The threats to human rights posed by non-state actors are of increasing concern. Human rights activists increasingly address the activity of multinational corporations, the policies of international organizations such as the World Bank and the World Trade Organization, and international crimes committed by entities such as armed opposition groups and terrorists. This book presents an approach to human rights that goes beyond the traditional focus on states and outlines the human rights obligations of non-state actors. Furthermore, it addresses some of the ways in which these entities can be held legally accountable for their actions in various jurisdictions. The political debate concerning the appropriateness of expanding human rights scrutiny to non-state actors is discussed and dissected. For some, extending human rights into these spheres trivializes human rights and allows abusive governments to distract us from ongoing violations. For others such an extension is essential if human rights are properly to address the current concerns of women and workers. The main focus of the book, however, is on the legal obligations of non-state actors. The book discusses how developments in the fields of international responsibility and international criminal law have implications for building a framework for the human rights obligations of non-state actors in international law. In turn these international developments have drawn on the changing ways in which human rights are implemented in national law. A selection of national jurisdictions, including the United States, South Africa and the United Kingdom are examined with regard to the application of human rights law to non-state actors. The book's final part includes suggestions with regard to understanding the parameters of the human rights obligations of non-state actors. Key to understanding the legal obligations of non-state actors are concepts such as dignity and democracy. While neither concept can unravel the dilemmas involved in the application of human rights law to non-state actors, a better understanding of the tensions surrounding these concepts can help us to understand what is at stake.

Addressing the reality that non-state actors do violate human rights in practice, which cannot be overlooked, author Nicolas Carrillo-Santarelli argues that the foundations and main principles of international human rights law call for the regulation of direct non-state obligations and responsibilities, given the potential failure of domestic actions and the limits of voluntary strategies. In part I, the author presents his ideas on why non-state abuses should be regarded as human rights violations and wrongful acts. Part II studies why direct protection from non-state violations is possible, and what legal mechanisms and institutions permit to make it effective. The final Chapter turns to the examination of the mechanisms that can be used to respond to or prevent non-state violations of human rights law. This book is based on the idea that the protagonists of human rights law are individuals, who deserve protection from all abusers, be they States, armed groups, international organizations, or other actors. Revised Dissertation. [Subject: Human Rights Law, International Law]

Can transnational corporations ignore human rights as long as governments don't hold them accountable? If the UN is put in charge of a territory, is it bound by human rights law? Does that body of law apply to private security contractors who use torture to achieve their goals? Does the right to freedom of speech apply in a private shopping mall which has become the modern-day town centre? Under traditional approaches to human rights, non-State actors are beyond the direct reach of international human rights law. They cannot be parties to the relevant treaties and so they are only bound to the extent that obligations accepted by States can be applied to them by governments. The result is that entities including Non-Governmental Organizations, international organizations such as the UN and the IMF, private security contractors, and transnational corporations, along with many others, are generally considered not to be bound directly by human rights law. This situation threatens to make a mockery of much of the international system of accountability for human rights violations. As privatization, outsourcing, and downsizing place ever more public or governmental functions into the hands of private actors, the human rights regime must adapt if it is to maintain its relevance. The contributors to this volume examine the different approaches that might be taken in order to ensure some degree of accountability. Making space in the legal regime to take account of the role of non-State actors is one of the biggest and most critical challenges facing international law today.

The role and position of non-state actors in international law is the subject of a long-standing and intensive scholarly debate. This book explores the participation of this new category of actors in an international legal system that has historically been dominated by states. It explores the most important issues, actors and theoretical approaches with respect to these new participants in international law. It provides the reader with a comprehensive and state-of-the-art overview of the most important legal and political developments and perspectives. Relevant non-state actors discussed in this volume include, in particular, international governmental organisations, international non-governmental organisations, multinational companies, investors and armed opposition groups. Their legal position is considered in relation to specific issue-areas, such as humanitarian law, human rights, the use of force and international responsibility. The main legal theories on non-state actors' position in international law – neo-positivism, the policy-oriented approach and transnational law – are covered at the beginning of the book, and the essential political science perspectives – on non-state actors' role in international politics and globalisation, as well as their soft power – are presented at the end.

The conduct of non-state actors can give rise to human rights violations to a greater extent than one would expect. Human rights law, interpreted in the light of general international law, applies to every private actor that is endowed with state power in any form. It applies to private entities that perform public functions and state-owned entities that are misused for political purposes. The state can also incur human rights responsibility for private conduct that it adopts as its own and for the conduct of de facto agents or hierarchically structured agent groups, over whom it exercises effective control. Finally, human rights responsibility also ensues where non-state groups, such as insurrectionary movements, usurp state power. The Westphalian paradigm of state responsibility has traditionally limited international law to hold only the state (rather than the usurpers themselves) responsible, but this short-coming is gradually being corrected as a customary norm emerges which extends human rights obligations also to non-state actors governing territory. Abuses of true non-state power are checked as well. Existential human rights are to be protected by reasonable and appropriate measures under all circumstances, bearing in mind countervailing human rights. In addition, the state has human rights obligations to protect the individual from non-state abuses of power, wherever access to public or tangible social goods is concerned and there is a disproportionate power relationship between the competing non-state actors. However, the current system suffers from one grave weakness. It is based on the premise that states are strong enough to check the range of agents that form part of the machinery of government, and that they can fulfill all their protective duties. If we are really experiencing a power shift away from the state and toward the non-state realm, this foundational premise becomes shaky. At the same time, as state capability to protect is weakening, their ambit of protective obligations to protect is widening, since the non-state sector expands into former state domains. The obvious answer would be to supplement the existing framework of vertical and diagonal human rights obligations with horizontal obligations for those non-state actors that seem to accumulate power, most prominently transnational corporations. The emerging duty for non-state actors not to become complicit in human rights violations of states is a first step in the right direction.

Non-State Actors and International Obligations examines the contribution and relevance of non-state actors in the creation and implementation of international obligations. These actors have traditionally been marginalised within international law and ambiguities remain over their precise role. Nonetheless, they have become increasingly important in legal regimes as participants in their implementation and enforcement, and as potential holders of duties themselves. Chapters from academics and practitioners investigate different aspects of this relationship, including the sources of obligations, their implementation, human rights aspects, dispute settlement, responsibility and legal accountability.

This book explores the human rights obligations of armed non-state actors in non-international armed conflicts. This book seriously challenges the State-centric view of human rights by breaking the traditional perception of international human rights regime that applies only to State actors. It shows the necessity in considering the capacity of de facto regimes of armed non-state actors to incur human rights obligations in order to protect individuals and groups, and regulate their daily lives in the controlled areas of these armed non-state actors. Further, this book proves the capacity of armed non-state actors for violating human rights, as well as bearing human rights obligations in non-international armed conflicts. The degree of human rights obligations of armed non-state actors, especially regarding civil and political rights, as well as obligations towards some vulnerable groups, has been confirmed in this book. Nevertheless, it is very difficult to impose human rights obligations on armed nonstate actors without relying on other international norms, such as international humanitarian law and international criminal law in non-international armed conflicts, since these bodies of law give more detailed provisions to regulate the specific issue. In addition, the success of the fulfilment of obligations in international norms by armed non-state actors mostly depends on their capacity, willingness and intentions, including the ideology of a specific group. [Subject: Human Rights Law]

This edited book by Mills and Karp brings together political, legal and moral perspectives on the responsibilities of human rights protection in world politics today. It critiques a narrow focus on states' 'violations' of human rights, incorporates non-state actors, and looks beyond the 'Responsibility to Protect' policy framework.

Non-state actors have always been treated with ambivalence in the works of international law. While their empirical existence is widely acknowledged and their impact and influence uncontested, non-state actors are still not in the centre of international legal research. The idea that non-state actors are not law-makers, however, stands in sharp contrast with the growing notion of non-state actors as law-takers. This book examines the position of non-state actors in international law as law-makers and law-takers and questions whether these different positions can or should be separated from each other. Each contribution reveals both the political and normative aspects of the question as well as the positivistic possibilities and constraints to accommodate non-state actors as law-takers and law-makers in the contemporary international legal system. Altogether, each expert reveals that the position of non-state actors in international law is not a fixed one but changes with the functional and theoretical perspectives of the observer. Non-State Actor Dynamics in International Law is a welcomed addition to an under researched field of legal study. An indispensable read to scholars and policy makers wishing to gain new insights into general discourse on non-state actors in international law and the process of norm formation in the international realm.

The accountability of armed non-state actors is a neglected field of international law, overtaken by the regimes of state responsibility and individual criminal accountability as well as fears of legitimacy. Yet armed non-state actors are important players in the international arena and their activities have significant repercussions. This book focuses on their obligations and accountability when they do not function as state agents, regardless of the existence or extent of accountability of their individual members. The author claims that their distinct features lead to their classification into three different types: de facto entities, armed non-state actors in control of territory, and common article 3 armed non-state actors. The mechanisms that trigger the applicability of humanitarian and human rights law regimes are examined in detail as well as the framework of obligations. In both cases, the author argues that armed non-state actors should not be treated as entering international law and process exclusively through the state. The study concludes by focussing on their accountability in international humanitarian and human rights law and, more specifically, to the rules of attribution, remedies and reparations for violations of their primary obligations.