume include unique office-holders who enable the voices of older people to be heard. By critically examining where protection from age discrimination is now, where it needs to go and how best to arrive there, the authors highlight that protection from age-based prejudices is crucial to the full enjoyment of all human rights by older people. This book allows age discrimination to be appraised from varied yet complementary perspectives, reinforcing the importance of protecting victims of all backgrounds from age-based discrimination. This book is an essential tool for students and academics in fields such as human rights, employment law, discrimination law and gerontology. Its practical approach will also greatly benefit health and social protection researchers, law makers and policymakers, as well as NGOs, human rights institutions and organisations, and care institutions interested in tackling systemic ageism and protecting older persons from age discrimination.

Roe and Dobbs in Context: Under the Societal Hood of Abortion in America

Roe and Dobbs in Context describes long-term demographic changes that underlie Roe v. Wade and Dobbs v. Jackson Women's Health Organization and concludes that, as the Court suggests in Dobbs, Americans accept women's participation in politics and hence in formulating law and government policy. The book examines the state of American public opinion on abortion and its impact on government regulation, investigates whether culture or religion is the source of the morality that underlies U.S. law on abortion and thus whether law-embodied protections of religion apply to government efforts to restrict abortion access. Finally, Larry Barnett reviews and critiques social science studies of the impact of law on the incidence of abortion and considers possible side effects of anti-abortion law along with two historical events (the War on Drugs and Prohibition) that, together with an evident need for access to abortion, indicate there will be a negligible long-term impact on abortion frequency in America from abortion-hostile law.

Global Business and Local Struggle: Reimagining Non-Judicial Remedy for Human Rights

In the quest for human rights justice for communities and workers whose rights are breached by transnational businesses, non-judicial mechanisms (NJMs) are often deployed, but how effective are they? This book creates a blueprint for reforming transnational human rights NJMs and for helping communities and workers to use them. Through 587 interviews with 1100 individuals over five years of research in Indonesia and India, the authors delve into the practical workings of NJMs in diverse industries and contexts. The findings reveal that while NJMs are limited in providing standalone remedies, they can play a valuable role within a broader regulatory ecosystem. Combining rich empirical data, multi-method analyses and a new theoretical framework, the authors argue for a multi-pronged approach to human rights redress. Their findings will advance both academic and policy debates about the merits and shortcomings of NJMs.

Elgar Concise Encyclopedia of Migration and Asylum Law

This Concise Encyclopedia provides a comprehensive overview of the rapidly developing field of migration and asylum law. It brings clarity on key terms and critical notions, while challenging misconceptions in this highly politicized sphere. Bringing together a diverse array of leading and emerging scholars and practitioners from across six continents, this Encyclopedia examines a broad range of topics and perspectives, such as diasporas, border control, racism and the human rights of migrants. Each entry offers a clear and concise summary of existing and contemporary knowledge, identifies important gaps in the field and outlines new directions for cutting-edge research. Carefully curated, this Encyclopedia scrutinizes well-known terms of art, including naturalization, non-refoulement, remittances and resettlement as well as addressing intersecting topics, like civil society, climate change, migration governance and digital technology. Students, scholars and researchers interested in migration and asylum will greatly benefit from this Concise Encyclopedia. It is also a vital reference for practitioners and policy makers. Key Features: A pioneering Encyclopedia highlighting key topics of the field and recent developments Over 100 entries written by leading scholars and practitioners from the six continents Comprehensive coverage of the critical notions and terms of art associated with migration and asylum Broad variety of themes and perspectives

Women's Rights under International, American, Islamic, and Egyptian Law: an Irresolvable Conflict?

This book presents a comprehensive analysis of women's rights pertaining to abortion, employment equality, and the choice to wear a hijab under international, American, Islamic, and Egyptian law. It challenges the notion that Islamic Shari'a inherently discriminates against women and attributes these perceptions to cultural stereotypes and social norms. It highlights the discrimination Muslim women encounter in Western countries and advocates for the protection and promotion of their rights to foster equality, fairness, diversity, and social cohesion. Essential reading for anyone interested in gender equality, it offers a fresh perspective on the intersections between law, culture, and women's rights.

Toward an Abolitionist Human Rights Court: Rethinking Responses to Gendered and Racialized Violence

Contemporary international human rights law increasingly obligates states to heighten their criminalization of certain human rights violations, including gendered, racialized, and homophobic violence. This Element uses prison and police abolitionist thought to challenge this trend. It focuses on the European Court of Human Rights (ECtHR), arguing that the Court's reliance on punishment and policing threatens to undo earlier European approaches to criminal law and human rights that resonate with abolitionist thought. It also contends that the criminalization approach provides the Court with an alibi for not recognizing or attending to the deeply structural racialized, colonial, sexual, gendered, and homophobic violence in Europe, particularly but not only against Roma communities and Black and Muslim migrants. Encouraging human rights advocates and judges to take seriously prison and police abolition in Europe and elsewhere, the Element calls for the ECtHR to pave the way for an abolitionist-oriented turn among human rights courts.

Climate Change on Trial: Mobilizing Human Rights Litigation to Accelerate Climate Action

This Element tells the twenty-year socio-legal story of human rights-based climate change litigation. Based on an original database of the totality of rights-based climate change (RCC) lawsuits around the world as well as interviews with leading actors and participant observation in the field, the Element explains the rise and global diffusion of RCC litigation. It combines insights from global governance, international law, climate policy, human rights, and legal mobilization theory in order to offer a socio-legal account of the actors, strategies, and norms that have emerged at the intersection of human rights and climate governance. By proposing a broad understanding of the impacts of legal mobilization that includes direct and indirect, material and symbolic effects, it documents the contributions and shortcomings of human rights litigation in addressing the climate emergency. 

Facilitating Judicial Cooperation in the EU: A Computable Approach to Mutual Recognition in Criminal Matters

The volume develops an innovative analysis of EU cooperation mechanisms in the criminal matter through the lens of a computational approach to the law. This multi-level research tackles both EU and national legislation. The comparative analysis of the European Arrest Warrant, the European Investigation Order and Regulation 1805/2018 is integrated with legal informatics research, translating into computable language the relevant EU and national legislation. This breakthrough perspective highlights potentially uncovered deficit of the normative texts and enhances comparative analysis of legal systems, adding a novel viewpoint to the debate on the interaction between criminal matter and technology.

Inter-State Communications and Human Rights: Developments and Prospects

Developments at the international level over the past 5 years have re-ignited the relevance of a mechanism that had remained dormant for decades: inter-state communications before UN treaty bodies. Under-utilised and, consequently, under-studied, inter-state communications allow States to bring cases against other States for violations of their human rights obligations. Given the strong human rights dimension of cases currently under consideration by the ICJ and other international disputes, as well as the numerous and significant cases being presently considered by human rights treaty bodies and other human rights courts, this edited volume seeks to consider the potential of inter-state communications for promoting and ensuring respect for human rights around the globe.

Routledge Handbook of Human Rights in Southeast Asia

The Routledge Handbook of Human Rights in Southeast Asia analyses some of the region's most pressing human rights issues, while also giving attention to those actors and institutions that work towards improvement.

Chapters by international experts in the field provide readers with a background on some of Southeast Asia’s most pressing human rights concerns. The book builds on, and contributes to, existing analyses of human rights in Southeast Asia to further enhance our understanding of what sits behind the region’s ambivalent human rights track record. Following an introduction, the handbook is structured in eight parts. The chapters cover a wide range of human rights issues including human rights debates at political and regional levels, and how human rights are experienced every day, such as the rights to food, water, and work: Advancing Human Rights through ASEAN; Refugees: Protecting Rights and Strengthening Agency; Transitional Justice in Southeast Asia: Confronting the Past; Balancing Moral Perspectives: Ideologies and Human Rights; Intersections between Workers’ Rights, Corporations and the State; Accessing and Maintaining Rights to Water, Food, and Health; On the Frontline: Human Rights Defenders; Promoting Human Rights in Southeast Asia: New Directions and Strategies.

The handbook considers the political and social contexts in which human rights emerge, the dynamics of their contestation and violation, and how rights are claimed. It demonstrates that human rights are a practice and goes beyond considering human rights as formal structures in laws, regulations, and meeting rooms. A timely overview and analysis of the situation of Human Rights in Southeast Asia, this handbook will be a valuable reference work for scholars and practitioners in human rights, the field of Asian Law, Asian Studies in general and Southeast Asian Studies in particular.

Right to Asylum: Between Demagogy and Hypocrisy

This book provides insight into the realities of, and right to, asylum from the frontiers of refugee law, as observed by a key practitioner, academic and policy-maker in the field. The book combines expert analysis and first-hand testimony. Written by one of the giants in the field, the first Belgian Commissioner General for Refugees and Stateless Persons, it blends the professional and the personal, to give a candid, compelling account of how asylum law has developed over the last quarter century. It looks back at some of the key cases of asylum, but also forward, suggesting how Europe might address current challenges such as deportation and regularisation. All lawyers, practitioners and policy-makers in the field of refugee law and policy will find this required reading.

An International Human Rights Law of Cooperation: International Cooperation, State Responsibility and the European Convention on Human Rights

This incisive book examines how states bear responsibility for human rights protection when they cooperate. Focusing on the European Convention on Human Rights (ECHR), it explores the challenges of international cooperation to international human rights law and uncovers how, nonetheless, human rights provisions may turn into an international human rights law of cooperation and regulate inter-state interaction. Prisca Feihle discusses the meaning of international cooperation to human rights law, engaging in detailed analysis of case-law to illustrate how the European Court of Human Rights (ECtHR) addresses cooperation between states in a range of areas including migration policies, surveillance measures or criminal investigations. Developing a comprehensive framework for states' human rights responsibilities in international cooperation, she puts forward insightful recommendations on what human rights law under the ECHR demands of states beyond these specific subject matters. Suggestions concern the ECHR's interactions with the law of international responsibility, interpretational method and the scope of application and content of human rights provisions in relation to inter-state interaction affecting individuals. This judicious book is a vital resource for students and scholars of public international law, particularly those with an interest in the law of international responsibility, human rights law and especially the ECHR and ECtHR. It will also benefit those studying international relations, as well as practitioners and policymakers in the field of human rights law.

On the Law of Speaking Freely

This book tackles the most pressing problems of contemporary free speech law by examining where the idea of free expression came from in the first place, applying the lessons of the past to address the challenges of the present. Free speech cannot be taken for granted - it needs to be fought for. But its champions will be successful only if they understand what they are defending. For free speech is a deceptively simple principle. How should it guide us on the bounds of what is acceptable to say? Should we be free to preach hatred, or to spread fear or fake news? Can media freedom be balanced against the right to privacy? How does free speech work online? Can the internet be made a safe space without compromising freedom of expression? On the Law of Speaking Freely offers not just insights but answers to these and other such vital questions by roaming widely over the law of free speech, from English common law to the European Convention on Human Rights via the US First Amendment. In rescuing free speech from the culture wars in which it has become embroiled, Adam Tomkins restates its values, its complexities and its enduring importance, in prose that is as passionate as it is clear-sighted. Even-handed, informed and authoritative, this is a major, timely work from one of the UK's leading constitutional scholars.

Defaming the Freedom of Religion or Belief: A Historical and Conceptual Analysis of the United Nations

This book explores the intricate terrain of international religious freedom discourse. It examines the evolution and controversies surrounding the formulation and interpretation of the freedom of religion or belief as a universal right within the United Nations. From legal and philosophical standpoints to the political dimensions of the subject, the book navigates through the complex terrain, shedding light on challenges to the universality and non-discriminatory implementation of this fundamental freedom. Beyond theoretical and legal debates, the study reveals how actors within the United Nations have 'defamed ' the freedom of religion or belief, reshaping its interpretation away from its original 1948 objectives. The book explores the dynamic interplay of postmodern views, legal intricacies, and political perspectives, contributing to a potential diminishment of the normative force of related legal provisions. It addresses critical topics including religious tolerance, blasphemy, defamation of religion, and apostasy, offering a comprehensive understanding of the evolving landscape of international human rights discourse. This is an indispensable resource for scholars, policymakers, and anyone seeking a profound insight into the challenges and transformations shaping the global pursuit of religious freedom.

International Migration of Children for a Better Life: Human Rights, State Power, and Nations' Duties

In a world where a child's fate is often determined by the arbitrary circumstances of their birth, International Migration of Children for a Better Life challenges the legal status quo. The book advances a dramatically different vision of children's relationship to nations and to the international legal order, one that provides theoretical grounding for a right of children to escape life-threatening circumstances, rather than waiting for change in their home environment. By offering a normative critique of existing international law, the book suggests novel arguments for enabling children to migrate more freely and escape adverse environments. It argues that the conventional policy response to tragic circumstances--war, famine, natural disaster, which prioritizes transformation of local conditions so people can remain in place or quickly return, is less appropriate for children than for adults. Children's needs are more urgent. The book arrives at several recommendations, backed by a theory of children's rights: eliminate citizenship for children altogether, disallow states from inhibiting children's departure, prioritize children over adults in immigration policy, and evacuate children en masse from nations that cannot protect them. Presenting a child-centered perspective on perennial issues in immigration law and political theory, International Migration of Children for a Better Life is a must read for legal academics, political philosophers, practitioners, and policy experts alike.

Ending Impunity for International Law Violations: Palestinian Bedouins and the Risk of Forced Displacement

This open access edited collection is the first book-length academic publication on the Palestinian Bedouins at risk of forced displacement in the Central West Bank and Greater Jerusalem area. At its core are two questions: firstly; what are the humanitarian vulnerabilities they face and how are they produced/constructed? And secondly, how does protracted impunity for international law violations drive humanitarian protection risks for them? It interweaves international law, community-based empirical research and interdisciplinary perspectives, to offer the broadest possible framework for understanding these complex and complicated questions.

Critical Legal Perspectives on Contemporary Slavery

This edited volume examines contemporary forms of slavery and the law through an historical and comparative lens. The volume consists of a general report and 15 national reports from a wide cross-section of jurisdictions that include Canada, Peru, the Netherlands, Barbados and Ghana. Each chapter provides in-depth engagement with slavery as a global institution in dialogue with slavery in its contemporary forms, including their causes and consequences. The book explores slavery and the Atlantic slave trade, its historical legacies in the persistence of racial capitalism, and points of continuity and disjuncture with contemporary attempts to redress severe labour exploitation in global supply and global care chains.

Immediate and Progressive Realisation in International Human Rights Law

This book makes a new and original contribution to the old debate about differences between socio-economic and civil and political rights, which has engaged human rights discourse over several decades. Although scholars and practitioners now agree that these categories are more alike than originally assumed, they continue to delineate them based on the alleged difference between immediate and progressive realisation. The book asks whether this differentiation is still valid by exploring the historical and theoretical background, the text of relevant UN human rights treaties, and the practice of the UN human rights committees. By so doing, it shows that the standards of realisation converge more than diverge and that this last remaining distinction should be abandoned. Human rights lawyers, advocates, practitioners and policy makers will find this book invaluable as it brings much needed clarification to this key question.

Business, Human Rights and Sustainable Development

Corporate businesses are expanding nationally and globally. Given this proliferation, this edited book investigates and finds the inseparable nexus between businesses, human rights, and sustainable development. It comprehensively accommodates chapters on separate but interrelated aspects of this interface, providing collective cutting-edge information and critical analyses by outstanding scholars. Their intellectual contributions are invaluable to understand the role of business in protecting, preserving, and improving the human capital and natural resources for the future and fill up a void in the existing literature. The book will be a handy and useful resource book for corporate policymakers, government officials, legislators, academics, researchers, libraries, lawyers, judges, human rights specialists/activists, and anyone interested in the interaction between business, human rights, and sustainable development.

Human Rights and Corruption in Brazil: Democracy at a Crossroads

This book identifies 2 polarising concepts used by Brazilian mainstream sociology to explain the formation and identity of Brazil as a society: corruption and human rights. As the 1988 Constitution is a milestone in the Brazilian transition to democracy and part of a broader movement of Brazil's integration into international law, the impact of international legal regimes on the attainment of human rights and the fight against corruption is analysed to evaluate the state of Brazilian democracy. The book examines the outcomes of 4 specific international human rights regimes in Brazil, involving rights and policies related to: - the right to food, the fight against hunger, and conditional cash transfer programmes; - the right to health and the public healthcare system; - the right to racial equality and affirmative action in superior education; and - the right to recognition and the protection of Indigenous populations. This approach is then applied to the examination of the international anti-corruption agenda. It focuses on Brazil's determination to deal with corruption against the backdrop of its worst democratic crisis of the last 35 years using meticulously researched case studies on the most prominent investigations, including Mensalão and Lava Jato (Car Wash). The book traces back to the origins of the international anti-corruption agenda and key legitimising efforts aimed at aligning the discourses with the developmental, good-governance trends, and delves into its repercussions within the Brazilian context, with a glance at their collateral effects in other parts of the world. Thus, the core focus of the work revolves around human rights and the fight against corruption, shedding light on how democracy evolves or recedes over time under their influence.

Righting Wrongs: Three Decades on the Front Lines Battling Abusive Governments

In three decades under the leadership of Kenneth Roth, Human Rights Watch conducted investigations in 100 countries to uncover abuses - and pressured offending governments to stop them. Roth has grappled with the worst of humanity, taken on the most ruthless oppressors of our time, and persuaded leaders from around the globe to stand up to their repressive counterparts. The son of a Jew who fled Nazi Germany just before the war began, Roth grew up knowing full well how inhumane governments could be. He has traveled the world to meet cruelty and injustice on its home turf- he arrived in Rwanda shortly after the genocide; scrutinized the impact of Saddam's invasion of Kuwait; investigated and condemned Israel's mistreatment of Palestinians. He directed efforts to curtail the Chinese government's persecution of Uyghur Muslims, to bring Myanmar's officials to justice after the ethnic cleansing of Rohingya Muslims, to halt Russian war crimes in Ukraine, even to rein in the U.S. government. Roth's many innovations and strategies included the deployment of a concept as old as mankind - the powerful tool of 'shaming' - and here he illustrates its surprising effectiveness against evildoers. This is a story of wins, losses, and ongoing battles in the ceaseless fight for a more decent world.

The Effectiveness of the Inter-American Court of Human Rights: The Case of Indigenous Territorial Rights

The Inter-American Court of Human Rights has the most developed jurisprudence on Indigenous rights, yet this case law is understudied. This book addresses this gap by exploring the Court and its cases from both the perspective of international law and the legal protection of Indigenous territories. Setting out the network of actors and institutions involved in such litigation, it examines the motivations and constraints in domestic politics affecting international orders (and by extension the impact of the Court). It provides both an important statement on the effectiveness of international tribunals and a fascinating insight into the evolution of Indigenous rights.

Protection of the Environment under International Law During Occupation: International Humanitarian, Human Rights, and Environmental Law

This book examines the relationship between International Environmental Law and Human Rights Law regarding the protection of the environment in times of occupation. Times of occupation create a tangible threat to the environment, alongside human, animal, and plant rights. This book uses international law to grapple with unprecedented environmental challenges, from water, air and soil pollution and severe damage to natural resources to the complexities of regulating emerging environmental challenges during extraordinary situations. Using international case studies alongside the prominent and evolving role of international law agreements, in particular Multilateral Environmental Agreements (MEAs), this book offers a comprehensive analysis of the legal tools available to navigate environmental challenges under occupation. The book also discusses occupying power obligations under public international law and the demands of protecting the environment in occupied territory. The book provides a valuable resource for researchers in the field of environmental law, human rights law, and humanitarian law.