The Politics of the Globalization of Law: Getting from Rights to Justice

244 Pages·2013·1.03 MB·English

by  Alison Brysk

ROUTLEDGE ADVANCES IN INTERNATIONAL
RELATIONS AND GLOBAL POLITICS
The Politics of the Globalization
of Law
Getting from Rights to Justice
Edited by
Alison Brysk
“In the fi eld of international human rights, the lure of law entices both law-
yers and non-lawyers alike. Making rights legal promises precision, predict-
ability and enforceability, in an area crying out for all three. And there are
sound reasons to have faith in the law, for sometimes it delivers on these
promises. At other times, however, it fails to deliver, or delivers inadequately.
The essays in this timely volume spell out the positives and negatives for
human rights of relying on the law, using live case studies from around the
world, and in ways that are trenchant, practical and forward-looking.”
—David Kinley, The University of Sydney
“This exciting new volume will be of interest to scholars of international
relations and law. Taken together, the contributions from a range of inter-
disciplinary scholars offer cogent arguments for the importance of law and
norms in global governance, tempered with a healthy recognition of their
limitations.”
—Chandra Lekha Sriram, University of London, School of Oriental and
African Studies
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The Politics of the Globalization

of Law
How does the globalization of law enhance or evade the fulfi llment of international
human rights? Alison Brysk’s edited volume aims to assess the institutional and po-
litical factors that determine the infl uence of the globalization of law on the realiza-
tion of justice.
The globalization of law has the potential to move the international human rights
regime from the generation of norms to the fulfi llment of rights, through direct en-
forcement, reshaping state policy, granting access to civil society, and global gover-
nance of transnational forces. In this volume, an international and interdisciplinary
team of scholars explores the development of new norms, mechanisms, and practices
of international legal accountability for human rights abuse, and tests their power in
a series of “hard cases.” The studies fi nd that new norms and mechanisms have been
surprisingly effective globally, in terms of treaty adherence, international courts, uni-
versal jurisdiction, and the diffusion of citizenship rights—but this effect is condi-
tioned by regional and domestic structures of infl uence and access. Thus, while the
globalization of law has shaped greater rights responsiveness in hard cases in the
United States, Europe, and Latin America, law has a more mixed impact on abuses
in Mexico, Israel-Palestine, and India. Brysk concludes that the globalization of law
is transforming sovereignty and fostering the shift from norms to fulfi llment, but that
peripheral states and domains often remain beyond the reach of this transformation.
Theoretically framed, but comprising empirical case material, this edited volume
will be useful for both graduate students and academics in law, political science,
human rights, international relations, global and international studies, and law and
society.
Alison Brysk is the Mellichamp Professor of Global Governance in the Global and
International Studies Program at the University of California, Santa Barbara. She
has authored or edited eight books on international human rights. She has been
a visiting scholar in Argentina, Ecuador, France, Spain, Sweden, the Netherlands,
South Africa, and Japan, and held the Fulbright Distinguished Visiting Chair in
Global Governance at Canada’s Centre for International Governance Innovation.
In 2011, she served as the Fulbright Senior Specialist at Ravenshaw University in
Orissa, India. Her new study of communication politics and human rights cam-
paigns, Speaking Rights to Power, will be published by Oxford University Press.
Routledge Advances in International Relations and Global
Politics
For a full list of titles in this series, please visit www.routledge.com
77 New Norms and Knowledge 82 Coping and Conformity in
in World Politics World Politics
Protecting people, intellectual Hugh C. Dyer
property and the environment
Preslava Stoeva 83 Defi ning and Defying Organized
Crime
78 Power, Resistance and Confl ict Discourse, perception and
in the Contemporary World reality
Social movements, networks and Edited by Felia Allum, Francesca
hierarchies Longo, Daniela Irrera and Panos
Athina Karatzogianni and Andrew A. Kostakos
Robinson
84 Federalism in Asia
79 World-Regional Social Policy India, Pakistan and Malaysia
and Global Governance Harihar Bhattacharyya
New research and policy agendas
in Africa, Asia, Europe and Latin 85 The World Bank and HIV/AIDS
America Setting a global agenda
Edited by Bob Deacon, Maria Sophie Harman
Cristina Macovei, Luk Van
Langenhove and Nicola 86 The “War on Terror” and
Yeates the Growth of Executive Power?
A comparative analysis
80 International Relations Theory Edited by John E. Owens
and Philosophy and Riccardo Pelizzo
Interpretive dialogues
Edited by Cerwyn Moore and 87 The Contested Politics of Mobility
Chris Farrands Borderzones and irregularity
Edited by Vicki Squires
81 S uperpower Rivalry and Confl ict
The long shadow of the Cold War 88 Human Security, Law and
on the twenty-fi rst century the Prevention of Terrorism
Edited by Chandra Chari Andrej Zwitter
89 Multilayered Migration 97 Anglo-American Relations
Governance Contemporary perspectives
The promise of partnership Edited by Alan P. Dobson
Edited by Rahel Kunz, Sandra and Steve Marsh
Lavenex and Marion Panizzon
98 The Emerging Politics of
90 Role Theory in International Antarctica
Relations Edited by Anne-Marie Brady
Approaches and analyses
Edited by Sebastian Harnisch, 99 Genocide, Ethnonationalism,
Cornelia Frank and Hanns W. Maull and the United Nations
Exploring the causes of mass
91 Issue Salience in International killing since 1945
Relations Hannibal Travis
Edited by Kai Oppermann
and Henrike Viehrig 100 Caribbean Sovereignty,
Development and
92 Corporate Risk and National Democracy in an Age of
Security Redefi ned Globalization
Karen Lund Petersen Edited by Linden Lewis
93 Interrogating Democracy 101 Rethinking Foreign Policy
in World Politics Edited by Fredrik Bynander
Edited by Joe Hoover, Meera and Stefano Guzzini
Sabaratnam and Laust
Schouenborg 102 The Promise and Perils of
Transnationalization
94 Globalizing Resistance against NGO activism and the socializa-
War tion of women’s human rights in
Theories of resistance and Egypt and Iran
the new anti-war movement Benjamin Stachursky
Tiina Seppälä
103 Peacebuilding and
95 The Politics of International Administration
Self-determination The cases of Bosnia and
Beyond the decolonisation process Herzegovina and Kosovo
Kristina Roepstorff Niels van Willigen
96 Sovereignty and the 104 The Politics of the
Responsibility to Protect Globalization of Law
The power of norms and Getting from rights to
the norms of the powerful justice
Theresa Reinold Edited by Alison Brysk
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The Politics of the
Globalization of Law
Getting from Rights to Justice
Edited by Alison Brysk
First published 2013
by Routledge
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Simultaneously published in the UK
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© 2013 Taylor & Francis
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and of the authors for their individual chapters, has been asserted in
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without intent to infringe.
Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data
The politics of the globalization of law : getting from rights to justice / edited
by Alison Brysk.
pages cm.
1. International law and human rights. 2. Law and globalization.
I. Brysk, Alison, 1960– editor of compilation.
KZ1266.P65 2013
341—dc23
2012044979
ISBN: 978-0-415-81488-1 (hbk)
ISBN: 978-0-203-06668-3 (ebk)
Typeset in Sabon
by Apex CoVantage, LLC
Contents
List of Figures and Tables xi
Acknowledgments xiii
Contributors xv
1 The Politics of the Globalization of Law 1
ALISON BRYSK AND ARTURO JIMENEZ-BACARDI
PART I
The Globalization of Law and Human Rights
2 Treaties, Constitutions, and Courts: The Critical
Combination 29
WAYNE SANDHOLTZ
3 The International Criminal Court: Globalizing Peace
or Justice? 47
CHARLES ANTHONY SMITH, AND ANTONIO GONZALEZ
4 Global Diffusion and the Role of Courts in Shaping
the Human Right to Vote 63
LUDVIG BECKMAN
5 From Pirates to Pinochet: Universal Jurisdiction for Torture 83
MARK BERLIN
6 Courts, Advocacy Groups, and Human Rights in Europe 107
RACHEL A. CICHOWSKI