Suchergebnisse

The African Court of Human and Peoples' Rights (ACtHPR) made history on August 27, 2018. The majority of its judges were female—six of 11, and the first among international courts and tribunals (ICs) to secure sex parity—that is, numerical equality.1 This achievement is even more remarkable given that only 23% of the judges and arbitrators of the ICs are women.2 The milestone also prompts us to consider more closely what considerations of legitimacy entail about the proportion of women international judges. The present composition of ICs is clearly under legal, social, and political control, and ICs have profound effects. The persistent underrepresentation of women is especially striking since not only civil society groups, but also the states who nominate and establish election procedures have agreed several treaties that require or urge a balance of gender representation.3 So it would seem that the parity achieved by the ACtHPR should be applauded. However, that IC may now be even more gender equal than we may have reason to require of a legitimate IC—or so this article argues. A less egalitarian composition within a "parity zone" of approximately 40% of either of the main sexes seems to suffice. The present reflections considers various possible arguments offered concerning the impact of gender inequality on the international bench, drawing in part on studies of domestic judiciaries, as well as on available research and reflections by practitioners and women international judges.4 Several arguments support calls to increase the proportion of female international judges—but how far? Section 2 addresses some background issues: first concerning the terms "feminism," "sex," and "gender," then, the tasks of ICs that should lead us to question the present sex inequality on the international bench.

Abstract Critics challenge international courts for their interference with domestic democratic processes and alleged violations of rule of law standards: they claim that these guardians of the rule of law are not well guarded themselves. These concerns should not be dismissed too quickly as mere disgruntled venting by populist politicians. This article focuses on regional human rights courts and argues that the same interests and values that justify rule of law standards of impartiality, independence and accountability domestically also justify similar standards for international courts. Focusing on the European Court of Human Rights and its doctrine of the margin of appreciation, the article demonstrates how this doctrine may contribute to fulfilling the rule of law but at the same time may also endanger it. This requires changes to the doctrine to ensure that the core rule of law standards of predictability and protection against arbitrary discretion are respected.

What does justice require concerning socio-economic distribution among citizens of the European Union? The EU should reduce cross-national economic inequalities among inhabitants of different member states, but full economic distributive equality or a European 'Difference Principle,' may not be required. Individuals' claim to more political influence over matters controlled by their own state in the quasi-federal EU may permit some economic inequality. Section 1 orients this contribution relative to arguments for a European universal income. Section 2 provides relevant features of the EU. Section 3 considers contractualist arguments against certain forms of economic inequality, while section 4 identifies a further argument in favour of equal shares of benefits of social cooperation, based on an interpretation of 'social primary goods' consistent with Rawls' theory. Section 5 argues that these reasons for economic distributive equality must be weighed against more political influence over matters controlled by the individual's sub-unit.

States are free, yet everywhere live under international courts and tribunals (ICs). As they proliferate and gain power across ever more domains, ICs become targets of resistance and criticism that they are illegitimate authorities. What reasons might a state have to defer to an IC's judgment or interpretation, even when the state regards it as mistaken, and even when it conflicts with the interests and objectives of government? Section I sketches the multiple tasks of ICs, in complex interdependence with other actors. Their core task is to adjudicate disputes through interpretation and application of international law by legal methods. This may also contribute indirectly to a range of further tasks. Section II addresses some aspects of the relation between normative legitimacy of ICs and descriptive legitimacy - actors' beliefs therein. Section III shows how a wide range of legitimacy challenges concern ways ICs fail to carry out their tasks. This account does not seek to provide substantive arguments or seek to show that all such criticisms are correct. The aims are rather to make many such criticisms comprehensible as legitimacy concerns, to provide a rationale for popular taxonomies of legitimacy criticisms, and to indicate which premises and arguments are required for such criticisms to be sound.