What’s New in Public Law

—Monica Cappelletti, School of Law and Government, Dublin City University (DCU), Ireland

In this weekly feature, I-CONnect publishes a curated reading list of developments in public law. “Developments” may include a selection of links to news, high court decisions, new or recent scholarly books and articles, and blog posts from around the public law blogosphere.

To submit relevant developments for our weekly feature on “What’s New in Public Law,” please email contact.iconnect@gmail.com.

Developments in Constitutional Courts

1. The Federal Constitutional Court of Germany will conduct an oral hearing in November concerning the European Banking Union Regulations.
2. The Constitutional Court of South Korea has declared unconstitutional the collection of DNA samples of criminals without their permission.
3. The Constitutional Court of South Korea ruled that it is unconstitutional to deny college professors the right to form labor unions.
4. The Constitutional Court of the Democratic Republic of Congo (DRC) has excluded Jean Pierre Bemba from the upcoming presidential election scheduled for 23 December 2018.
5. The Constitutional Court of Guatemala reversed a Supreme Court decision to reinstate the Escobal mine’s licence and ordered that nearby communities be consulted.
6. The Supreme Court of India decriminalized gay sex.
7. The Supreme Court of Ireland will decide whether to hear abortion poll challenge appeal.
8. The International Court of Justice begins hearing Mauritius claim that Britain forced territory exchange for independence.
9. The European Court of Human Rights ruled that proceedings before the Armenian courts concerning the smuggling of enriched uranium were not fair because key witnesses were never heard.

In the News

1. The Ukrainian Parliament published a constitutional reform bill concerning the strategic course for obtaining full membership of Ukraine in the EU and NATO.
2. The Cambodian Parliament held its first session since the July vote.
3. The Iraqi Parliament has met for the first time since elections in May.
4. The Iranian Parliament drops plan to impeach education minister.
5. The Irish Government decided to postpone the constitutional referendum on the ‘sexist’ constitutional reference to a woman’s place in the home.
6. The Uganda Government withdrew Constitution (Amendment) Bill, 2017 that aimed at resolve the problem of delayed implementation of government infrastructure and investment projects due to disputes arising out of the compulsory land acquisition process.
7. The Danish Government decided for medicinal cannabis subsidy for terminally ill patients.
8. The Philippine President revokes amnesty of political opponent over historic attempted coup.
9. The Mexican National Human Rights Commission is calling on federal authorities to investigate the allegedly illegal detention and torture of 17 people by marines.
10. The UN Human Rights Council will hold its thirty-ninth regular session from 10 to 28 September 2018.

New Scholarship

1. Grainne de Burca, Shaming Human Rights, International Journal of Constitutional Law (forthcoming) (reviewing Samuel Moyn, Not Enough: Human Rights in an Unequal World (Harvard University Press, 2018))
2. Marta Baretta, Olurotimi Osha, St John Howard-Brown, Victoria Deliege, and Victor Freire, An investigation of the right to life according to the ECHR regime: putative asbestos case (2018) Diritti Comparati, Working Paper 3 (analyzing the application of article 2 ECHR in historical cases of the Court)
3. Shai Dothan, The Three Traditional Approaches to Treaty Interpretation: A Current Application to the European Court of Human Rights (2018) iCourts Working Paper Series (examining how the European Court of Human Rights has developed its own version of the rules of treaty interpretation, combining the three traditional approaches – the textual approach, the subjective approach, and the teleological approach)
4. Adoración Galera Victoria, The displacement of social Europe. The Spanish case (2018) 2 Diritti Comparati (analyzing the European Social Model and exploring the effects of anti-crisis measures adopted in Spain and the resulting loss of social rights)
5. Janneke Gerards, Margin of Appreciation and Incrementalism in the Case Law of the European Court of Human Rights (2018) Human Rights Law Review (analyzing the application of margin of appreciation doctrine by the ECtHR and demonstrating how the Court has used this doctrine as an instrument to reconcile European protection of fundamental rights and national diversity)
6. Ursula Kilkelly, Ton Liefaard, International Human Rights of Children (2018) (exploring the meaning and implementation of international children’s rights law, as laid down in the United Nations Convention on the Rights of the Child and related international and regional human rights instruments)
7. Catarina Santos Botelho, Constitutional Narcissism on the Couch of Psychoanalysis: Constitutional Unamendability in Portugal and Spain, in Lech Garlicki and Yaniv Roznai (eds), European Journal of Law Reform – Special issue on European Perspectives on Constitutional Unamendability (forthcoming 2019) (comparing the Portuguese Constitution, which has the longest unamendable clause in the world, with the silence of the Spanish Constitution regarding the language of eternity)
8. Andreas von Staden, Strategies of Compliance with the European Court of Human Rights. Rational Choice Within Normative Constraints (2018) (exploring the nature of human rights challenges in two enduring liberal democracies—Germany and the United Kingdom. The cross-national overview of compliance illustrates a strong correlation between the quality of a country’s democracy and the rate at which judgments have met compliance and details how governments, legislators, and domestic judges responded to the court’s demands for either financial compensation or changes to laws, policies, and practices)
9. The Democratic Decay Resource (DEM-DEC) released the second monthly update of its bibliography on democratic decay (September 2018), containing new research worldwide from August 2018; key items from earlier in 2018 and late 2017; a significant list of items suggested by DEM-DEC users; and forthcoming research. A post introducing the Update was published on Verfassungsblog on 4 September.

Calls for Papers and Announcements

1. The IV International Congress “Perspectives of contemporary constitutionalism. On the occasion of the 70th anniversary of the Italian Constitution and the 40th Anniversary of the Spanish Constitution” that will be held in Murcia (Spain) on 28-30 November 2018, invites submissions of abstract of paper. The deadline for the submission is September 24, 2018.
2. The Asian Law Institute (ASLI) at the National University of Singapore will host the 16th ASLI Conference in Singapore on 11 and 12 June 2019. The ASLI invites submissions of abstract of paper by December 3, 2018.
3. The European Research Council Project “Transnational Private-Public Arbitration as Global Regulatory Governance: Exploring The Lex Mercatoria Publica” at the Amsterdam Center of International Law issued a call for papers for a workshop on “Engaging with Domestic Law in International Adjudication: Factfinding or Transnational Law-Making?” to take place February 27-March 1, 2019, at the University of Amsterdam. The deadline for the submission is September 15, 2018.
4. The Research Area “Migration and Diversity” of the WZB Berlin Social Science Center invites submissions for a multi-disciplinary conference on minority and majority rights. The deadline for the submissions is October 1, 2018.
5. Centre for Law and Culture St Mary’s University, Twickenham with the University of Westminster and GSM London will host the Conference “Race: Why can’t the law effect genuine equality?”. Submissions of abstract of paper are welcomed by September, 28 2018.
6. The City College of New York invites submissions for its “Critical Perspective on Human Rights2 Conference that will be held on March 13-15, 2019. Proposal of abstract should be submitted by October 31, 2018.
7. I-Courts in Copenhagen issues a call for papers for its Interdisciplinary Conference “Who is afraid of the International Criminal Courts” that will be held on January 25-27, 2019. The deadline for the submissions is September 15, 2018.
8. The Journal of Constitutional Law, issued by the Constitutional Court of Georgia, welcomes contributions for its next volume. The deadline for the submissions is October 1, 2018.
9. The Journal of Internal Displacement and Internal Displacement Monitoring Centre welcomes manuscripts for the call on ‘Getting to 2030: The Future of Internal Displacement and Sustainable Development’ (Special Issue January 2019). The deadline for the submission is November 8, 2018.

Elsewhere Online

1. Idris Fassassi, Removing ‘Race’ and Adding ‘Gender’ to the French Constitution: On Constitutional Redundancy and Symbols, Constitionnet
2. Helena Guimarães de Oliveira, My Body, the Majority’s Choice? A Comparative Overview of Abortion Laws in Ireland and Argentina, Verfassungsblog
3. Sreang Heng, Elections under oppression in Cambodia: a predictable outcome?, Yale Macmillian Centre
4. Thomas Hochmann, Shedding Light or Shooting in the Dark – How to define Fake News?, Verfassungsblog
5. Grant Hooper, Minister for Immigration and Border Protection v SZVFW: The High Court on Unreasonableness and The Role of Judicial Review, AUSPUBLAW
6. Zann Isacson, Combating Terrorism Online: Possible Actors and Their Roles, Lawfare Blog
7. Katalin Kelemen, The Agreement on a Unified Patent Court cannot be ratified by Hungary, the Constitutional Court says, DirittiComparati
8. Raffaela Kunz, A further “constitutionalization” to the detriment of the individual?, Volkerrechtsblog
9. Jordi Nieva-Fenoll, Spanish Jurisdiction at Stake: Puigdemont’s Judge to be Judged by a Belgian Court?, Verfassungsblog
10. Jan Przerwa, The Pisciotti case: how can free movement rights impact EU citizen extradition to a third country?, European law blog
11. Mario Savino, The Diciotti Affair: beyond the Populist Farce, Verfassungsblog
12. Johan Sigholm, I Wrote About Russian Election Interference. Then I Was Trolled Online, Lawfare Blog
13. Sebastian Spitra, The politics of cultural heritage protection in international law, Volkerrechtsblog
14. Sophie Starrenburg, Cultural heritage protection: a truly “global” legal problem?, Volkerrechtsblog
15. Joe Tomlinson and Katy Sheridan, Judicial Review, Evidence, and Systemic Unfairness in the UK, IACL-AIDC Blog
16. Sam Wice, Proposed Reform of House Rules Would Not Be Enforceable, Blog of the Yale Journal of Regulation