The recent developments in central and eastern Europe have changed the political landscape of the world. The dissolution of the Soviet Union, Czechoslovakia and Yugoslavia, the collapse of Communism in Europe, market reforms, and the processes of democratisation are all seminal events affecting not only the countries in transition but other states as well. All these changes presuppose fundamental legal reforms. In this process most of the countries in transition have adopted new constitutions where issues of participation in the international political order and questions of international law enjoy a prominent place. This book is one outcome of many research activities concerning these transitions in central and eastern Europe at the Centre of European Law, King's College London. It contains essays about constitutional reforms and international law by leading international judges and academics. It is edited by Mads Andenas, Director of the Centre of European Law at King's College London, Malgosia Fitzmaurice, Reader in International Law at Queen Mary and Westfield College, London, and Rein Müllerson, Professor in International Law at King's College.

In the wake of the EU's biggest enlargement, this book explores the adaptation of the constitutions of Central and Eastern Europe (CEE) for membership in the European Union. In response to the painful past, these new constitutions were notably closed to transfer of powers to international organizations, and accorded a prominent status to sovereignty and independence. A little more than a decade later, the process of amending these provisions in view of the transfer of sovereign powers to a supranational organization has proved a sensitive and controversial exercise. This book analyses the amendments against the background of comparative experience and theory of sovereignty, as well as the context of political sensitivities, such as rising euroscepticism ahead of accession referendums.

Recent confrontations between constitutional courts and parliamentary majorities in several European countries have attracted international interest in the relationship between the judiciary and the legislature. Some political actors have argued that courts have assumed too much power and politics has been extremely judicialized. This volume accurately and systematically examines the extent to which this aggregation of power may have constrained the dominant political actors’ room for manoeuvre. To explore the diversity and measure the strength of judicial decisions, the contributors to this work have elaborated a methodology to give a more nuanced picture of the practice of constitutional adjudication in Central and Eastern Europe between 1990 and 2020. The work opens with an assessment of the existing literature on empirical analysis of judicial decisions with a special focus on the Central and Eastern European region, and a short summary of the methodology of the project. This is followed by ten country studies and a concluding chapter providing a comprehensive comparative analysis of the results. A further nine countries are explored in the counterpart volume to this book: Constitutional Review in Western Europe: Judicial-Legislative Relations in Comparative Perspective. The collection will be an invaluable resource for those working in the areas of empirical legal research and comparative constitutional law, as well as political scientists interested in judicial politics.

A comprehensive analysis of the extent, method, purpose and effects of domestic and international courts' judicial dialogue on human rights.

An authoritative and engaging work, combining straightforward exposition with extensive footnotes for further research.

This handbook surveys how international law is applied and interpreted in the Asia-Pacific region. It explores Asia's contribution to the development of international law and whether a distinct 'Asian' approach can be perceived

This volume focuses on a highly challenging aspect of all European democracies, namely the issue of combining guarantees of judicial independence and mechanisms of judicial accountability. It does so by filling the gap in European scholarship between the two policy sectors of enlargement and judicial cooperation and by taking full stock of an interdisciplinary literature, spanning from comparative politics, socio-legal studies and European studies. Judicial Accountabilities in New Europe presents an insightful account of the judicial reforms adopted by new member States to embed the principle of the rule of law in their democratic institutions, along with the guidelines of quality of justice promoted by European institutions in all member States.

This book takes an interdisciplinary approach to the question of what role international law plays in promoting a resolution of Central and East European transboundary environmental disputes. The author examines a wide variety of environmental disputes in Central and Eastern Europe, with particular emphasis on the Gabcíkovo-Nagymaros Project dispute between Slovakia and Hungary, and melds international legal theory and international relations theory to develop an analytic framework for understanding the role of law and assessing its future application.

The Academy is an institution for the study and teaching of Public and Private International Law and related subjects. Its purpose is to encourage a thorough and impartial examination of the problems arising from international relations in the field of law. The courses deal with the theoretical and practical aspects of the subject, including legislation and case law. All courses at the Academy are, in principle, published in the language in which they were delivered in the "Collected Courses of the Hague Academy of International Law," The contents of this volume consist of: - International Protection of the Environment by M.A. FITZMAURICE, Professor at Queen Mary University of London. To access the abstract texts for this volume please click here

The book analyses the judicial culture in East Central Europe from the era of Stalinism up to the post-Communist period of the 1990s and 2000s. The book targets the judicial ideology and the conception of law, phenomena most resistant to change.