Global Governance through Private Organizations

Governance at international and global levels is not only provided through states and markets but also through a variety of private organizations. The business world is well represented through this kind of organization and contributes to global governance through self-regulation across a number of industries. This article examines these efforts in the encompassing organization of global commerce, in the pharmaceutical industry and among dye stuffs producers. Smaller organizations are generally better suited to monitor compliance and impose sanctions on members violating the codes and norms behind self-regulation. Even small organizations, however, are confronted with problems and there is also evidence of large and very complex organizations having established effective mechanisms as alternatives to public regulation. These experiences can be built into theories on self-regulation as a form of global governance.     

Human Rights,Intellectual Property,and Struggles for Recognition

This article examines recent controversies over the relationship between human rights and intellectual property rights (IPRs). Many activists have claimed that IPRs conflict with human rights. Others have argued that IPRs are themselves human rights. The article approaches the debate as an opportunity to clarify the nature of IPRs in relation to human rights, as well as the nature of contemporary struggles over these rights. After surveying the dual expansion of both human rights and IPRs and rejecting the view that IPRs are rooted in human rights, the author investigates the example of the HIV/AIDS crisis and the global Campaign for Access to Essential Medicines in order to illustrate attempts to represent IPRs as an outright threat to human rights. Highlighting the limitations of a human rights-based critique of IPRs, he concludes by proposing to study contemporary conflicts over IPRs and human rights as struggles for recognition and as struggles over the institutionalization of a transnational “recognition order.”

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Superior Responsibility under Article 28 ICC Statute: For What Exactly is the Superior Held Responsible?

Superior responsibility is a concept for attributing criminalliability to military commanders and other superiors that isemployed with some frequency in the ad hoc international criminaltribunals. Nevertheless, it remains unclear for what the superioris actually blamed. The author argues that with respect to superiorresponsibility as construed in Article 28 ICC Statute the answerto this question depends on the form of superior responsibilityfor which the accused is found guilty. If the superior is heldresponsible for not having prevented or repressed the subordinate'scrime even though the superior knew of the crime, he or shecan be blamed for both, the criminal conduct of the subordinateand the wrongful consequence caused by it. For all other formsof superior responsibility, the superior can only be blamedfor his or her failure to exercise control properly, which resultedin a wrongful consequence, but not for the criminal conductof the subordinate.