What’s New in Public Law

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—Vini Singh, Assistant Professor & Doctoral Research Scholar, National Law University Jodhpur, India.

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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 Supreme Court of India held that citizens have the right to criticize the government as long they do not incite violence.
2. The European Court of Justice ruled that Germany failed to cut dangerous air pollution.
3. The Constitutional Court of Mali named Colonel Assimi Goita as the country’s transitional president.
4. The Supreme Court of Brazil authorized a criminal probe into allegations that the Environment Minister obstructed a police probe into illegal logging.
5. The U.S. Supreme Court limited the reach of the federal computer fraud law.
6. The Supreme Court of India questioned the policy mandating compulsory registration in CoWIN app for COVID – 19 vaccination flagging India’s digital divide.
7. The Federal Court of Australia upheld Australia’s outbound travel ban.

In the News

1. PM of Isreal, Benjamin Netanyahu seeks block on deal to oust him.
2. Israel appoints Isaac Herzog as new President.
3. Danish Parliament approves law to deport to deport asylum seekers to countries outside Europe.
4. Germany officially apologizes for Namibia genocide.
5. Canada introduces legislation to change complaints process under Judges Act.
6. The government of India introduces guidelines for care and protection of the children affected by the pandemic.
7. Prosecutors demand a 30 year prison sentence for Derek Chauvin in George Floyd Murder case.
8. Human rights and media organizations oppose Pakistan’s Media Development Authority Ordinance 2021.
9. Canada mourns as remains of 215 children found at indigenous school.
10. China’s silencing of Tiananmen tributes extends to Hong Kong.

New Scholarship

1. Charlotte Reyns, Saving Judicial Independence: A Threat to the Preliminary Ruling Mechanism, 17 European Constitutional Law Review 26 (2021) (explores the issue of structural inadmissibility of questions for preliminary ruling that arises due to the attempts to safeguard the independence of the EU judiciary.)
2. Democratic Decay: Challenges for Constitutionalism and the Rule of Law, 7 Canadian Journal of Comparative & Contemporary Law (2021) (featuring a symposium on Rosalind Dixon & David Landau’s Abusive Constitutional Borrowing and articles on the theme of democratic decay.)
3. Ittai Bar-Siman-Tov (ed.) Comparative Multidisciplinary Perspectives on Omnibus Legislation (2021) (contributes to the global debate over omnibus legislation by providing a cross – national , comparative and multi-disciplinary exploration of omnibus legislation.)
4. Shannon Reid, The Deepfake Dilemma: Reconciling Privacy and First Amendment Protections, 23 U. Pa. J. Const. L. 209  (2021) (argues for a re-evaluation of U.S. First Amendment jurisprudence and suggests that U.S. courts could recognise personality and reputation claims under the Fourteenth Amendment and balance the same with First Amendment in a better fashion.)
5. Giuliano Amato, Benedetta Barbisan, Cesare Pinelli, Rule of Law vs. Majoritarian Democracy (forthcoming 2021) (explores the tension between rule of law and majoritarian democracies based on four parameters such as the meaning of ‘people’, the phenomena impacting traditional democratic balance of powers and institutional order and the juxtaposition between non representative bodies and people’s representation.)
6. Andrew T. Kenyon, Democracy of Expression: Positive Free Speech and Law (2021) (emphasises on the positive dimensions of free speech and argues that positive enablement makes possible a democracy of expression in which society has a voice, formulates judgments, and makes effective claims of government.)  

Calls for Papers and Announcements

1. The Bonavero Institute of Human Rights, University of Oxford, Centre for Comparative and Transnational Law, Chinese University of Hong Kong and Asian Law Centre, Melbourne Law School invite submissions for a workshop on Issues in Public Law in South Asia to be held between June 10 – 12, 2022. The proposals may be submitted by July 30, 2021.
2. The Catolica Law Review welcomes submission of articles in the field of public law for its Vol VI, Issue 1 to be published in January 2022. The deadline for paper submissions is September 30, 2021.
3. The National Law University Jodhpur Law Review invites submissions for its Vol VIII Issue 1. The manuscripts may be submitted by June 15, 2021.
4. Loyola University Chicago School of Law and George Washington University Law School invite paper submissions for their Twelfth Annual Constitutional Law Colloqium to be held on November 12-13, 2021. The deadline for submission of abstracts is June 21, 2021.
5. The International Review of Human Rights invites submissions for VII issue to be published in February 2022. The last date for submission of manuscripts is September 5, 2021.
6. The Goettingen Journal of International Law invites submissions for its student essay competition on the International Law in Times of a Pandemic. The deadline for submissions is August 1, 2021.

Elsewhere Online

1. Yaniv Roznai & Matan Gutman, Saving the Constitution from Politics, Verfassungsblog.
2. Manika Zalnieriute, Procedural Fetishism and Mass Surveillance under the ECHR, Big Brother Watch v. U.K., Verfassungsblog.
3. Tanmay Singh and Abhinav Sekhri, India’s New Intermediary Guidelines, Verfassungsblog.
4. Dragoș Călin, The Court of Justice of the European Union, ultima ratio for saving the independence of the judges in Romania – a commentary of the CJEU preliminary ruling in C-83/19, C-127/19, C-195/19, C-291-19 and C-355/19 and C-397/19, AFJR and Others, Constitutionalism and Politics, EUI Blog.
5. Vasudev Devadasan, Intermediary Guidelines and the Digital Public Sphere: Balancing the Scales, Indconlawphil.
6. Pierre de Vos, No Good Legal Options: Zuma Could Be Planning An All Out Political Attack On The Judiciary, Constitutionally Speaking.
7. Paolo Sandro, Do You Really Mean It? Ouster Clauses, Judicial Review Reform, and the UK Constitutionalism Paradox, UK Constitutional Law Association Blog.