This chapter maintains that the International Court of Justice (ICJ) may usefully intervene in the complex and multifaceted litigation that has developed before national and international tribunals, as well as human rights treaty bodies, concerning national climate policies adopted to implement international obligations. By considering the rationale and nature of climate litigation, the chapter seeks to point out what international law rules the ICJ should take into account (especially clarifying their existence and scope) in order to make a real contribution to national and international jurisprudence.

Legislation in all Australian jurisdictions allows courts to award damages either in addition to, or in lieu of, specific performance or an injunction. Although damages awarded under this legislation are sometimes known as ‘equitable damages’, to avoid confusion with equitable compensation, they are called ‘Lord Cairns’ Act damages’ in this book.

Lord Cairns’ Act damages are primarily awarded for proprietary torts such as trespass, and for breaches of contract or negative covenant where no other relief is available (either because it is impossible or for discretionary reasons). Their calculation varies according to the facts of the individual case, and the rules are complex. They have also been awarded for equitable or statutory wrongs, but this is controversial.

As noted in this chapter, the placement of this remedy within a functional structure presents difficulties. Lord Cairns’ Act damages have been said to perform multiple functions including compensation and restitution. Strictly speaking, they do not compel performance, but award money instead. However, because they are a monetarised version of specific relief, they follow specific performance and injunctions for the pragmatic reason that they ‘fit’ best here.

This chapter describes: the creation of the ICC; its main features (such as its jurisdiction and its rules for selecting cases); opposition and criticisms; and a brief assessment of its work, including its controversial and sometimes disappointing early efforts, and the challenges that the Court confronts. The chapter discusses the Court’s jurisdiction – including personal and territorial jurisdiction, temporal jurisdiction, and subject matter jurisdiction. It discusses the ‘trigger mechanisms’: State Party referrals (including self-referrals), Security Council referrals, and initiation by the Prosecutor. It explains preliminary examination, investigation, and prosecution, as well as the selection criteria of admissibility (complementarity and gravity), and the interests of justice. It discusses opposition to the ICC, including the criticisms from the United States and the African Union, as well as key developments, such as US attacks on the ICC and threats of withdrawal from the African Union. The chapter reviews the Court’s record, including problems of collapsed cases, slow proceedings, the early focus on Africa, and accusations of selectivity and bias, as well as recent indications of progress.

This chapter begins by discussing how the crime of aggression differs from all other core international crimes in being inextricably linked to an act of aggression by a state against another state. It then turns to a discussion of the history of the crime of aggression, including its inclusion in the Statute of the International Criminal Court (ICC). It covers the definition of the crime of aggression as set out in Article 8bis of the ICC Statute, as well as its relationship with other crimes. It also examines the material elements: (1) by a perpetrator in a leadership position in a state (2) who has participated (3) in an act of aggression by the state (4) which ‘by its character, gravity and scale, constitutes a manifest violation of the Charter of the United Nations’. It also explains the mental elements as set out in Elements 4 and 6 of the ICC’s Elements of Crime; the jurisdiction of the ICC over aggression, including the role of the Security Council; and the implications of an ICC prosecution of the crime of aggression.

In response to two conflicts in the 1990s - the Yugoslav wars of dissolution and the Rwandan genocide of 1994 - the United Nations (UN) UN Security Council created the International Criminal Tribunals for the Former Yugoslavia and Rwanda (ICTY and ICTR). This chapter begins with the creation of the ICTY through UN Security Council Resolution 827, the court’s three organ structure (Registry, Office of the Prosecutor, and Chambers), jurisdiction, and relationship with national courts. The chapter examines the milestones of the ICTY, from its first case through to the conflict in Kosovo, prosecution of former Heads of States, and implementation of its Completion Strategy, and assesses the critiques of the tribunal. The chapter then turns to the history of the creation of the ICTR, its structure (which was similar to that of the ICTY), and its jurisdiction. It then examines the practice of the ICTR, from its initial troubles through the prosecution of the leaders of the genocide, and the implementation of its Completion Strategy. Both Tribunals have now closed and transitioned into a residual phase.

The ICC launched in 2002 to judge cases against individuals accused of war crimes, crimes against humanity, and genocide. It is unique among international institutions in this book in that it imposes its obligations upon individual persons rather than governments. This chapter shows the powers and limits on the authority of the ICC to punish people for large-scale atrocities. The practical power of the ICC is shaped by both the difficulty of apprehending people and the active work of those who wish to remain insulated from accountability.

This chapter examines the kinds of legal procedure adopted by various ancient legal systems to conduct legal proceedings in a court. The areas covered include the constitution of courts, preliminary court proceedings, valid evidence, presentation and evaluation of evidence, and the final verdict, including the possibility of appeals. Discussions include judges and court personnel, the physical space of courts, distinctions between civil and criminal cases, plaint and plea, sureties, and legal representation. Under evidence there is examination of witnesses, documents, oaths, ordeals, torture for evidentiary purposes, and forensic investigation, and punishment for perjury. Once a verdict is reached by the court, there are issues relating to the recording and the enforcement of the verdict. There is wide diversity in the legal procedure recorded in the sources from different legal traditions. Some deal with the topic explicitly, while in others we have to deduce the procedure from material on court cases.

Comparing ancient societies allows us to observe the variety of relationships that prevailed between states — in different forms and at different scales — and their complex legal environments. This chapter explores five dimensions of this relationship. First, we examine the capacity of law to shape state power. While constitutional law, strictly speaking, was comparatively rare in the ancient world, we can yet observe various ways in which law, law-like practices and other cultural norms operated collectively to both empower and constrain the state. The second and third parts of the chapter look at the inverse relationship: state power over law and legal practice in the form of legislative powers and jurisdiction, respectively. In the fourth part, we turn from ideational aspects of state law to the structure of state legal systems themselves, particularly in the context of private or non-state legal practices. Here we focus on those domains of law in which the state was most intimately engaged, what was left to non-state actors and the engagements between both across a sometimes indistinct boundary. The final part of the chapter explores the role of law in legitimizing state power.

Chapter 9 examines the relationship between IHL and international human rights law (IHRL). Both bodies of law are concerned with protection of the human person, but there are some stark differences between the two. First, many IHRL instruments permit parties to derogate from their IHRL obligations in times of public emergency such as armed conflict, while IHL applies precisely at such times and permits of no derogation. Second is the difference in scope. IHL applies to all territory where an armed conflict is taking place, whereas IHRL has only limited extraterritorial application. This can lead to a direct conflict for a State, such as in a situation of occupation: the local law might violate IHRL obligations, yet under IHL the Occupying Power is required to respect that local law. Third, where IHL applies to both States and non-State actors, IHLR is primarily addressed to the State. In cases of overlap, harmony is preferred – both bodies of law apply. Where that is not possible because the conflict is direct, there are different views on how such conflicts should be reconciled. One view is that IHL, as the lex specialis, should prevail; the other is that the lex specialis doctrine will not always be appropriate. The conclusion is that although IHL and IHRL are slowly converging over time, there will still be situations where the differences are irreconcilable.

The focus of Chapter 4 seeks to determine whether the dominant focus should be judicial or non-judicial. To that end, the manner in which the European Court of Human Rights has interpreted ‘jurisdiction’ under Article 1 of the ECHR in a representative sample of seminal cases pertaining to ‘grey zones’ is examined. The chapter highlights the inconsistency of Court practice, the manifestly inexecutable nature of many of the cases associated with grey zones and, consequently, the limits of the Court in affecting general or individual justice in practice in these regions. The chapter concludes by noting that effectiveness depends on looking beyond the Court.

The introductory chapter establishes the central questions, the rationale and structure of the monograph noting that it is concerned with the impact of unresolved conflict and contestation on the effectiveness of Europe’s human rights protection architecture within the framework of the Council of Europe. It also highlights several limits, such as the European focus and the deliberate decision not to seek to advance any reform proposals for the European Court of Human Rights Article 1 jurisprudence. It also engages, and dismisses, the potential critique of human rights imperialism.

This chapter re-inserts the (rethought) concept of territory into the legal-theoretical framework, offering a look at how this concept can be realised and might differently operationalise concepts such as sovereignty and jurisdiction. Taking the concept of sovereignty first, the chapter operationalises this concept as a bundle of legal rights, duties, etc. informed by legal realist methods and social constructivism. The chapter then turns to the concept of jurisdiction, problematising the ‘boundaries’ of and reterritorialising extraterritorial jurisdiction. The chapter offers an alternative to the ‘ownership’ and ‘exclusive’ model of legal rights, which otherwise has at its core a reified and flat territory. The final part explores actorhood, demonstrating how the spaces of international organisations can be understood as their territories. Taking as its starting point the possibility of territorial pluralism, multiplicity, and continuous (re)production, the chapter ends with an account of territories proliferating rather than diminishing. Taking the idea of reterritorialising seriously, it proposes a legal account of the relationship between actors and their spaces.

Complaints procedures offer a unique opportunity for individuals and groups to have claims of human rights violations considered and their rights vindicated in a judicial or quasi-judicial procedure. On the one hand, for non-governmental organisations (NGOs) and human rights lawyers, complaints procedures are an important avenue to pursue strategic objectives, in addition to supporting victims in individual cases. States, on the other hand, may find themselves having to defend allegations of specific or systemic violations. Ideally, complaints procedures act as a mirror that provides an opportunity for states to bring their practices into conformity with the respective treaty. In practice, however, states often view unfavourable decisions as unwarranted criticism, which may create difficulties at the implementation stage. The treaty bodies themselves are in theory neutral arbiters that apply the treaty provisions and rules of procedures. However, inevitably, their position as bodies created by states, and relying on states’ cooperation on the one hand and seeking the effective protection of human rights on the other, raises a host of challenges in actual practice.

Chapter 10 discusses some of the issues and procedures pertinent to recognition and enforcement of awards under international conventions and various national laws, as well as the limited grounds for refusing enforcement. In particular, the chapter focus on Article III of the New York Convention which requires countries to recognize foreign arbitral awards as binding and to enforce them in accordance with the provisions of the Convention. The chapter also notes that there are only a limited number of defenses against enforcement of an award under the Convention and that national courts construe such defenses narrowly. There are five kinds of defenses found in Article V(1) and two additional defenses found in Article V(2). The most important characteristic of the defenses is that they are not based on the merits. Under the Convention, a court cannot refuse enforcement of an award because the arbitrator got it wrong, either on the facts or the law. Instead, the defenses focus on the integrity of the process, fairness to the parties, and a reasonable opportunity to be heard.

Does arbitration permit a self-sufficient contract? To what extent can relevance be disregarded without affecting the validity and enforceability of an award? What power does the arbitral tribunal have?

This chapter examines the scope of federal judicial power. Chapter III of the Australian Constitution sets out a comprehensive regime for the exercise of federal judicial power. This means that federal judicial power can be exercised only in the way prescribed by Chapter III. There is no comprehensive definition of ‘judicial power’, although there are some functions that are always judicial in nature and some functions that are never judicial in nature. Federal jurisdiction – that is, the exercise of federal judicial power – is limited to the subject-matters set out sections 75 and 76 of the Constitution and also limited to ‘matters’ respecting those subject-matters.

In this chapter, Kimberley Trapp and Jacob Smith examine the role of domestic courts in international dispute settlement. This chapter maps the variety of engagements by international dispute settlement bodies with the decisions and processes of domestic courts and explores how the particular institutional nature and contexts of international dispute settlement bodies may colour the nature and degree of that engagement. The chapter situates this engagement on a spectrum of deference to greater intrusion. It also provides an illustration of the factors that determine this engagement, including the degree of penetration of the international legal framework in domestic legal systems, the expectations that States have when submitting to means of dispute settlement, and the socio-legal context.

In this chapter, Massimo Lando focuses on the advisory jurisdiction of international courts and tribunals. This chapter explains that, traditionally, advisory opinions are not seen as a means of inter-State dispute settlement. However, it argues that recent developments justify re-assessing this traditional view. This chapter claims that the most significant development in this context is the judgment on preliminary objections delivered by the Special Chamber of the International Tribunal for the Law of the Sea in the maritime dispute between Mauritius and Maldives, which gave binding effect to the determinations made by the International Court of Justice in its 2019 advisory opinion concerning the decolonisation of Chagos. This chapter evaluates the Special Chamber’s decision by considering its impact on the Eastern Carelia doctrine and the Monetary Gold principle, as well as its implications for the legal effects of advisory opinions and for the legitimacy of exercising the advisory function.