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In the almost twenty-five years after the violence that destroyed much of the country’s physical, institutional and social infrastructure, the government of Rwanda has made national unity and reconciliation a priority. Much has been written about its reconciliation policies and their effects. In this literature, Batwa are frequently presented as ‘forgotten’ or ‘invisible’, and are portrayed as the victims of a government that does not care for them and of neighbours who despise them. Drawing on qualitative research with Twa, their non-Twa neighbours, government actors, and NGO workers conducted between 2015 and 2017, this paper seeks to build on earlier studies and suggests that the policies of national unity and reconciliation are having a major impact on how Twa construct their identity within post-genocidal Rwanda., Paper presented at the meeting of the Section of Human Sciences held on 21 November 2017. Text received on 13 March 2018 and submitted to peer review. Final version, approved by the reviewers, received on 14 January 2019.

Summary – C.E. Lewis – ‘Public International Law and the Pursuit of Universality’ Despite a myriad of contributions from within the discipline of public international law that have sought to reveal how the concept of the universal can and arguably has been employed for imperialistic ends, there remain norms, such as international human rights norms, which are still defended as embodying universal values. In fact, such claims form part of a persistent and seemingly irresolvable doctrinal debate over the universality of international law, the resolution of which carries both practical and theoretical implications for our understanding of the discipline as a whole. This thesis argues that the doctrinal stalemate over the universality of international law can be reconciled, however, by addressing the conceptual confusion that surrounds several key concepts that lie at its core. Specifically, it argues that public international lawyers have a lot to gain from exploring what philosophers and sociologists have uncovered in respect to both the concept of the universal and values, and offers a defense for the pursuit of universality that can stand up to the critique of imperialism. To do so, the thesis takes an alternative, interdisciplinary approach to the existing literature, applying the results gained from philosophical analyses of core concepts at the heart of the doctrinal debate, to the realm of international law. Its primary focus, in this respect, is the Universal Declaration of Human Rights (UDHR), an international legal document that openly claims universality, and which is identified as the ideal specimen for applying the results of the thesis’ conceptual analyses. Its conclusions nevertheless apply beyond the international human rights regime, and aim to provide a solid basis for testing the universality of any norm of international law. The thesis reveals how philosophers subscribe to one strict sense of the universal, which ought not to be confused with either the uniform or the common. And by exploring the context and contingencies surrounding the drafting of the UDHR, shows that one cannot defend the universality of the norms held therein, at least not in a monological sense. Yet, by turning to Jürgen Habermas’ universal pragmatics and dialogical reformulation of Immanuel Kant’s categorical imperative, the thesis argues that Article 1 of the UDHR does embody the practical normative content of the universal, which all must accept on pain of performative contradiction. It does not, however, support the claim that Article 1 of the UDHR therefore grounds the universality of the rest of the norms of the Declaration, nor international human rights in general. Nor does the thesis support a claim that the UDHR embodies universal values. Yet, contrary to what critics from within the doctrine of international law and philosophy have argued, the thesis contends that this is not due to values being akin to irreconcilable preferences. Rather, by enquiring into sociology and the works of Hans Joas, the thesis reveals how value commitments not only bind their addressees, much like norms, but that a synthesis can be reached between cultures with competing value commitments, as demonstrated through Joas’ interpretation of the process of value generalisation. Thus, whilst a further analysis of the UDHR shows that it cannot be considered a successful product of such value generalisation, nor a document of values, it is nevertheless maintained that value talk need not be avoided altogether within international law. The thesis concludes by defending the argument that much like how Article 1 UDHR operates as the touchstone for international human rights – a goal to aim for, even if it may never be truly achieved in practice – so too can it be defended as the regulative ideal for international law in general. Thus, the pursuit of universality in the context of international law ought not to be abandoned, for it is in light of this pursuit, and the open recognition of its perpetuity, that one may demand the improvement of the international legal order.

My response to this year’s Montesquieu lecture focuses on Professor Kennedy’s invitation to imagine the liberal institutional order as having been a dream-like experience, from which international elites have abruptly awoken. Yet, I engage that invitation by altering the framing somewhat. Perhaps the experience that was the liberal institutional order was a kind of theatre as opposed to merely a dreamscape. The ‘deliberate’ enactment of a geopolitical and geo-eco-nomic imaginary,1 but where liberal actors forgot over time that this ruling imaginary required a convincing public performance.2 Using my frame, the ensuing decay or collapse of the imaginary then invites a different kind of cautionary tale, where the scene of awakening is a prologue. The actual plot involves a settling of economic, political and legal debts incurred by liberal elites to sustain an imaginary that now confronts declining domestic and international purchase.

Within the legal framework of the EU, the Member States have remained competent to regulate who qualifies as a national. As nationals of a Member State are simultaneously EU citizens and enjoy the right to intra-EU mobility, it is the Member States who, through their Nationality Laws, determine who is to be classed as an EU citizen and who enjoys the right to intra-EU mobility. This article explores whether Member State competence to regulate nationality matters has been affected by the introduction of EU citizenship and/or developments in intra-EU mobility rights, the contents of which are determined primarily by the EU.

Nationality is the legal bond between a person and a state that connotes full and equal membership of the political community. Yet, in the practice of states, not everyone who is admitted as a national enjoys the full package of rights attached, nor the same security of status. The phenomenon of inequality among citizens is particularly apparent when examining the question of how protected the legal bond itself is: citizenship by birth is more secure than citizenship acquired otherwise—such as by naturalisation—and mono citizens are less prone to withdrawal of nationality than persons with dual or multiple nationality. As nationality revocation gains new attention from states as a tool to counter terrorism, prompting much political, public and academic debate, the reality that this measure often applies only to particular sub-groups of citizens demands closer scrutiny. This article explores how law and practice on citizenship deprivation is to be evaluated against contemporary standards of international law. While states justify unequal application of citizenship deprivation measures by invoking the duty to avoid statelessness, this article shows that the application of other international standards such as non-discrimination and the prohibition of arbitrary deprivation of nationality calls into question the legitimacy of citizenship stripping as a security instrument. Finally, the article reflects on the broader implications of the current trend towards greater inequality of citizenship status as a reaction to the perceived threat that terrorism poses to the integrity of the state, discussing how the creation of different classes of citizen is in fact likely to have a deeper and more lasting impact on the foundations of liberal democracies.

This article explores the implications of unprecedented commitments by leading international sports organizations to include human rights principles into their bidding requirements and hosting agreements. In May 2017, UEFA communicated their updated requirements for the 2024 tournament, which now explicitly refer to human rights protection. Four months later, the 2024 and 2028 Summer Olympic Games have been awarded to Paris and Los Angeles, for which the IOC drafted host city contracts that for the first time in thehistory of Olympic Games include human rights clauses. In November 2017, FIFA announced the adoption of new bidding requirements for the 2026 tournament, which expressly mention the protection of human rights. The aim of this article is to examine if and how such provisions and requirements could improve access to remedy for victims of human rights violations that occurred in the course of delivering mega-sporting events. In pursuing this aim, this article sheds light on the scope and enforceability of these measures and looks into the extent to which the Court of Arbitration for Sport is equipped to deal with human rights matters.

This paper examines the role of the Protocol on Environmental Protection to the Antarctic Treaty in relation to marine spatial protection, with a focus on the designation of marine or partially marine areas as Antarctic Specially Protected or Managed Areas (ASPAs and ASMAs). For an improved understanding of this ASPA and ASMA practice, the competence arrangements between the Antarctic Treaty Consultative Meeting (ATCM) and the Commission on the Conservation of Antarctic Marine Living Resources (CCAMLR) are also examined. Five categories of ASPAs and ASMAs are identified according to their location and values relative to marine environments and ecosystems. A series of maps illustrate the outcomes of this inventory. The analysis and maps show that the use of ASPAs and ASMAs in marine or partially marine areas has been limited, although such protection is clearly within the mandate and competence of the Antarctic Treaty Consultative Parties. In part to explain these outcomes, the paper examines some recent ATCM discussions on marine protection issues. It is concluded that stronger spatial marine protection through ASPAs and ASMAs, as well as a strengthened integrated protection of the marine environment, requires stronger collaboration between the ATCM and CCAMLR, as well as mutual respect between these bodies.

This introduction to the special issue part of this issue of The Polar Journal takes the great success of the adoption of the Protocol on Environmental Protection to the Antarctic Treaty in 1991 as a starting point. Next, it discusses some criticism in the literature regarding the progress that has been made to implement the Protocol and the adoption of additional measures to ensure a comprehensive protection of the Antarctic environment since the entry into force of the Protocol in 1998. It appears that the Antarctic Treaty Consultative Meeting (ATCM) suffers from ‘the Success Syndrome’, a syndrome well known to very successful artists and companies: a great success leads to high expectations which the artist or company subsequently struggles to meet. Indeed, while the ATCM has had additional smaller successes since 1998, from various perspectives the Consultative Parties have not been able to meet the high expectations set by the Protocol’s aims and provisions. Based on the articles in this special issue, some of the setbacks are identified. Whether the ATCM will be able to address the Success Syndrome in the years to come is uncertain, but it may prove to be necessary to take some unusual steps to get back on the ‘path of success’.

This article assesses current and proposed EU climate and environmental law and the legal instruments associated to the common agricultural policy to see whether soil carbon sequestration as a promising example of ‘climate smart agriculture’ is sufficiently promoted. The assessment shows that current and proposed policies and instruments are inadequate to stimulate large scale adoption of soil carbon projects across Europe. Given the structural flaws that were found, it is likely that this is true for all climate smart agricultural practices. An alternative approach needs to be developed. Under EU climate policy, agriculture should be included in the EU ETS through allowing regulated industries to buy offsets from the agricultural sector, following the examples set by Australia and others. Lessons learned from these experiences abroad will be helpful when drafting new EU rules and regulations aimed at setting up a reliable and robust regulatory offsets system under the EU ETS. The second element of a new approach is aimed at the CAP. The CAP, generally, needs to be much more focused on the specific requirements of climate change mitigation and adaptation. Such stronger focus does not take away the need to open up a new income stream for farmers from offsets under the ETS, as the CAP will never have sufficient funds for the deep and full transition of Europe’s agriculture sector that is needed.

Much evidence demonstrates the adverse effects of lead ammunition on wildlife, their habitats and human health, and confirms that the use of such ammunition has no place within sustainable hunting. We identify the provisions that define sustainable hunting according to European law and international treaties, together with their guidance documents. We accept the substantial evidence for lead’s actual and potential effects on wildlife, habitats and health as persuasive and assess how these effects relate to stated provisions for sustainability and hunting. We evaluate how continued use of lead ammunition negatively affects international efforts to halt loss of biodiversity, sustain wildlife populations and conserve their habitats. We highlight the indiscriminate and avoidable health and welfare impacts for large numbers of exposed wild animals as ethically unsustainable. In societal terms, continued use of lead ammunition undermines public perceptions of hunting. Given the existence of acceptable, non-toxic alternatives for lead ammunition, we conclude that hunting with lead ammunition cannot be justified under established principles of public/international policy and is not sustainable. Changing from lead ammunition to non-toxic alternatives will bring significant nature conservation and human health gains, and from the hunter’s perspective will enhance societal acceptance of hunting. Change will create opportunities for improved constructive dialogue between hunting stakeholders and others engaged with enhancing biodiversity and nature conservation objectives. ELECTRONIC SUPPLEMENTARY MATERIAL: The online version of this article (10.1007/s13280-018-1042-y) contains supplementary material, which is available to authorized users.

Historically, states have found it useful to regulate their relationship over their shared water resources via treaties. While treaties provide some element of predictability and certainty with regard to the future supplies of water to the riparian states, they also need to incorporate mechanisms that allow flexibility to respond to changes in the quantity of water available for allocation amongst the parties. This requirement is especially relevant when global climate change is causing freshwater resources to shrink. The legal regime of the Guadiana, as an example of a modern legal regime of a transboundary river, includes some provisions that permit the riparian states to accommodate the variability of the Guadiana's streamflow in response to climate change within the water allocation arrangements. The lessons learned from these provisions, which include periodical update of the historical mean precipitation values, updating the flow regime of the rivers and cancelling minimum flow requirements under special circumstances, may contribute to climate-proofing international transboundary agreements within the catchments where climate-change induced water scarcity poses a major threat.

This review article assesses the relevance of international wildlife treaties for the conservation and sustainable use of the world’s five species of rhinoceros – white rhino (Ceratotherium simum), black rhino (Diceros bicornis), Indian rhino (Rhinoceros unicornis), Javan rhino (Rhinoceros sondaicus) and Sumatran rhino (Dicerorhinus sumatrensis). The analysis covers global treaties like the Convention on International Trade in Endangered Species (CITES), the World Heritage Convention and the Ramsar Wetlands Convention, alongside various regional African treaties. Employing standard legal research methodology combined with relevant knowledge from the natural and social sciences, the focus of the review is both on past performance and future potential of the treaties involved. The outcomes of the analysis suggest that, despite pervasive compliance deficiencies which continue to curtail the effectiveness of the various treaties, the prospects of various rhinoceros populations may well have been (even) worse without some of these treaties. The comparative importance of the World Heritage Convention for the conservation of the three Asian rhino species is an example. The main threat to rhinoceroses – poaching driven by a demand for rhino horn in various Asian countries – is international in nature, and a substantial part of the analysis centers on the international community’s efforts to address this threat over the past four decades within the framework of CITES. A key recommendation flowing from this analysis is for CITES parties to seriously but critically explore alternatives to the current trade ban regime, including the option of a strictly controlled legal trade in rhino horn sourced from viable, sustainably managed populations.

Efficient use of transboundary rivers under climate change requires periodic adaptation of their governing regime to the hydrological realities of the basin. Applying a short-term time horizon to an agreement on water allocation can make it easier for the riparian states to update the terms of their cooperation periodically, and thus, adapt them to changes in water availability resulting from climate change. However, agreements with a pre-agreed termination date can only increase the efficiency of water use if they lead to a stable cooperation. In this paper, I analyze how riparian states’ previous knowledge of the termination date of a water allocation agreement affects the agreement’s stability. The results show that when riparian states are aware of the agreement’s termination date, there is a higher chance for them to free-ride. However, certain cases may occur in which previous knowledge of the agreement’s termination date can contribute to the stability of an agreement by enforcing compliance.

The article examines the implementation of the UN Guiding Principles on Business and Human Rights (UNGPs) in the European Union via National Action Plans (NAPs). We argue that some of the shortcomings currently observed in the implementation process could effectively be addressed through the Open Method of Coordination (OMC) – a governance instrument already used by the European Union (EU) in other policy domains. The article sketches out the polycentric global governance approach envisaged by the UNGPs and discusses the institutional and policy background of their implementation in the EU. It provides an assessment of EU member states’ NAPs on business and human rights, as benchmarked against international NAP guidance, before relating experiences with the existing NAP process to the policy background and rationale of the OMC and considering the conditions for employing the OMC in the business and human rights domain. Building on a recent opinion of the EU Fundamental Rights Agency, the article concludes with a concrete proposal for developing an OMC on business and human rights in the EU.

This paper examines how the distribution of social goods within a political community relates to decisions on membership boundaries. The author challenges two renowned accounts of such a relation: firstly, Walzer’s account according to which decisions on membership boundaries necessarily precede decisions on distribution; secondly, Benhabib’s account, according to which membership boundaries can be called into question on the basis of universalist claims. Departing from both accounts, the author concludes that actual changes in the pool of participants in practices of creation and exchange of social goods pressure a political community to redefine its distributive patterns and, accordingly, the boundaries of its formal political membership. This claim will be supported by the analysis of threshold cases decided by the EU Court of Justice, in which EU citizenship is invoked with the atypical purpose of granting rights to a specific group of non-formal members. The reason for extending the protection provided by EU citizenship to these non-formal members is that they are already deeply embedded in practices of creation and exchange of social goods that concur to realise the distributive plan to which the EU is committed.

Traditionally, parents determine their children’s right to reside in a host-State. This means that a child’s right to remain in a host-State is intrinsically linked to the presence of those parents in their host-State. This changed for the eu Member States with the Court of Justice’s ruling in the Baumbast case and was extended in that Court’s Chen ruling. In these cases the Court of Justice, as a first step, acknowledged children as independent bearers of residence rights. To ensure the effectiveness of this right to remain, the Court of Justice, as a second step, reasoned that a third-country national parent also enjoys a right to remain in that Member State if that parent is their primary carer. These rulings play a crucial role in the Court of Justice’s recent decision in the na case. Although Article 13(2) of the Citizens Directive provides for a right to remain as a victim of domestic violence, it is not in this capacity but rather her capacity of the primary carer of two young eu-citizens that ensures her a right to remain in her host-Member State after the departure of her eu-citizen spouse. This contribution seeks an alternative reading of Article 13(2)(c) of the Citizens Directive to that offered by the Court of Justice in the na case. Arguments are found in that Directive’s objectives, drafting history and effectiveness; benchmarks normally used by the Court of Justice in its case law when clarifying the scope of eu free movement rights, as well as that Court’s case law on the declaratory nature of those rights.

One of the world's most successful climate litigation cases thus far, the remarkable Urgenda ruling by a Dutch Court in 2015, survived appeal. In October 2018, the Court of Appeal of The Hague rejected all of the State's objections, including that on the alleged infringement of the balance of powers principle. The court confirmed that, when so asked by individuals or nongovernmental organizations, courts are obliged to assess government actions (including policies) against human rights obligations. By setting the required outcome of policies (at least 25 percent emissions reduction by the end of 2020), the court left it up to the Dutch Government and Parliament to discuss which policy interventions to adopt to achieve this outcome. The Court of Appeal also confirmed, and sometimes even put greater emphasis on, a number of important elements of the Urgenda ruling, such as the role of the precautionary principle, the issue of causality (including the ‘drop in the ocean’ argument put forward by the State) and the potential role of climate engineering.

The land sector is essential to achieve the Paris Agreement’s goals. Agriculture and land use contribute between 20 and 25 per cent of global greenhouse gas emissions. The Paris Agreement’s aim to keep the average global temperature rise between 1.5 and 2 degrees Celsius implies that drastic emission cuts from agriculture are needed. The sequestration potential of agriculture and land use offers an important mechanism to achieve a transition to net-zero carbon emissions worldwide. So far, however, states have been reluctant to address emissions from, and sequestration by, the agricultural sector. Some states that have or are setting up a domestic emission-trading scheme allow for the generation of offsets in agriculture, but only to a limited extent. Australia is the only country that has a rather broad set of methodologies in place to award credits to farmers for all kinds of carbon-farming projects. This article reviews the experience with the Australian model so far, with the objective of articulating transferable lessons for regulatory design aimed at reducing greenhouse gas emissions from agriculture. It finds that it is possible to regulate for the reduction of emissions from agriculture and for increased sequestration in agricultural soils and in vegetation on agricultural lands, provided that certain conditions are met. Regulation must focus on individual projects at farms, based on a long-term policy that has a wider focus than just emission reduction. Such projects must comply with climate-smart methodologies that ensure the delivery of real, additional, measurable, and verifiable emission reductions and also foster long-term innovation and create economic, social, and environmental co-benefits. Moreover, a robust and reliable mrv system must be put in place.

In Norway, as in many other countries, a government-sponsored campaign against large carnivores was waged well into the twentieth century and eventually led to the disappearance of gray wolves (Canis lupus) from the country.1 By the 1960s, the species was considered functionally extinct both in Norway and neighboring Sweden. In 1971, wolves received legal protection under Norwegian law.2 Occasionally in subsequent years,wolves dispersing fromthe Russian-Finnish population made it into the Scandinavian Peninsula. In 1983, in the south-central Swedish–Norwegian border area, two of these immigrants produced a first litter of wild Scandinavian wolf pups again. The Scandinavian wolf population has been growing since and numbers over 400 individuals today, although only a small part of the population lives on the Norwegian side of the border. The threats faced by Scandinavian wolves include inbreeding, low levels of tolerance by some sectors of the rural public, and high levels of poaching.3 Since the official status of wolves in Norway switched from vermin to a protected species, wolf conservation and management has been an increasingly contested topic in the country, with the controversy generally peaking every time the Norwegian government authorizes a winter wolf hunt.4 Whereas some Norwegian citizens would like to seemanymore wolves in the country than the currently estimated 65– 68 animals (plus another 25wolves or sowhose range straddles the Sweden–Norway border), others would rather see them all disappear once more.5 The latest chapter in the Norwegian wolf saga began in summer 2016 when Parliament agreed on a new wolf policy. In the follow-up implementation of this national policy, the relevant RegionalManagement Authorities earmarked a total of 47 wolves—two-thirds of the national population— for culling in order to reduce sheep depredation, only to see the Climate and Environment Minister reverse this decision and reduce the number of wolves to be killed to 15.6 One international treaty has been an influential feature in debates on Norway’s wolf policy during the past three decades: the Council of Europe’s 1979 Bern Convention on the Conservation of European Wildlife and Natural Habitats.7 The discourse has, unfortunately, been affected by some tenacious misunderstandings concerning the compatibility of Norway’s constantly evolving wolf policy with the Convention. Our aim in this article is to reduce the confusion in this regard, in order to promote a constructive and well-informed debate regarding the future of wolf conservation and management in Norway. An added advantage of this focus is that it entails the legal analysis of certain features of the Bern Convention, the relevance of which extends far beyondNorwegian wolves, as they apply to European wildlife conservation at large.

Fences, walls and other barriers are proliferating along international borders on a global scale. These border fences not only affect people, but can also have unintended but important consequences for wildlife, inter alia by curtailing migrations and other movements, by fragmenting populations and by causing direct mortality, for instance through entanglement. Large carnivores and large herbivores are especially vulnerable to these impacts. This article analyses the various impacts of border fences on wildlife around the world from a law and policy perspective, focusing on international wildlife law in particular. Relevant provisions from a range of global and regional legal instruments are identified and analysed, with special attention for the Bonn Convention on Migratory Species and the European Union Habitats Directive.

The EU Habitats Directive is a key biodiversity conservation instrument. It contains legal obligations for the 28 EU member states in order to safeguard a ‘favourable conservation status’ (FCS) for selected species and habitat types. The crucial FCS concept itself, however, remains subject to considerable confusion regarding its proper interpretation and operationalization, impairing the Directive’s effective implementation. Diminishing this confusion is the purpose of this review. It focuses specifically on large carnivores—wolf (Canis lupus), brown bear (Ursus arctos), Eurasian lynx (Lynx lynx) and wolverine (Gulo gulo). These pose particular challenges, given their low densities, transboundary populations, and human-wildlife conflict potential. Large carnivores are also the only species for which specific guidance has been adopted by the European Commission— and subsequently contested. Our methodology combines legal analysis with an understanding of the species’ ecology and associated social, economic and cultural dimensions. We analyze the methods and processes through which EU law is interpreted, implemented, and enforced, by member states, European Commission, and EU Court of Justice—which is the ultimate authority regarding EU law interpretation. On that basis, we engage three particularly complex interpretation questions which are also of great practical significance: (1) the appropriate scale to achieve FCS (national or transboundary population level); (2) the respective roles of demographic, genetic and ecological factors in determining FCS; and (3) the use of extinction versus carrying capacity as benchmark. Regarding these questions, we identify approaches that are workable and effective, as well as likely to be endorsed by the EU Court.

The lecture ‘The Spirit of Laws is not Universal: Alternatives to the Enforcement Paradigm for Human Rights’ by Professor Abdullahi An-Na’Im goes to the heart of the human rights predicament. An-Na’Im offers a profound critique of the inadequacy of the current treaty-based state-centric enforcement paradigm and suggest a people-centered alternative, to human rights protection. The alternative proposed remains rather indistinct and raises several questions addressed in this commentary. Human rights enforcement is a much more complex interplay of transnational legal processes than portrayed. It is argued that international human rights law is gradually evolving towards a more complex, multifarious landscape than that of the established, one-dimensional state-centered paradigm. Moreover, agreeing with the need for a paradigm shift away from the state as the conventional duty-bearer it is suggested that this should go beyond political power to include economic power.

De recente rechtspraak van het Hof van Justitie over de voorwaarde in richtlijn 2004/38/EG om over voldoende bestaansmiddelen te beschikken om in een gast-lidstaat te verblijven heeft de nodige stof doen opwaaien. In deze bijdrage wordt stilgestaan bij de vraag wat de gevolgen zijn van de vaststelling door het Hof dat die richtlijn zelf rekening houdt met de verschillende factoren die de positie van de aanvrager kenmerken voor de belangenafweging die altijd centraal heeft gestaan in het recht op vrij verkeer van personen.

Through their annual movements in search of favorable locations to feed, breed, and raise their young, migratory birds connect ecosystems and countries that are sometimes thousands of kilometers ap...

Climate change has a profound impact on agriculture and on food security. At the same time agriculture contributes to climate change to a considerable extent. Fortunately there is also much to gain since the agricultural sector holds significant climate change mitigation potential through reductions of greenhouse gas emissions and enhancement of sequestration. A policy aimed at achieving greenhouse gas emission reductions, adaptation to climate change and an increase in productivity is, therefore, very much needed. “Climate smart agriculture” policies are being proposed, but so far remain underdeveloped. This article reviews whether the 2015 Paris Climate Agreement pushes towards the development of such policies. It finds that, unfortunately, the Paris Climate Agreement does not provide a powerful stimulus to adopt and implement climate smart agriculture policies. The Paris Climate Agreement does not change the troublesome relationship between agriculture policies and climate policies that we have already witnessed under the UNFCCC and the Kyoto Protocol. There is some attention for adaptation to climate change in rural areas in developing countries, but progress is painfully slow. For the developed countries, the UNFCCC does not make much of a contribution to addressing climate change and food security issues. This is a pity, as the developed country agriculture sector will play an important role in addressing the increasing global demand for food. Developed countries, including important players such as the EU, should, therefore, not wait for the UNFCCC process. The EU recently announced its intention to implement an ambitious policy aimed at climate friendly and resilient food production, while optimising the agricultural sector's contribution to greenhouse gas mitigation and sequestration. It is of vital importance that this example is followed and implemented across the globe. Hopefully such initiatives will then be picked up by the international community under the UNFCCC process.

This paper reports on an online contrastive vignette study investigating the public's views of gene editing for therapy and enhancement in adult and prenatal contexts. The study, comprising quota samples of 1000 respondents per country, involved 10 European countries and the United States. Vignettes featuring gene editing for therapy compared to enhancement are seen as more morally acceptable and gain more support. Adult therapy attracts majority support, while prenatal enhancement elicits almost complete rejection. The assessment of adult enhancement and prenatal therapy are more ambivalent. These results and the respondents’ accounts of the reasons behind the decision point to a focus on the uses of gene editing, rather than the technology itself. The study is a contribution to understanding the practical dimensions of the ethical question: how can gene editing contribute to human flourishing?

PhD (Law and Development), North-West University, Potchefstroom Campus Cities have long been the pioneers of and driving force behind the development and evolution of human societies. The significance of cities as drivers of the sustainable development agenda received its strongest recognition to date with the adoption of, amongst others, the UN 2030 Agenda for Sustainable Development in 2015, and the UN Habitat III Declaration (the New Urban Agenda) in 2016. These international policy instruments frame the context in terms of which urban sustainability, or sustainable cities, must be pursued across the globe. Of the many fields of law that are applicable to cities, several scholars and research groups increasingly maintain that planning law and policy has a specific role to play in addressing the challenges that cities face, and in guiding them towards a more sustainable development trajectory. Notably, South Africa’s planning law system has recently been transformed by a new planning law framework. In contrast with the pre-1994 legislation, the country’s new framework legislation for planning prioritises the transformation of South Africa’s cities into more efficient, equal, resilient and sustainable spaces. It also places municipalities at the heart of urban planning and enables them to develop and implement a number of governance instruments that can be used to integrate social, economic, and environmental factors into the development and reshaping of the country’s urban areas. While much research pertaining to South Africa’s apartheid planning history and its shaping of human settlements and cities has been disseminated over the years, significant research and enquiry remains necessary to better comprehend and apply the country’s new planning system. This is particularly true in the context of municipal planning and rapid urbanisation, and the extent of local government’s legal responsibilities and authority for planning to promote sustainability in their areas of jurisdiction. The original contribution of this thesis lies in its use of a mixed methodology of performing the necessary research. The approach consists of employing both legal research methodology and qualitative empirical research methodology towards analysing the municipal planning function, both in theory and in practice. The research also provides a detailed inquiry into the understanding of the sustainable city concept, and the scope of local government’s responsibility to promote sustainability through planning. For this purpose, the research critically questions and analyses the extent to which municipal planning law and policy promotes the development of sustainable cities in South Africa. The Gauteng province is employed as the subject of a case study to illustrate the role and function of municipal planning law and policy in promoting the development of sustainable cities in the country’s smallest yet most urban province. Specific emphasis is placed on the planning law and policy instruments of three municipalities in the Province, namely the City of Johannesburg Metropolitan Municipality (a category A municipality); the Emfuleni Local Municipality (a category B municipality); and the Sedibeng District Municipality (a category C municipality). Each of the municipalities, despite their differences in size, faces unique sustainability challenges which include, amongst others, spatial segregation, service backlogs, high levels of poverty and inequality, and conflicting interests in terms of the protection of environmentally sensitive areas and responsible resource use on the one hand and the promotion of economic development on the other. The municipalities also differ in terms of their institutional and financial capacity. While these municipalities do not represent the entire Gauteng province, they do serve as a meaningful lens through which to consider the extent to which municipal planning law and policy currently promotes sustainability in varying urban contexts. Doctoral

Wilderness is a central feature of the Arctic and the Antarctic, and both regions are commonly known to contain vast areas of it. However, the legal frameworks to protect either region’s wilderness expanses differ significantly. While for the Antarctic, the legal protection of wilderness falls under the international Antarctic Treaty System – generally known as the Antarctic Treaty and related agreements adopted thereunder; wilderness areas in the Arctic are primarily governed by the domestic legislation of the eight Arctic States – Canada, Denmark, Finland, Iceland, Norway, Sweden, the Russian Federation and the United States. As for the Antarctic, wilderness values receive explicit legal protection under the Environmental Protocol to the Antarctic Treaty (AT). In practice, however, these values are rarely considered, mainly because of different opinions concerning the meaning of wilderness in the AT context and the consequences that may arise from the legal duty to protect it. These deficiencies become especially problematic with regard to the increase of tourism activities in the region and their potential to cause negative impacts on its wilderness. Against this background, the present PhD research project, sponsored by the Netherlands Organization for Scientific Research (NOW), has been conducted. Its central aim was to study the relevance of the wilderness concept for regulating and managing tourist activities in Antarctica. In doing so, the project took particular notice of experiences and possible ‘lessons learnt’ in wilderness areas of the Arctic. For this purpose, three case study areas were examined in detail – the Hammastunturi Wilderness Reserve (Finland), the Archipelago of Svalbard (Norway) and the Denali National Park and Preserve (Alaska, United States) – all of them, fully or partially, designated as legally protected wilderness areas and, at the same time, characterized as important tourist destinations. The results of the case studies reveal, among others, that wilderness protection policies and regulations in each area differ according to the specific legal regime in each country as well as due to the various cultural contexts and traditions. Nevertheless, important similarities could be also recognized, especially in terms of certain minimum standards characterizing wilderness. These standards, which are central to the diverging wilderness protection approaches, can be summarized as (a) a relatively large size of the area in question; (b) the prevailing of natural intact species and ecosystems in the area; and (c) the absence of major human-related infrastructure as well as minimum distances from such facilities and developments. As to the threats or risks caused by tourism to wilderness, the PhD-thesis points out, first, that the relevant impact factors in each area have common characteristics which can be found also in Antarctica: (a) significantly growing numbers of tourists, (b) the use of more and more visiting sites, (c) an increasing diversity of tourist activities, and (d) the establishment of tourism related infrastructure. Secondly, the thesis outlines already observed and possible consequences of this development for the wilderness of the concerned area or region. Regarding this situation, a multitude of measures, referring either explicitly or implicitly to the protection of wilderness, could be identified in each case study aiming at the regulation and management of tourism in the areas. These measures are often of a similar kind in each case study area. Most of them could be applied in Antarctica as well. Thus, they provide a substantial number of possible policy approaches and legal instruments that could be used also in the AT context, and might, if adopted, contribute – this is at least the hope of the author – to improve the status of wilderness protection in Antarctica

Given the emergence of challenges that are increasingly global in nature, and given the irreducible contingency of state borders, it would seem that justice must become global justice: justice that takes shape through a legal order that holds for all of humanity and everywhere. But is justice for all and everywhere possible? At issue, in this question, is not a rearguard defense of the state and state law. Instead, the question concerns the globality of global law and global justice. Is any legal order possible, global or otherwise, that organizes itself as an inside without an outside, that is, which is all-inclusive? A prima facie candidate for such an order is the Rome Statute, which established the International Criminal Court to investigate and prosecute genocide, crimes against humanity, war crimes, and the crime of aggression. Yet careful consideration of the scope of the Rome Statute shows that it cannot realize global justice as criminal justice without excluding other forms of justice, for example restorative justice, thereby both recognizing and misrecognizing the victims of the crimes the International Criminal Court is called on to investigate and prosecute. Humanity is inside and outside the Rome Statute’s invocation of ‘the international community as a whole.’ Because it organizes itself as an inside vis-a-vis an outside, the Rome Statute, like all global law and justice, is local law and justice. If, as this article argues, the inside/outside contrast is constitutive for any imaginable legal order, it also draws on the asymmetries of processes of collective recognition to articulate a concept of global justice that is neither universalist nor particularist, neither all-encompassing nor relativistic.

An Appraisal of the African-Eurasian Waterbird Agreement and its Role in the Conservation and Management of Migratory Birds at Flyway-level Melissa Lewis The annual movements of migratory birds can span thousands of kilometres. In the course of their journeys, these species encounter a myriad of risks associated with human activities. They also traverse multiple jurisdictions. International cooperation is therefore a prerequisite for their effective conservation and management. One of the most ambitious international instruments thus far developed to facilitate such cooperation is the Agreement on the Conservation of African-Eurasian Migratory Waterbirds (AEWA). AEWA is an extremely complex and, in some respects, pioneering treaty and has been lauded as a very promising tool for bird conservation. However, the Agreement has attracted little attention from legal scholars. This research consequently sought to examine AEWA’s role in, and implications for, the conservation and management of migratory birds, as well as how the Agreement’s contribution to these objectives might be enhanced in the future. The dissertation tracks the manner in which AEWA has evolved since its entry into force, explores its relationship with other conservation treaties, and identifies a variety of strengths in the Agreement’s design and functioning which, in principle, position the Agreement to make a valuable contribution to the conservation and management of migratory waterbirds. Examples include AEWA’s emphasis on a flyway-scale approach to conservation, the detail and rigor of its legal provisions, its strong scientific basis, and its active and inclusive supporting institutions and processes. The dissertation also identifies various challenges facing the Agreement and argues that there is a need to better define AEWA’s niche, enhance its engagement with other international fora, and more rigorously prioritise its activities. Various suggestions are made in this regard. For instance, the dissertation identifies several distinct roles that AEWA can play in relation to habitat conservation, despite the Agreement’s overlap with other habitat-focused treaties. It also highlights AEWA’s importance as a platform for regulating the harvest of migratory waterbirds across their ranges, but identifies a variety of challenges that arise in interpreting and implementing the Agreement’s harvest-related provisions. Recommendations are made as to how particular interpretive uncertainties can be resolved, how AEWA’s provisions on harvest could be further developed in the future, and how states can go about better implementing their commitments under the Agreement (especially those concerning internationally-agreed harvest quotas). The dissertation also makes several suggestions and observations concerning the legal avenues through which AEWA’s geographic and taxonomic coverage could potentially be expanded in the future. The dissertation comprises five journal articles and one commissioned guidance document. It was based primarily on standard international law research methodology and comparative legal methodology, and was further informed by material and perspectives from the natural and social sciences and by the author’s direct involvement in a variety of AEWA processes. It was, from the outset, intended that the author’s academic research and AEWA activities would be mutually supportive, and indeed, several of the recommendations emerging from the dissertation have been incorporated into guidance documents subsequently adopted under the Agreement. Despite focusing specifically on AEWA and its importance for migratory (water)bird conservation in Africa and western Eurasia, much of the dissertation’s analysis is also relevant for other species, treaties and regions.

The relationship between China and international human rights law (IHRL) is an often-discussed issue that nonetheless remains peripheral from an academic perspective. The reason that it is often discussed has to do with China’s rapid rise to its global superpower status—economically, politically, militarily, and (in a way) culturally. It remains ‘peripheral’, however, insofar as the common approach situates China as an outlier in the international legal order that must be treated differently. It is this commonly held point of view that first prompted this study. This research focuses investigates particular reasoning–based arguments offered by China in constructive dialogue on specific topics (i.e. interpretation, reservation, sovereignty, and treaty implementation). The purpose of conducting this investigation is first and foremost to examine the justifiability of China’s arguments—that is, to identify those arguments that are in fact justifiable from the point of view of the human rights treaties to which China is a party, along with other human rights instruments it adheres to, versus those arguments that indeed deviate from IHRL. Therefore, it aims to give China’s arguments a fair examination. Moreover, by investigating the arguments in constructive dialogue between China and human rights treaty bodies over time, this research also expounds the relationship between China and the international human rights legal order. In Part I of this study, I consider the question of what counts as a good argument in constructive dialogue. I begin by identifying the characteristics of constructive dialogue by comparing it with legal arguments in the courtroom, which helps me to develop criteria for determining what counts as a justifiable argument in constructive dialogue--a justifiable argument has to be legally justifiable and dialogically constructive. I then investigate the interpretation rules for international treaties in general and IHRL in particular. Finally, I articulate the concept of particular reasoning and its implications for legal argumentation in constructive dialogue. In Part II, I investigate arguments that employ particular reasoning under the four topics identified above. A representation and reconstruction of the arguments is then carried out, in chronological order. The main materials for my analysis are summary records. This research could be situated in three broader debates, namely the relationship between China and international human rights legal regime, the universality versus relativity of human rights, and the (in)determinacy and objectivity of the IHRL. One key observation of this study is: the committees have a greater impact on China than China has on the committees. Specifically, when it comes to topics on which China does not hold a strongly oppositional position, the legally justifiable and dialogically constructive arguments from the committees are very likely to make a positive impact on the process, whereas un-justifiable or non-constructive arguments do not have this effect, or even affect the process negatively. Moreover, this research reveals that the relationship between China and IHRL is rather complicated and may sometimes seem like it has reached an impasse. Nevertheless, it also shows that there is a systemic dialogue between China and the treaty bodies, which has generally improved over time (especially on China’s part). The fact that China has made an effort to offer justifiable or constructive arguments implies that it is adapting to the ‘rightness’ of the rules and principles of IHRL. This adaption to the ‘rightness’ of the regime is, in my view, a process of institutionalisation. In other words, despite its relatively poor compliance record (as some scholars, NGOs, or states hold), China does consider itself subject to the international human rights treaty regime. At last, I suggest that when it comes to IHRL, it is probably the time to go back to basics by taking the legal characteristics of IHRL and argumentation seriously, because forgetting them is as (if not more) dangerous than lack of imagination.

This thesis shows how the perceptions of practitioners and other stakeholders in clinical research in India differ from how informed consent appears in the academic literature and the regulatory framework. My empirical research findings hint at apathy towards the purpose and process of informed consent. I argue that this apathy raises doubts as to the impact of prescriptive work on informed consent in clinical research. I reach the above conclusion in three broad parts. First, I outline the conceptual framework of informed consent (what makes consent ethically and legally valid) and show how this conceptual framework appears in practice in India and what problems have arisen with regard to the way informed consent is dealt within this contemporary context. Second, I show how informed consent has been legally translated by courts in India and the limits of law in dealing with informed consent in clinical research. Third, I lay out the findings of an empirical research that I conducted in India (between April 2016-October 2016) that reflect stakeholder perspectives on informed consent. The empirical findings are analysed using the contrasting method where stakeholder perspectives are juxtaposed with how informed consent appears in the academic literature and law. What emerges from my data is a picture that presents a situation where the process of informed consent is oftentimes followed neither as an ethical compulsion nor strictly as a legal obligation. It is not uncommon that researchers consider the process of consent as a mere procedural necessity, thereby performing the action without affording much consideration to either law or ethics. This often leads to apathy towards the ‘larger cause’ (or end goal) of informed consent which, I suggest, is a major reason for the misalignment between ethics, law and the practice of informed consent. To mitigate this misalignment I suggest some non-traditional tools of behaviour regulation alongside the traditional ones.

This research assessed the role of public interest litigation in the achievement of sustainable waste management in the Addis Ababa Administration (AAA) of Ethiopia. It employed a single country case-oriented comparative research design, and data triangulation was used to establish the validity of the findings. The research first shows Ethiopia&rsquo, s commitment to sustainable waste management, implementing environmental tax and the command-and-control instruments of the polluter-pays principle and public interest litigation within the context of environmental justice. Secondly, it shows that public interest litigation is one of the innovative techniques in the struggle against waste mismanagement across all legal systems. Thirdly, it demonstrates the potential role of public interest litigation in Ethiopia in encouraging the federal and regional environmental protection and management organs to implement environmental tax and command-and-control instruments. Fourthly, it uncovers that public interest litigation is not fully compatible with the Civil Procedure Code of Ethiopia. Fifthly, it shows the failure of the judiciary system of Ethiopia to accommodate environmental courts and tribunals that flexibly and innovatively adopt public interest litigation. Sixthly, it reveals that, in Ethiopia, the scope of public interest standing is highly restrictive for Civil Society Organizations (CSO). Finally, it implies that the legal viability and administrative feasibility of environmental public interest litigation in Ethiopia is in its infancy, and its crystallization is partly contingent on the cautious review of the Civil Procedure Code and CSO laws and on greening the judiciary system.

In policy documents and the literature it has often been emphasised that the concept of ecosystem-based management includes human use of natural resources as humans are also part of the ecosystem. This chapter aims to contribute to the broader discussion of what this consideration should mean for implementing the ecosystem-based approach. For the purpose of discussing this theme, the chapter focuses on the area protection regime of the EU Birds Directive and the Habitats Directive - the Natura 2000 regime - and its implementation.First, the relevance of the Natura 2000 regime for the marine environment will briefly be introduced (Section 2 (2.1)). In this section the question of whether the Natura 2000 regime is based on the ecosystem approach also receives attention (Section 2 (2.2)). Next, attention focuses on the question of what the challenges are in applying an ecosystem-based approach to natural resources at a moment in time where the ecosystem has already been substantially affected (Section 3). Based on this understanding, the Natura 2000 regime is related to the ecosystem-based approach more specifically, with special attention to the importance of ecological restoration (Section 4). Then it is time to strengthen the focus on the place of humans in the ecosystem by discussing the implementation practices in the Netherlands. The various approaches that have been developed by politicians and other stakeholders in order to weaken the legal protection of Natura 2000 in the benefit of ‘space for human activities’ will be discussed (Section 5). The final section contains the main conclusions and some lessons learned that may be useful when implementing the ecosystem-based approach under other legal regimes that are relevant for the marine environment, such as the EU Marine Strategy Framework Directive (Section 6).

With some exceptions, populations of bears, wolves, lynx and other large carnivores are recovering across Europe. Zoning is one of the means available to public authorities to promote large carnivore conservation while minimizing conflicts with human interests. In principle, this can entail designating zones where large carnivore conservation is prioritized over conflicting human interests, but also zones where the population density of large carnivores is adjusted to human activities, including low‐density areas or exclusion zones. Zoning as a large carnivore conservation and management tool is explored here in light of two influential European legal instruments, the Bern Convention and the EU Habitats Directive. The article finds that, first, the various legal regimes that apply to large carnivores under these instruments in different parts of Europe by themselves provide for a distinct degree of high‐level zoning. Second, and importantly, the Convention and Directive determine the legal bandwidth within which domestic authorities can design and implement more specific (sub)national zoning regimes.

Despite their iconic status, lion (Panthera leo) populations continue to decline across the majority of their range. In the light of the recent decision (in October 2017) to add lions to the Appendices of the Convention on Migratory Species (CMS), this paper identifies the new and existing legal protections afforded to lions through five global treaties, and maps these protections against the most critical contemporary threats facing the species. It thus offers a new analysis of the CMS listing, and draws on existing legal reviews, to highlight the ways in which global treaties offer differing forms of protection for lions. It then combines multiple concordant assessments of lion populations, to highlight nine categories of threat: human-lion conflict, bushmeat poaching, human encroachment, trophy hunting, trade in lion bones, unpredictable environmental events, socio-economic factors, policy failures, and governance/institutional weakness. The paper assesses how the various treaties each address these different categories of threat. The analysis identifies two pathways for improving legal protection: expanding the application of global treaties in respect of lions and their habitats (the paper considers the CMS listing in these terms), and improving the implementation of treaty commitments through local and national-scale actions. Furthermore, it identifies local implementation challenges that include the local knowledge of rules, compliance with rules and enforcement capacity, alongside the variety in local contexts and situations, and suggests where global treaties might provide support in meeting these challenges. We suggest that this analysis has wider implications for how treaty protection can and is utilised to protect various species of large-bodied, wide-ranging animals.

The central purpose of this chapter is to consider how complexity might usefully be applied to the study of regulation and regulatory systems. As with any field, one must be cautious when cross-applying a new and unfamiliar perspective and its associated methodologies to something like regulation. One of the central claims made here is that in order for this to be a meaningful exercise, complexity needs to piggyback onto existing concepts from regulation scholarship in order to distinguish and make sense of important patterns of relationships within a regulatory environment. It proposes that the concept of the ‘regulatory space’ can be a useful handmaiden for this purpose and offers a new conceptual framework of the ‘complex regulatory space’ as the outcome of their union. It explores what a complex regulatory space would look like and uses banking as an example to demonstrate how it can highlight the relationships, dynamics and tensions that give shape to patterns of banking actor behaviours and their relationship to systemic phenomena. It also locates the place of law in regulation, one that is necessarily ‘decentred’ as a contextual feature of actor behaviour rather than a core structural feature of regulation itself. Overall, the tone of this chapter is meant to be both exploratory and circumspect. Applying complexity to something like regulation is far from straightforward, but what it might sacrifice in simplicity it can exchange for greater nuance and new insights into regulation as a complex social phenomenon.

Agriculture depends on a stable climate. Crops need fertile soil, sufficient water and temperatures that remain within a certain (plant specific) bandwidth. Livestock needs healthy grazing land, sufficient water and livable temperatures. The climate needs to be predictable, so that farmers can plan their activities with the aim to secure the best possible harvest. Such stable conditions only occurred after the previous major climate change that took place on Earth and which marked the end of the last ice age, around 12,000 years ago. Around that time, man began to live in settlements and started to grow his own food through agriculture. The major climate change that we are witnessing in the 21st century, this time man made, severely threatens the necessary climatic equilibrium, hence threatening food security. This chapter briefly summarizes the nature of climate disasters that are and will be hitting the agricultural sector, relying mainly on the IPCC’s 5th Assessment Report. Then, following the disaster cycle, the chapter discusses: how disaster risks for agriculture can be prevented or mitigated, what emergency response needs to be prepared, and how compensation and rebuilding should be organized after disaster has struck. The aim of this chapter is to find and analyze the main issues on which law and policymakers at the international and at the domestic level should focus on when developing a legal framework that is sufficiently equipped to deal with climate disasters that affect agriculture.

In 2008, South Africa adopted its ‘National Norms and Standards for the Management of Elephants in South Africa’. Concern has subsequently been raised as to whether these norms and standards apply to free-ranging elephant on land, which had not been enclosed with a fence with the express purpose of containing these animals and other game on the property. The application of these norms and standards pivots on whether the owner(s) of the property have taken possession of these animals in accordance with common law applicable to game, or have given effect to the provisions of the Game Theft Act. To address this concern, this article briefly explores the evolution of South African regulatory jurisprudence applicable to game, including elephant, and analyses the norms and standards in relation to international and national legislation and common law applying to elephants. The norms and standards are not applicable to unowned, free-roaming elephant. These norms and standards, therefore, do not fulfil their primary objective of uniform management of elephant across South Africa. This limitation of the norms and standards, therefore, needs to be considered when they are revised.

Het begrip Gunstige Staat van Instandhouding kent een centrale plaats in het natuurbeschermingsrecht, zowel in de omschrijving van de doelen als in het gebieds- beschermingsrecht en het soortenbeschermingsrecht. Dit onderzoek beoogt meer helderheid te bieden over de betekenis van dit begrip. Hoewel het begrip mede aandacht zal krijgen vanuit de invalshoeken van verslaglegging, gebiedsbescherming en actieve soortenbescherming, ligt het accent in dit onderzoek op de betekenis van de term in het kader van het ‘passieve soortenbeschermingsrecht’. Daarbij gaat het voor de praktijk met name om de toepassing van het vereiste dat bij het beoordelen van ontheffingsaanvragen getoetst moet worden aan de voorwaarde dat “geen afbreuk [wordt] gedaan aan het streven de populaties van de betrokken soort in hun natuurlijke verspreidingsgebied in een gunstige staat van instandhouding te laten voortbestaan”. De GSvI-voorwaarde krijgt aandacht binnen de bespreking van een brede selectie van vragen over het begrip GSvI. Daarbij wordt steeds de aandacht primair op het internationale en vooral Europese recht gericht, om er vervolgens de nationale implementatie en jurisprudentie bij te betrekken.