‘If I Would Stay Alive,I Would Be Their Voice’: On the Legitimacy of International People's Tribunals

In recent years there has been a proliferation of People's Tribunals (PTs), promising to address atrocities that have fallen through the net of a statist international legal order. However, the status of such informal tribunals has remained controversial in both literature and practice. The dominant view has been that PTs simply lack legitimate authority. Positing that, in the language game of legitimacy, PTs are put on a perpetual argumentative backfoot, this article examines aspects of their input, process and output legitimacy. It is argued that the right of victims-survivors to be heard reigns supreme and it is in upholding that right that the authority of PTs is legitimised. In the current state of international justice, PTs constitute indispensable, quasi-judicial institutions that bridge gaps in access to justice, challenge official narratives (or silences) about atrocities and, potentially, open up new avenues towards justice and recognition.     

Cautious scrutiny: The Federal Climate Change Act case in the German Constitutional Court

In a unanimous decision of 24 March 2021, the German Federal Constitutional Court declared certain provisions of the Federal Climate Change Act (FCCA) unconstitutional. The Court upheld the greenhouse gas emission targets for the period until 2030 but found the outlined review procedure for the following years lacking: it failed to adequately specify targets, thereby violating the fundamental rights of the applicants. Despite the at times exuberant reception, this case note argues that the decision stopped well short of a legal revolution. Ultimately, the Court embraces an orthodox doctrine on positive obligations that emphasises deference to the legislature on climate change policy. Nonetheless, there are some genuine, albeit subtle legal innovations: (1) extending legal standing to applicants resident outside of Germany; (2) specifying general constitutional commitments to tackling climate change through the Paris Agreement, and (3) relying on a concept of intergenerational equity in the distribution of emission reduction burdens.     

Income portfolios in rural Ethiopia and Tanzania: Choices and constraints

The article analyses the different income portfolios of households using survey data from rural Ethiopia and rural Tanzania. It suggests that the different portfolios held by households cannot be explained by their behaviour towards risk as is usually suggested. It is better explained by differences in ability, location, and in access to credit. A logit analysis of households with different income portfolios, controlling for the effects of location, suggests that entry into high‐return activities is determined by investment in particular skills or by access to capital.     

China and climate justice: moving beyond statism

China is the largest national source of greenhouse gas (GHG) pollution causing climate change. However, despite some rhetorical progress at the 2011 Durban climate conference, it has consistently rejected calls to take on binding targets to reduce its GHG emissions. The Chinese Government has understandably argued that developed states are responsible for the predominant share of historical GHG emissions, have greater capacity to pay for the cost of mitigation, and indeed have an obligation to do so before China is required to take action. However, due to the explosive growth in its GHG emissions, China is now in a position to single-handedly dash any hope of climate stability if its position does not change. On the diplomatic level, other big polluters, particularly the United States, will not enter into new binding agreements to reduce substantially their own GHG emissions without a credible commitment from China. Challenging the “statist” framing of the climate justice, this article explores the possibility for China to take on a leadership role in climate change diplomacy in a way that allows it to maintain its long-standing principled resistance to binding national emissions targets while making meaningful progress toward combating the problem. Action by China’s rapidly growing affluent classes may hold the key to long-term climate stability.     

A tale of culture-bound regime evolution: the centennial democratic trend and its recent reversal

Using a new measure of “comprehensive democracy,” our analysis traces the global democratic trend over the last 116 years, from 1900 until 2016, looking in particular at the centennial trend’s cultural zoning. As it turns out, democracy has been proceeding and continues to differentiate the world’s nations in a strongly culture-bound manner: high levels of democracy remain a distinctive feature of nations in which emancipative values have grown strong over the generations. By the same token, backsliding and autocratization are limited to cultures with under-developed emancipative values. In line with this finding, public support for democracy neither favours democratization, nor does it prevent autocratization in disjunction from emancipative values. On the contrary, public support for democracy shows such pro-democratic effects if – and only if – it co-exists in close association with emancipative values. The reason is that – in disconnect from emancipative values – support for democracy frequently reverts its meaning, indicating the exact opposite of what intuition suggests: namely, support for autocracy. In conclusion, the prospects for democracy are bleak where emancipative values remain weak.     

Discourses of the Vanishing: Modernity,Phantasm, Japan by Marilyn Ivy

Abstract

Discourses of the Vanishing has been anticipated for several years now; it won't disappoint. Despite the rising number of authors who seek to “explain” Japan or attack its essentialism, Ivy is one of the few who have the understanding of modernity and the methodological tools to excavate the celebration (Japanese and American) of Japan's “uniqueness.” Discourses is by far one of the most sophisticated inquiries into what Ivy calls—properly I believe—the “Japanese thing.” The juxtaposition between the singular, thing, and plural, discourses, suggests her overall theme: to discuss the always incomplete reconfigurations of the many pasts that have existed within the archipelago into a singular ideology of Japan.