A. Chechi,The Settlement of International Cultural Heritage Disputes,Oxford University Press,Nex York,NY 2014, xxx + 343 pp. ISBN 978-0-19-870399-0.

Netherlands International Law Review -     

Symposium,Cannabis—Legal,Ethical, and Compliance Issues: Introduction

This introduction reviews six articles presented at the 2020 symposium, “Legal, Ethical, and Compliance Issues in Emerging Markets: Cannabis in the States.” Scholars from across the United States and Canada presented research using the lens of law and strategy, ethics, and compliance to focus on the U.S. cannabis industry. The articles are discussed within the framework of institutional voids common to emerging markets, which may include a lack of a fully developed regulatory system and issues related to financial markets. These institutional problems create complexity for consumers, producers, municipalities, and state governments in this industry, and make success for this market segment more challenging. The introduction contributes to the discussion by reviewing securities litigation involving the cannabis industry generally and specifically in light of some of the issues identified by authors in the special issue.     

The Abdullah Azzam Brigades

This article looks at the growth and evolution of the The Abdullah Azzam Brigades, from the group's Egyptian origins through its most recent attack on a Japanese tanker in the Hormuz Straits. In addition to an overview of the group's main personalities and claims of responsibility, the article aims to explain the group by placing it in the context of recent jihadi theory.     

Distributive Politics in Developing Federal Democracies: Compensating Governors for Their Territorial Support

Using original data from the period 1999–2011 on federal infrastructure investment for all subnational units in two federations, Argentina and Brazil, and a unitary nation, Colombia, this study shows that in developing federal countries with strong governors, presidents use nonearmarked transfers as a tool to compensate governors for sizable and secure territorial political support. The study argues that in these cases, resources do not make electoral power but chase it. In the unitary case, conversely, governors do not influence distributive politics. Variation also was found in the relevance of Congress, legislative overrepresentation, and programmatic criteria across cases. The article discusses possible reasons for these results and their implications for the comparative debate on distributive politics.     

Does participation generate democratization? Analysis of social participation by institutional means in Argentine,Brazilian and Uruguayan foreign policies

The article questions if the participation of civil society actors in foreign policy making would lead to the democratization of foreign policy processes. The analysis is based on the comparison of three foreign policy participatory initiatives – the Civil Society Consultative Council, the Social and Participative Mercosur Programme and the Dialogue and Consultation System – which currently take place in Argentina, Brazil and Uruguay, respectively. The hypothesis to be tested is that participatory institutions modify representation in foreign policy by breaking with the monopoly of the diplomatic bureaucracy in foreign policy making on regional integration. For that, we develop a comprehensive model based on social participation indicators and assess the specifics of each participatory initiative by mobilizing documental sources and conducting face-to-face interviews with key actors for each initiative. We ultimately find that the democratic nature is rather correlated with the institutional design adopted by the participatory initiative under scrutiny.