Suchergebnisse

Set against previous stages of minority protection under international law, this book discusses the role of courts and court-like bodies particularly in the Americas, Africa and Europe in articulating and accommodating the interests and needs of ethno-cultural minority groups as part of the human rights discourse. Conceptually, it exposes different moments of intervention by such bodies involving the recognition of group existence or identity, the adjustment of human rights norms to accommodate the groups perspectives, the establishment of processes designed to address the complexities resulting from competing claims, and the expansion of procedural avenues within litigation. The result is a fresh comparative practical and theoretical perspective on international jurisprudence as an emerging distinctive component in the complex history of the field.

Large sectors of the Kurdish movement in Turkey have progressively come to discuss, develop and/or endorse models of so-called "democratic autonomy". While there are several works in the field detailing and critiquing Turkey's policies vis-à-vis the Kurds, the international legal dimension of the Kurdish democratic autonomy proposal in its own right has received far less attention to date. The present article seeks to fill this gap by reflecting upon the internal coherence and consistency of the democratic autonomy argument in light of international law standards and practice, with particular reference to internal self-determination in Turkey. I argue that any future settlement of the Kurdish question will require not only Turkey's compliance with its own human rights obligations, but also the Kurdish movement's ability to negotiate the accommodation of its aspirations in ways that are consistent with international human rights law.

The identity of groups of an ethno-cultural variety has long fallen within the remit of internati­onal human rights law. In this context, discussions have been largely concerned with the legal status of groups and/or the nature of the legal right(s) in question. While acknowledging the importance of these dimensions, in this article I seek to provide an alternative account by dis­cussing the continuities and discontinuities in articulating the very concept of group identity. I first examine the potential, limitations and eventual hybridity of human rights practice across the spectrum of minority/indigenous identities. Then, I critique a range of instabilities in human rights discourse relating to the idea of group identities, their personal scope and the role of international law. I argue that such instabilities do not merely mirror the ambivalent outlook of the relationship between human rights and group identities; they raise the broader question of whether there is a relatively more coherent way to capture the legitimacy of group claims. I conclude by pointing to the outer limits of identity claims, the understated interplay of sove­reignty and inter-group diversity, and the need to unpack the reasons why certain groups merit protection in the way they do.