Sovereignty, Rights and Justice

Sovereignty, Rights and Justice
Author: Chris Brown
Publisher: Polity Press
Total Pages: 276
Release: 2002
Genre: Political Science
ISBN: 9780745623023

Sovereignty, Rights and Justice surveys the relationship between international relations theory and political theory, showing the way in which these two discourses, once considered separate, are now intertwined. In the first part of the book an historical overview of the international political theory on the ?Westphalia System' is presented, with brief accounts of the law of nations, and the notion of an ?international society' as well as an examination of the international thought of the Enlightenment and of nineteenth- century industrial society. International theory in the twentieth century is then examined, leading into a consideration of some of the key issues of late-twentieth-century international relations, including the rights of political communities; the ethics of force in international relations; human rights; humanitarian intervention; global social justice and the moral relevance of borders; cultural diversity and the ?Asian values' debate. In the final chapters, the impact of globalization on all these issues is examined. This is an accessible introduction to one of the most important areas of contemporary political theory, and one based firmly on the analysis of real-world problems.

Political Theory Today

Political Theory Today
Author: David Held
Publisher: Stanford University Press
Total Pages: 382
Release: 1991
Genre: Political Science
ISBN: 9780804718868

What is the proper subject matter of political theory? What kind of a theory is political theory? Uncertainty about the most appropriate way of answering these questions provides the key rationales for this volume: to provide a comprehensive overview of the central questions and debates in contemporary political thought and to offer guidelines for the reformation of political theory made necessary by the philosophical and substantive problems it faces today. The twelve essays in this book examine some of the classic traditional questions of political theory: the nature of obligation, equality, liberty, the public, the private, democracy, and justice. They also examine questions that relate these notions to a broader framework encompassing the many recent changes in the nation-state, forms of sovereignty, domestic and international law, violence and warfare, and domestic and international political economy. The contributors are leading scholars in political theory from the United States, Europe, and Africa: Samara Amin, Charles Beitz, Antonio Cassese, John Dunn, Jon Elster, David Held, Agnes Heller, Steven Lukes, Iain McLean, Claus Offe, Susan Moller Okin, Onora O'Neill and Ulrich K

The Sovereignty of Human Rights

The Sovereignty of Human Rights
Author: Patrick Macklem
Publisher: Oxford University Press
Total Pages: 272
Release: 2015-08-20
Genre: Law
ISBN: 019026733X

The Sovereignty of Human Rights advances a legal theory of international human rights that defines their nature and purpose in relation to the structure and operation of international law. Professor Macklem argues that the mission of international human rights law is to mitigate adverse consequences produced by the international legal deployment of sovereignty to structure global politics into an international legal order. The book contrasts this legal conception of international human rights with moral conceptions that conceive of human rights as instruments that protect universal features of what it means to be a human being. The book also takes issue with political conceptions of international human rights that focus on the function or role that human rights plays in global political discourse. It demonstrates that human rights traditionally thought to lie at the margins of international human rights law - minority rights, indigenous rights, the right of self-determination, social rights, labor rights, and the right to development - are central to the normative architecture of the field.

Sovereignty

Sovereignty
Author: Dieter Grimm
Publisher: Columbia University Press
Total Pages: 186
Release: 2015-04-21
Genre: Philosophy
ISBN: 0231539304

Dieter Grimm's accessible introduction to the concept of sovereignty ties the evolution of the idea to historical events, from the religious conflicts of sixteenth-century Europe to today's trends in globalization and transnational institutions. Grimm wonders whether recent political changes have undermined notions of national sovereignty, comparing manifestations of the concept in different parts of the world. Geared for classroom use, the study maps various notions of sovereignty in relation to the people, the nation, the state, and the federation, distinguishing between internal and external types of sovereignty. Grimm's book will appeal to political theorists and cultural-studies scholars and to readers interested in the role of charisma, power, originality, and individuality in political rule.

Sovereignty and Justice

Sovereignty and Justice
Author: Mark S. Ellis
Publisher: Cambridge Scholars Publishing
Total Pages: 325
Release: 2014-04-23
Genre: Law
ISBN: 1443859656

The drafters of the ICC’s founding document, the Rome Statute, foresaw what would become the main challenge to the Court’s legitimacy: that it could violate national sovereignty. To address this concern, the drafters added the principle of complementarity to the ICC’s jurisdiction, in that the Court’s province merely complements the exercise of jurisdiction by the domestic courts of the Statute’s member states. The ICC honours the authority of those states to conduct their own trials. However, if the principle of complementarity is to be applied, states must ensure that their own judicial systems and trials are consistent with international standards of independence and fairness. In addition, for complementarity to work, the ICC must be willing to actively support, embrace, and implement the principle. If the Court holds on too tightly to a self-aggrandising view of its role in promoting international justice, then it will lose all credibility in the eyes of nation states. Finally, the international community, in calling on states to address war crimes committed within their borders, must provide the financial, technical, and professional resources that many struggling states need in this endeavour. This book sets forth several innovative recommendations to fulfil these goals so as to make future domestic war crimes courts work more effectively.

Freedom Beyond Sovereignty

Freedom Beyond Sovereignty
Author: Sharon R. Krause
Publisher: University of Chicago Press
Total Pages: 260
Release: 2015-03-13
Genre: Philosophy
ISBN: 022623472X

What does it mean to be free? We invoke the word frequently, yet the freedom of countless Americans is compromised by social inequalities that systematically undercut what they are able to do and to become. If we are to remedy these failures of freedom, we must move beyond the common assumption, prevalent in political theory and American public life, that individual agency is best conceived as a kind of personal sovereignty, or as self-determination or control over one’s actions. In Freedom Beyond Sovereignty, Sharon R. Krause shows that individual agency is best conceived as a non-sovereign experience because our ability to act and affect the world depends on how other people interpret and respond to what we do. The intersubjective character of agency makes it vulnerable to the effects of social inequality, but it is never in a strict sense socially determined. The agency of the oppressed sometimes surprises us with its vitality. Only by understanding the deep dynamics of agency as simultaneously non-sovereign and robust can we remediate the failed freedom of those on the losing end of persistent inequalities and grasp the scope of our own responsibility for social change. Freedom Beyond Sovereignty brings the experiences of the oppressed to the center of political theory and the study of freedom. It fundamentally reconstructs liberal individualism and enables us to see human action, personal responsibility, and the meaning of liberty in a totally new light.

American Indian Sovereignty and the U.S. Supreme Court

American Indian Sovereignty and the U.S. Supreme Court
Author: David E. Wilkins
Publisher: University of Texas Press
Total Pages: 426
Release: 1997
Genre: Social Science
ISBN: 9780292791091

Himself a Lumbee Indian and political scientist, David E. Wilkins charts the "fall in our democratic faith" through fifteen landmark cases in which the Supreme Court significantly curtailed Indian rights. These case studies--and their implications for all minority groups--are important and timely in the context of American government re-examining and redefining itself.

Globalization and Sovereignty

Globalization and Sovereignty
Author: Jean L. Cohen
Publisher: Cambridge University Press
Total Pages: 455
Release: 2012-08-02
Genre: Political Science
ISBN: 1139560263

Sovereignty and the sovereign state are often seen as anachronisms; Globalization and Sovereignty challenges this view. Jean L. Cohen analyzes the new sovereignty regime emergent since the 1990s evidenced by the discourses and practice of human rights, humanitarian intervention, transformative occupation, and the UN targeted sanctions regime that blacklists alleged terrorists. Presenting a systematic theory of sovereignty and its transformation in international law and politics, Cohen argues for the continued importance of sovereign equality. She offers a theory of a dualistic world order comprised of an international society of states, and a global political community in which human rights and global governance institutions affect the law, policies, and political culture of sovereign states. She advocates the constitutionalization of these institutions, within the framework of constitutional pluralism. This book will appeal to students of international political theory and law, political scientists, sociologists, legal historians, and theorists of constitutionalism.

Justice for Some

Justice for Some
Author: Noura Erakat
Publisher: Stanford University Press
Total Pages: 405
Release: 2019-04-23
Genre: History
ISBN: 1503608832

“A brilliant and bracing analysis of the Palestine question and settler colonialism . . . a vital lens into movement lawyering on the international plane.” —Vasuki Nesiah, New York University, founding member of Third World Approaches to International Law (TWAIL) Justice in the Question of Palestine is often framed as a question of law. Yet none of the Israel-Palestinian conflict’s most vexing challenges have been resolved by judicial intervention. Occupation law has failed to stem Israel’s settlement enterprise. Laws of war have permitted killing and destruction during Israel’s military offensives in the Gaza Strip. The Oslo Accord’s two-state solution is now dead letter. Justice for Some offers a new approach to understanding the Palestinian struggle for freedom, told through the power and control of international law. Focusing on key junctures—from the Balfour Declaration in 1917 to present-day wars in Gaza—Noura Erakat shows how the strategic deployment of law has shaped current conditions. Over the past century, the law has done more to advance Israel’s interests than the Palestinians’. But, Erakat argues, this outcome was never inevitable. Law is politics, and its meaning and application depend on the political intervention of states and people alike. Within the law, change is possible. International law can serve the cause of freedom when it is mobilized in support of a political movement. Presenting the promise and risk of international law, Justice for Some calls for renewed action and attention to the Question of Palestine. “Careful and captivating . . . This book asks that the Palestinian liberation struggle and Jewish-Israeli society each reckon with the impossibility of a two-state future, reimagining what their interests are—and what they could become.” —Amanda McCaffrey, Jewish Currents