What’s New in Public Law

–Maja Sahadžić, Ph.D. Researcher (University of Antwerp)

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 Spanish Constitutional Court suspended a planned session in Catalonia’s parliament, preventing the Catalan government from making a unilateral declaration of independence.
2. The Constitutional Court of Kuwait overturned a controversial mandatory DNA collection law.
3. The Supreme Court of India set to hear pleas challenging the Finance Act provisions which changed the search and selection and removal process of members and presiding officers of tribunals including the Central Administrative Tribunal.
4. Brazil’s Supreme Court ordered the head of the Senate to reconsider proposed amendments to a bill overhauling regulation of telecommunications companies.
5. The Supreme Court of the United States refused to hear a surrogacy case where the mother-surrogate was pressured to abort triplet but refused to do so.
6. India’s Supreme Court heard arguments from the government and the two Rohingya, who have petitioned against the government’s plan to deport the persecuted refugees.

In the News

1. The Japanese prime minister seeks a new party’s support for a proposed constitutional revision.
2. The president of Sudan plans to amend the existing constitution to permit him to run for office for a third term.
3. A law amending Uganda’s constitution to allow the president to extend his rule was introduced in the parliament causing major distress among MPs.
4. Canada’s parliament approved a bill banning visas for foreign citizens of countries with human rights violations or corruption.
5. The parliament speaker announced that Sri Lanka will soon amend its parliamentary laws to fall in line with the best international practices.
6. The South African High Court in Pretoria ruled against the opposition party in a case to have the president implement remedial action recommended by the former public protector.
7. The president of the Philippines vowed to file an impeachment complaint against the head of the country’s anti-graft body after launching an inquiry into allegations about president’s undeclared funds in bank accounts.
8. The Venice Commission of the Council of Europe issued its final opinion over Georgia’s constitutional reforms reiterating its previous positive assessment.
9. The Ukrainian president signed a decree for selecting candidates for the constitutional court judges.

New Scholarship

1. Arthur Guerra Filho, The Brazilian Supreme Court’s ADI 4650 Decision: A Step Towards the End of Plutocracy?, King’s Law Journal Vol. 28 No. 2 (2017) (analyzing a landmark case of the Brazilian Supreme Court on the statutory provision that regulates corporate donations).
2. Michael Dougan (ed.), The UK after Brexit: legal and political challenges (2017) (exploring the key challenges facing the UK legal system in and through the process of Brexit).
3. Umut Özkirimli, Theories of nationalism: a critical introduction (2017) (exploring the main theoretical perspectives of nationalism with revised, updated, and new chapters in the contemporary debates on nationalism).
4. Howard Tumber and Silvio Waisbord (eds.), The Routledge companion to media and human rights (2017) (offers a comprehensive and contemporary survey of the key themes, approaches, and debates in the field of media and human rights).
5. Nicole Bürli, Third-party interventions before the European Court of Human Rights: amicus curiae, member-state and third-party interventions (2017) (offers the first comprehensive and empirical analysis of all cases of the ECHR from 1979 to 2016 to which third-party interventions by non-governmental organizations, member states and individuals were made).
6. Hans-Wolfgang Micklitz and Carla Sieburgh, Primary EU law and private law concepts (2017) (analyzing the interplay between approaches and legal concepts of private law and primary EU law, particularly internal market law).
7. Peter Bursens, Christ’l De Landtsheer, Luc Braeckmans and Barbara Segaert (eds.), Complex political decision-making: leadership, legitimacy and communication (2017) (exploring the impact of a complex environment on the legitimacy and transparency of polities, on the role of leadership and political personality, and on motivated images, rhetoric and communication).

Call for Papers and Announcements

1. Constitutional Court Review welcomes essays, articles and case comments for the Constitutional Court Review IX (2018). Submissions are accepted on a rolling basis.
2. Asian Law Institute announces a call for abstracts for the 15th ASLI Conference “Law into the Future: Perspectives from Asia” on 10-11 May 2018 in Seoul. The deadline for a submission of abstracts is 24 November 2017.
3. The Centre for the Study of International Peace and Security organizes the conference “Democracy and the Rule of Law” on 18 November 2018 in London.
4. The Legal Theory and History Research Centre of the University of Lisbon, the Faculty of Law of the University of Lisbon, the Institute of History of Law and Political Thought, and Fundação para a Ciência e a Tecnologia welcome abstracts for the international conference “Suárez in Lisbon 1617-2017” on 4-6 December 2017 in Lisbon. The deadline for a submission of abstracts is 30 October 2017.
5. The Public Law Editorial Committee invites expression of interest for joining the Committee. The deadline for submitting expressions of interest is 28 October 2017.
6. The UK House of Commons Library welcomes application for a constitutional law researcher. The deadline for submitting applications is 22 October 2017.
7. The Toronto Group for the Study of International, Transnational and Comparative Law invites submissions for the 11th annual Toronto Group Conference “Boundaries, Conflicts and Alliances: Interactions between International, Transnational and Comparative Law” on 1-2 March 2018 in Toronto. The deadline for submitting abstracts is 5 November 2017.
8. ACTORE, the Jean Monnet Centre of Excellence of the University of Antwerp, organizes the two-day workshop “Judicial Governance: the role of European and International Courts and their Interaction with other Actors” on 14-15 December 2017 in Antwerp.
9. The student chapter of the American Constitution Society at Barry University School of Law and Texas A&M University School of Law invites proposals for the Third Annual Constitutional Law Scholars Forum on 2 March 2018 in Orlando.

Elsewhere Online

1. Carlos Closa Montero, Catalan secessionism faces the European Union, Verfassungsblog.
2. Cristiano d’Orsi, The unclear relation between Angola and its Muslim citizens and migrants: Is Angola discriminating against them?, AfricLaw.
3. Sam Jones, Can Catalonia declare independence from Spain?, The Guardian.
4. Gunadasa Amarasekara, The present Constitution Is it Federal or not?, Daily Mirror.
5. Edward Webster and Karin Pampallis, Why the dream of a prosperous, united nation continues to elude South Africa, The Conversation.
6. Kylie Noble, Irish Politicians Don’t Want to Legalize Abortion-But the People Do, New Republic.
7. Bo Zhiyue, Commentary: The changing meaning of political legitimacy for the Chinese Communist Party, Channel NewsAsia.
8. Ausuman Bisiika, Oh Uganda: Where the constitution is slowly becoming unconstitutional, Daily Monitor.
9. Marcin Matczak, President Duda is Destroying the Rule of Law instead of Fixing it, Verfassungsblog.
10. By Wang Cheng-chung and Elizabeth Hsu, Changing definition of territory needs social consensus: premier, Focus Taiwan.
11. Joseph Ziritwawula, Beyond term limit and age limit: The Museveni-Besigye connection, Daily Monitor.
12. Editorials, Constitutional amendment as a campaign issue, the japan times.
13. Merris Amos, Red Herrings and Reductions: Human Rights and the EU (Withdrawal) Bill, UK Constitutional Law Association.
14. Wojciech Sadurski, Courts. A choice between Duda and cholera (in Polish), wyborcza.pl.