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The Government Consultation on wedding law reform is currently open.  As argued in my book and by the Law Commission, the Government is proposing a move from a law that largely regulates buildings to one that regulates officiants.

This is welcome and is badly needed because the law in England and Wales has not kept up to date with how people marry. It excludes many religious ceremonies that take place outside a registered place of worship as well as ceremonies conducted by belief organisations such as Humanists UK and independent celebrants.

The Consultation summarises the ‘two key features’ of the Law Commission’s proposals that ‘underpin’ the suggested reforms as follows:

“Firstly, a move away from a system based on the building in which a wedding takes place towards one focused on the officiant responsible for the ceremony. Secondly, the introduction of universal rules applying across different types of wedding (with the exception of Anglican weddings), reducing disparities between groups” [12]

The move to recognising officiants makes sense and would remove much of the discrimination, disadvantage and inconvenience caused by the current law.

The Law Commission said that it would be a political decision for Government whether to include humanist and independent celebrants. The decision in R (on the application of Harrison and others) v Secretary of State for Justice [2020] EWHC 2096 (Admin) that the current lack of recognition of humanist marriage is not compatible with human rights has settled the issue in terms of the inclusion of humanist celebrants.

The Government is consulting on the question of whether independent celebrants should be included but the consultation has taken the initial view that independent officiants should be permitted to conduct legally binding weddings. This is to be welcomed. As I have argued in article for Family Law, the reform objectives will only be met if independent celebrants are included. It is great to see the Government accept and argue for this – and this should be supported.

The Consultation raises the issue of interfaith weddings as a clear catalyst for reform. It notes:

“Couples with different religious affiliations or couples where one partner has no religion, estimated at 21% of relationships, may also face challenges in having a wedding that accommodates their beliefs.  A key driver of these issues is that the current law regulates weddings primarily by the building in which they take place, rather than the person conducting the ceremony” [22].

This is an important argument for the inclusion of independent celebrants who can conduct such ceremonies.  Merely modernising the law to include belief organisations would not accommodate this group. This underscores the need for comprehensive reform that includes independent celebrants, as the Consultation rightly proposes.

The Consultation builds upon the work of the Law Commission in most respects. However, unlike the Law Commission who suggested central regulation of independent celebrants, the Government proposes that ‘independent officiants would be required to belong to a recognised, regulator-approved membership organisation similar to the approach proposed for belief groups’ [77].  This is in line with my suggestions to the Law Commission and, as I have argued previously,  is a much better approach since it means that the central regulator can play the same role in relation to all officiants and can serve as the regulator of their regulators.

The Consultation proposes a structured dignity framework placing a legal responsibility on officiants to ensure that locations and ceremonies are safe, dignified and uphold the significance of marriage. The Consultation seeks views on whether existing wedding venues should be able to apply for voluntary pre-authorisation. This makes sense, meaning that the Dignity Framework only really applies to new venues and places.

The Consultation as a whole is an accessible, thoughtful and concise guide to be proposed reforms that would make a significant difference. Space does not permit the detailed discussion of all aspects of the reform. This post focuses on five particular areas where it is suggested that the proposals can be strengthened further.  These are little more than tweaks given the worth of the proposals overall.

[1] List rather than classify officiants 

The Consultation’s glossary defines ‘officiant’ as ‘a person who is legally responsible for ensuring that a wedding complies with the law and who oversees the legal formation of the marriage. This includes registration officers, Anglican clergy, nominated officiants, independent officiants and maritime officiants’ [9].

This list approach is unproblematic and should be adopted throughout.  However, unfortunately this is not the case and this complicates matters considerably.  The Glossary unhelpfully makes further distinctions.  It adopts a distinction drawn by the Law Commission between: ‘“Belief officiants”: Anglican clergy and nominated officiants from religious or non-religious belief organisations’ and ‘“Civil officiants”: The person who would be legally responsible for ensuring that a civil wedding complies with the law and who oversees the legal formation of the marriage, under proposed reforms. This includes registration officers, independent officiants and maritime officiants’[6].

I have been critical of this distinction and the Law Commission’s differential treatment of independent celebrants that flowed from them being treated as being under the ‘civil’ category.  This makes little sense given that they have more in common with humanist celebrants than registration officers.

This is underlined by the definition given of an ‘independent officiant’, which is what legally recognised independent celebrants would become. These are defined as officiants ‘that will be neither state appointed registration officers, nor officiants acting on behalf of a religious or non-religious belief organisation, under the proposed reforms’[8]. This underscores that the distinction between civil and belief officiants is unhelpful since independent officiants can be distinguished from bedfellows in each category.

The ‘belief-civil’ distinction can be confusing given that the main distinctions envisaged in the Consultation are not between belief and civil officiants. For the most part, all officiants are treated the same.  Under the Consultation, the only significant dividing lines are types of officiants is between State officials and all others in terms of regulation and, between Anglican weddings and all other weddings in terms of universal rules as to preliminaries etc. (There are some proposed differences but I will argue below that they should not apply)

The term ‘civil’ has two different meanings in the Consultation. For the most part, it refers to officiants other than Anglican clergy and nominated officiants. However, ‘civil preliminaries are defined as those that apply to ‘all non-Anglican weddings’ [7]. This means that Catholic and Humanist weddings, for example, would be conducted by ‘belief officiants’ but undergo ‘civil preliminaries’. This will lead to confusion.

It is true that in common parlance, there is understood to be a distinction between civil and religious weddings.  However, this distinction is not found in the Marriage Act 1949 which adopts the list approach (see section 26). It was originally reflected in the civil partnership legislation but civil partnerships can now be conducted by religious officiants.

The preferable approach is not to distinguish between ‘belief’ and ‘civil’ officiants but to simply include the list of officiants as in the definition given of officiants.  The ‘civil’ label can then be kept for the discussion of preliminaries where it denotes anything non-Anglican.

Many of the proposals in the Consultation would be even clearer if the discussion was organised around the five categories of officiant (registration officers, Anglican clergy, nominated officiants, independent officiants and maritime officiants) rather than using broader categories that conflate officiants and have little meaning in terms of the few differences in treatment of officiants that is being proposed.

The Consultation document is a master class in communicating complex information clearly and sweeping away unhelpful distinctions.  The inclusion of definitions for and therefore a distinction between civil and belief officiants is a rare blip and needs to be removed

[2] Rules on consent need recasting 

The consultation proposes that in ‘religious and non-religious belief ceremonies’, ‘consent should be capable of being expressed through actions as well as words’ and that this would better reflect the diversity of traditions and practices used in wedding ceremonies’ [33].

Given the important role they play in terms of interfaith marriages, it may be argued that this rule should also apply to independent officiants.

The Consultation argues that ‘civil ceremonies should continue to have a clear, standardised and identifiable expression of consent’ that ‘required words of consent should be used in civil ceremonies as the means by which consent can be expressed, but that these words should be limited to the core elements of the commitment of marriage’  [33-34] .  It is proposed that ‘the required words should take the form of a short statement of contract, such as:  “I [name] accept you [name] as my [husband / wife / spouse]”’ and that ‘limited variation should be permitted through the use of “words to the same effect” [34].

This protects the state’s interests in ensuring that both parties have freely agreed to marry and provides certainty in law for civil ceremonies ‘where there are no established non-verbal practices and traditions for expressing consent’[33].

This is true for registration officers but it is difficult to see why this should apply to independent officiants.

The Consultation paper states that the Government believes that these different rules are justified:  ‘It would accommodate different belief practices, while improving consistency and legal clarity in all marriage ceremonies’.  Yet, Independent Celebrants are placed on the wrong side of this line.

Indeed, it would be preferable to get rid of the line altogether and having the same rule across the board:  suggested words of consent with limited variation that could include action. The discussion of consent underscores the problem with the ‘belief-civil’ distinction and provides further reason for disregarding it. Should different rule be necessary, it would be clearer to distinguish officiants by type using the five-fold list.

[3] Clarifying the use of religious or belief materials

The Consultation also differs from the Law Commission’s proposals in terms of the use of religious or belief content in ceremonies other than religion or belief organisations.

The Consultation distinguishes ‘between a full belief service, which should not be permitted and individual elements of belief content, which may be [46]. This can be understood as allowing individual “ingredients”, but not the full “recipe”, or a combination of elements that, taken together, would amount to a recognisable religious or non-religious belief service’.  The Consultation proposes that at a civil wedding, it would be matter for the ‘discretion of the officiant, who will be responsible for ensuring that the ceremony remains clearly identifiable as civil and does not amount to a recognisable belief service’.

The Consultation further proposes that ‘registrars should not lead or participate in religious or non-religious belief elements in a civil ceremony. Couples would still be able to include permitted belief elements, provided they are led by the couple, a guest or a third party [47].

This seems to be a sensible solution but one that is confused by reference to the word ‘civil’ rather than just listing the officiant. The Consultation proposes a general rule for civil ceremonies but then makes it clear that this does not apply to registrar ceremonies.  It would be much clearer to say that the general rule applies to independent and maritime officiants with the second rule applying to registrars.

Yet again, the ‘civil-belief’ distinction is unhelpful because the same rules should not apply to independent and maritime officiants as to registrars. Classifying both as ‘civil’ causes more problems.

[4] Rethink the purpose of defining religion or belief  

The Consultation ties itself in knots attempting to define ‘religious belief organisations’ and then ‘non-religious belief organisations’ [61]. A lot of this rests upon the rather naïve belief that there is a robust and clear definition of the term ‘belief’ under the Article 9 case law. The Consultation even relies upon the ‘Grainger’ criteria under the Equality Act 2010’ [61-62], completely ignoring the extraordinary contradictory and confused case law that those criteria have led to. There is then a detailed discussion of the number of households that would need to belong to a ‘religion or belief’ for that religion or belief to be recognised.

All this is utterly unconvincing and also misses the point.  The question is whether the nominating body is able to serve effectively as a regulator for the purposes of marriage law. Under the proposals, celebrancy organisations will perform similar nominating and regulatory functions for independent officiants as religion or belief organisations will play for officiants representing them.  Yet, no attention is afforded (rightly) to the question of how a celebrancy organisation is defined; the focus is rather on whether it is able to serve effectively as a regulator.

If nominating officials are to be limited to belief organisations’ and then ‘non-religious belief organisations’ then all that is needed is the rule suggested by the Law Commission that such ‘organisations should only be eligible to nominate officiants where “it would be a manifestation of an individual’s religion or beliefs to have a wedding officiated at by an officiant nominated by that organisation”’ [62].

This could be buttressed by excluding certain types of organisations such as political parties and trade unions from the definition, an approach taken in other jurisdictions that the Law Commission rejected but that the Consultation now raises [65]. This seems a sensible addition.

Chapter seven of the Consultation deals with the Regulation of Officiants and explores many suggested requirements, some of which are only to apply to independent and maritime officiants.  Most of the time, however, it would make sense for these to apply to all officiants including those nominated by religion or belief bodies.

In particular, question 36 consults on the eligibility criteria ‘that would be necessary for membership organisations to become approved, both in relation to the organisation’s structure and to how it appoints and oversees officiants’. It would make sense for these to apply not only to celebrancy organisations but to all nominating bodies – including religion or belief bodies.  This, again, undermines the use of the ‘belief-civil’ distinction.

[5] Some thoughts on disturbances

A major, if not the major, innovation by the Consultation is the suggestion of a dignity framework that would enable officiants to determine whether locations and ceremonies are safe and dignified. There is a lot of detail on this, despite the intention being that it should enable ‘discretion in order to reflect the particular circumstances of each wedding’ [37].

One aspect that I found questionable is the suggestion that officiants should be clear that the ‘dignity of the occasion will not be undermined by distraction or trivialisation’[38]. These are very subjective terms.  The reference to ‘distraction’ is particularly problematic; a distraction for whom? In a religious wedding, the religious rituals could be seen as a distraction from the main event of the wedding in some eyes.  It is stated that:

‘Locations characterised by unavoidable interruption or distraction, such as nightclubs during normal operation or stadiums during live sporting events, will not meet the proposed standard. Settings that require participants to focus on another activity during the ceremony, such as skydiving, white-water rafting, rollercoasters or other amusement rides, will also fall short of the standard’ [41]

However, how does his differ from religious or cultural weddings where there are other traditions ongoing? The idea that a closed nightclub or sports arena might be a suitable venue but an open one would not goes against the ‘public’ nature of marriage.

It later suggests a number of factors to be taken into account including ‘Control of the environment: whether the officiant is able to maintain appropriate control over the immediate environment, including preventing interruptions or distractions during the ceremony’ [42].

This would seemingly allow other focuses provided that they can be policed. This may be a preferable approach to banning distractions or other focuses.

Indeed, the Consultation stresses that this is not ‘intended to exclude all non-traditional locations. For example, a tethered hot-air balloon or a busy public beach may require careful consideration but could be permitted provided the officiant is satisfied that the ceremony can be conducted safely, seriously and without avoidable distraction’ [41].

The other thing missing from the Consultation’s discussion of this is the proximity of the other event from the ‘legal’ part of the ceremony, the expression of consent. Surely, this makes a huge difference.  This is why a communion service during the wedding ceremony is fine – the religious ritual does not disturb the legal part of the ceremony since the two are not at the same time.  The same logic would apply to non-religious activities.

Somewhat bafflingly, the Consultation gives the following example:”

‘if a couple wanted the ceremony to be performed as a parody or comedic sketch, with the expression of consent treated as part of the performance, this would not meet the proposed standard. In those circumstances, the ceremony would not reflect the seriousness required for the legal act of marriage” [42].

Surely, the issue would be whether the sketch was the legal part of the ceremony. How different would be a recitation of a comedy routine to any other reading? It would be fine as part of the ceremony provided it is not the expression of consent.

This is the nub of the issue. It needs to be made clearer that interpreting and applying the Dignity Framework, attention is to be afforded to the proximity of the potentially undignified matter with the legal expression of consent.

These five suggestions are mere tweaks.  Most of them result from the rejection of the ‘civil-belief’ distinction.  The vast majority of the proposals are to be welcome as they stand and represent an improvement on the Law Commission’s already stellar work.  Clarity and fairness would, however, be achieved by using the five-fold list of types of officiant throughout and this would be particularly true if legislation is enacted following the Consultation, which it hopefully will be given the importance of this reform and the general brilliance of this Consultation document.

Russell Sandberg

Cite this article as: Russell Sandberg, “Five suggestions on wedding law reform” in Law & Religion UK, 6 September 2026,

Jamaica is asking King Charles to refer its questions to the Judicial Committee of the Privy Council. The Judicial Committee descends from bodies within the Privy Council that had both advisory roles and acted as tribunals of last resort for the entire British Empire. Today, the Committee mostly hears appeals, both civil and criminal, from Commonwealth Countries (with appeals from defendants sentenced to death in the Caribbean among the most prominent). Although rarely invoked, Section 4 of the 1833 Statute that created the Committee also gives it the power to issue advisory opinions on matters that “cannot be effectively decided in ordinary courts.” The King may choose (or refuse) to refer such matters to the Committee at his discretion, and typically also acts on the advice of his ministers. So in Jamaica’s bid to reach the Privy Council, King Charles is the gatekeeper, and Jamaica is at the gate. 

The King will almost certainly refuse to refer Jamaica’s questions to the Committee. Still, Jamaica’s decision to submit a public petition asking for a reckoning with slavery and its legacies has enormous symbolic and political power. By petitioning the King to seek advice from the Judicial Committee, Jamaica is engaging the judicial heir of the institution charged with overseeing the colonies and ensuring that colonial law did not contravene English law. In a sense, Jamaica is asking this institution to audit its own historical performance. 

Jamaica’s petition is shot through with other poignant ironies. First, the Jamaican government is simultaneously working to remove King Charles as its head of state. Petitioning the Judicial Committee, a legal residue of Britain’s Empire, is a kind of swansong to the Crown’s power. Second, while the King can technically use his discretion to refer questions to the Committee, he typically does so only on the advice of his ministers, who are part of the government of the United Kingdom. The King is, separately and simultaneously, the King of Jamaica, and it is in that capacity that Jamaica addresses him. So the King has competing loyalties—to Jamaica on the one hand, and to the UK Government, on the other. But the competition is unlikely to be a fair one. 

Jamaica’s petition includes three questions, the first of which is especially incisive:

The First Question: The Status of Slavery in English Law

Jamaica’s first question is whether the forced transport of Africans to Jamaica and their enslavement there was lawful at the time, or whether these practices were contrary to the fundamental principles of the common law, such that colonial slavery statutes were “void as repugnant to fundamental principles of English law.” While the King’s powers in England were limited by the rights of Parliament and statutory law conferring individual rights, the colonial territories were ruled by royal prerogative, with the Crown conferring powers on colonial governments. Colonial governments could promulgate laws that would apply locally, as long as they were not repugnant to English law. The limits on the Crown’s power in England did not extend to the colonies, and colonial governments’ discretion to promulgate their own laws created a legal grey zone. 

Jamaica’s question about the status of slavery under English law brings the legal tensions that characterized the patchwork law of empire into sharp focus. Although colonial law regulated slavery (the first Slave Codes were enacted by the colonial government in Barbados in 1661, and were subsequently adopted elsewhere), slavery had no foundation in English law itself. Because there was no law expressly authorizing enslavement, some enslaved persons who made their way to England from the colonies were able to successfully petition for their freedom. The status of enslaved people in the colonies as chattels remained contested until 1732, when Parliament enacted the Debt Recovery Act. The Act allowed English creditors to pursue “houses, lands, and negroes” for outstanding debts. Still, even after Parliament implied that English creditors could treat enslaved Africans as chattel when recovering debt, an English judge refused to recognize the ownership rights of a colonial enslaver who sought to assert them over an enslaved man he had brought to England. In Somerset v Stewart (1772), Lord Mansfield wrote that an institution as odious as slavery was “incapable of being introduced [to England] on any reasons, moral or political” and that “nothing can be suffered to support it, but positive law.” Mansfield understood that the decision had the potential to cause confusion by highlighting a gap between the laws of England and the practice of slavery in its territories, but he insisted that “whatever inconveniences…  may follow,” Mr. Somerset could not be held in bondage under English law. 

Across the centuries in which transatlantic slavery generated its fortunes, no situation forced the question of whether colonial statutes regulating slavery were “repugnant to the laws of England” and therefore void. This may seem striking, but the material interests of the Crown and the class of absentee Plantation owners steadily buying its way into Parliament explain why so many were perfectly content for the legal murkiness to persist. The enormous profits generated by plantation slavery allowed the Crown to rake in duties and plantation owners to amass the levels of private wealth that helped make the Industrial Revolution possible. 

Jamaica’s first question takes on this profitable murkiness. 

The Second Question: The Status of Slavery Under International Law

Jamaica’s second question asks whether the transport and enslavement constituted crimes against humanity (CAH) under international law for which the UK bears responsibility. In invoking CAH in reference to slavery, Jamaica’s question tracks a rhetorical move in the broader global movement for reparations. The Durban Declaration of 2001 described slavery and the slave trade as crimes against humanity and said that they “should always have been so.” In 2026, Ghana introduced a Resolution in the General Assembly describing slavery as “the gravest crime against humanity.” The notion that slavery today constitutes a crime against humanity is not in dispute. Framing the question in terms of CAH raises two intractable legal issues: a temporal one and a definitional one.  

First, Jamaica’s question gets at something both the Durban Declaration and Ghana’s Resolution elide. It is the thorniest part of the contemporary reparations debate: Was transatlantic chattel slavery illegal at the time it was practiced? The position of the United Kingdom, the European Union, and the United States is that slavery did not violate international law at the time, and that the present-day international law cannot and should not be applied retroactively. Furthermore, to the extent that the Crown or the UK engages with Jamaica’s questions, it will probably point to a further but distinct temporal issue: that “Crimes against humanity” is a legal category that entered positive law only after 1945, when it was invoked to try Nazi leaders. To ask whether conduct during and prior to the 19th century “constituted” CAH is to reach for a legal concept that did not yet exist.

Patrick Robinson, the Jamaican jurist and former judge of the International Court of Justice, has argued that a principle of humanity condemning the traffic in enslaved people ran through the whole period, so that “the substance of a prohibition preceded the doctrinal label.” But the legal instruments Robinson’s argument leans on, such as the 1815 Vienna Declaration, referred to the slave trade, which was more consistently condemned than the institution of slavery. Other scholars, including me, have argued that transatlantic slavery violated international legal norms of the time, which technically permitted enslavement, but not the brutal, racialized, hereditary enslavement that accompanied the emergence of capitalism in the New World. But, as written, Jamaica’s question asks whether slavery was a crime against humanity—not whether it violated international law more broadly. 

The framing of slavery as a crime against humanity creates a further difficulty: CAH is a category that belongs to international criminal law, which assigns guilt to individuals, not states. At Nuremberg, the Tribunal declared that “crimes against international law are committed by men, not abstract entities”; the International Law Commission eventually abandoned the inclusion of a category of state crimes in its Draft Articles on State Responsibility. The Draft Crimes Against Humanity Convention (which, if enacted, would be a standalone treaty for CAH, similar to the Genocide Convention) does provide, at Article 3, that a state must not engage in acts that constitute crimes against humanity. However, the bulk of the Draft Convention focuses on individual criminal liability, setting out how states should criminalize and prosecute CAH domestically and cooperate to bring those who commit these crimes to justice. For better or for worse, jurisprudence suggests that states are not the kind of defendant that the notion of CAH contemplates.

These difficulties could have been avoided by framing the second question around whether slavery and the slave trade violated international law more generally. This would have invited a reckoning with recent scholarship on this question (for example: here, here, and here), which has argued that transatlantic chattel slavery violated the law of nations and general principles of international law as they would have been understood in the early modern period. Despite these difficulties, the question’s final clause pulls it back toward firmer ground. In asking whether the UK “bears responsibility,” it puts the real issue to the Committee: not whether Britain violated international criminal law, but whether it is responsible for a wrong. That is a question of state responsibility, and it is the heart of the matter.

The Third Question: Responsibility for Slavery’s Contemporary Legacies 

Jamaica’s third question asks whether the UK owes the Jamaican people a remedy for both the historical wrong and its continuing consequences. That final clause opens a distinct and more durable route to reparation, one not mired in the status of slavery under eighteenth-century law. The Committee on the Elimination of Racial Discrimination, and the former U.N. Special Rapporteur on Racism Tendayi Achiume, have pressed the point that slavery’s legacy continues long after abolition: it persists in structures of racial disadvantage whose maintenance is a present matter, engaging present obligations under international law. Redress for the enduring legacies of slavery may be owed as a matter of contemporary human rights law even if Britain refuses to concede that slavery was unlawful when it occurred. The obligation attaches to the enduring legacy rather than the underlying historical wrong.

Jamaica’s Petition Forces a Confrontation 

The King will almost certainly not refer these questions to the Judicial Committee of the Privy Council as Jamaica has requested him to do. By settled convention, the King exercises his discretionary power to refer questions to the Committee on the advice of his ministers. This means, in substance, that the U.K. government will help decide whether a U.K. appellate body may examine the U.K.’s liability for the harms of slavery. The U.K. government’s position is not difficult to predict. 

Still, even if it does not move forward, Jamaica’s petition is meaningful. The King’s refusal to entertain Jamaica’s questions—made as a public petition from a Commonwealth country—would likewise be a public, concrete act of avoidance. Jamaica cannot compel an answer, but in submitting this petition, it is snatching from the Crown the ability to maintain the silence that has served it for three centuries. The petition converts silence from a background condition into a public act. Although the reckoning Jamaica and other Caribbean countries long for may never come from the Privy Council, its demand for it is now on the record.

This review concentrates principally on the private international law dimensions of Andrew Dickinson and Alexander Thompson’s The State Immunity Act 1978. Although state immunity is fundamentally a subject of public international law, the legislation operates at the point where public and private international law intersect. It determines whether the English courts may adjudicate disputes involving foreign states, how proceedings may be served, and whether judgments or arbitral awards may be recognised and enforced against state property. These questions are of direct importance to private international lawyers, particularly in transnational commercial, employment, property and arbitration disputes.

The authors bring considerable practical expertise to the subject. As the preface indicates, their analysis is informed not only by academic study but also by professional experience of state-immunity litigation. The result is a specialist and authoritative treatment of a technically demanding statute. The chapters generally combine legislative history, an overview of the relevant statutory provisions, and a detailed examination of their judicial application.

Chapter 1 explains the historical development of the State Immunity Act 1978 and the United Kingdom’s movement from absolute to restrictive immunity. Under restrictive immunity, a foreign state remains immune in respect of sovereign acts but may be subject to jurisdiction in relation to commercial and other non-sovereign activities. This distinction provides the organising principle for much of the Act and gives the subject its particular importance for private international law.

Chapter 2 is especially significant because it situates the 1978 Act within the wider legal framework. The Act is mandatory and generally supersedes the pre-existing common-law rules governing state immunity. Although it was influenced by the European Convention on State Immunity 1972, the United Kingdom courts are not required to interpret it as if it faithfully reproduced every aspect of that Convention. At the same time, the Act should, so far as its language permits, be interpreted consistently with customary international law, on the presumption that Parliament did not intend to place the United Kingdom in breach of its international obligations.

The United Nations Convention on Jurisdictional Immunities of States and Their Property  2004 may also inform the interpretation of the Act. It is not, however, binding for this purpose, nor can all its provisions automatically be treated as definitive statements of customary international law. The authors therefore demonstrate that statutory interpretation in this field requires careful engagement with legislation, treaties, customary international law and judicial authority.

The chapter also distinguishes state immunity from related regimes. The State Immunity Act primarily concerns the immunity of foreign states and incorporates exceptions associated with restrictive immunity. The Diplomatic Privileges Act 1964 and Consular Relations Act 1968, by contrast, protects particular persons in the performance of their official functions and is governed by separate legislations. Special missions and international organisations are similarly subject to distinct statutory regimes.

The discussion of human rights identifies a persistent tension between access to justice and respect for sovereign immunity. The United Kingdom courts have generally placed substantial weight on the latter. Provisions of the Act have nevertheless been challenged under Article 6 of the European Convention on Human Rights 1998. Declarations of incompatibility have been made in the employment context, most notably in Benkharbouche v Embassy of Sudan and Secretary of State for Foreign and Commonwealth Affairs v Benkharbouche, while in Kingdom of Spain v Lydia Lorenzo [2024] EWCA Civ 1602, the UK Court of Appeal ruled that a foreign state cannot claim state immunity in an employment discrimination and unfair dismissal case brought by an administrative embassy worker. These cases show that state immunity is not merely a procedural technicality: it may determine whether an individual has any effective opportunity to vindicate substantive rights.

The book also explains the post-Brexit relationship between state immunity and European Union law. EU law no longer has the supremacy it previously enjoyed within the United Kingdom, although retained or assimilated EU law and the European Union (Withdrawal) Act 2018 remain relevant to the historical development and present operation of some rules.

Equally important is the distinction between state immunity and the foreign act-of-state doctrine. Both rest, in part, on ideas of sovereign equality and the independence of states, but foreign act of state is a common-law doctrine rather than a product of the 1978 Act. The doctrines should therefore not be treated as interchangeable.

For private international lawyers, the book’s most important conceptual point is that the 1978 Act limits the adjudicatory jurisdiction that a United Kingdom court would otherwise possess. It does not itself confer jurisdiction. A claimant must first establish jurisdiction under the ordinary rules of civil procedure and private international law. Only then does the separate question arise whether the foreign state is immune from the exercise of that jurisdiction. This distinction between the existence of jurisdiction and immunity from its exercise is fundamental.

Chapter 4 examines the general immunity from adjudicatory jurisdiction. The statutory scheme leans strongly towards protecting foreign states: the claimant bears the burden of establishing an applicable exception to immunity, even where the foreign state declines to appear. This may present a considerable practical obstacle because the facts necessary to establish an exception may be difficult for a private claimant to obtain without the state’s participation.

Chapter 5 considers submission to jurisdiction. A choice-of-court agreement in favour of the courts of any part of the United Kingdom may constitute a waiver of immunity, whereas a choice-of-law clause does not. This distinction is particularly important in drafting international contracts. Selecting English law does not, without more, amount to consent by a foreign state to the jurisdiction of the English courts.

Submission may also occur through a treaty, convention or other international agreement, but it must be express. A state may submit after the dispute has arisen, and although such submission must be express, it need not necessarily be in writing. Submission may additionally result from instituting proceedings, advancing a counterclaim or participating in proceedings beyond what is necessary to assert immunity. The act of submission must be duly authorised by the state. Once valid submission occurs, the state is generally placed in the position of an ordinary litigant for the relevant proceedings. Importantly, however, submission to adjudication does not necessarily amount to consent to enforcement against state property.

Chapter 6 addresses commercial transactions and associated obligations, including contracts to be performed in the United Kingdom. The commercial-transactions exception lies at the heart of restrictive immunity and is shaped by both the earlier common law and the European Convention. It is particularly relevant to private international law because disputes concerning the character of a transaction, contractual performance and the territorial connection with the United Kingdom may determine whether immunity is available.

Chapter 7 concerns employment contracts. As the authors observe, section 4 may justifiably claim to be among the most controversial provisions of the Act. The central authority is Benkharbouche, in which statutory restrictions on claims by state employees were held incompatible with Article 6 of the European Convention on Human Rights and, at the relevant time, Article 47 of the EU Charter of Fundamental Rights. The resulting changes strengthened employees’ access to justice. The chapter is particularly valuable because cross-border employment disputes frequently bring together jurisdiction, applicable law, mandatory employment protection, human rights and the public international law of immunity.

Chapters 8 to 14 examine the statutory exceptions relating to personal injury and damage to property; ownership, possession and use of property; intellectual and industrial property; companies and other collective bodies; arbitration; admiralty proceedings; and taxation. The property provisions remove immunity in defined proceedings concerning property, subject to protections for premises used for diplomatic purposes. The intellectual-property exception reflects restrictive immunity but has generated comparatively little reported litigation.

The arbitration chapter is of special interest to commercial lawyers. Where a state has agreed in writing to submit a dispute to arbitration, immunity from the supervisory or supporting jurisdiction of the courts is generally removed in relation to the arbitration. This provision has been frequently litigated. Nevertheless, the existence of an arbitration agreement and the removal of adjudicatory immunity do not automatically permit execution against state assets. Parties dealing with states must therefore distinguish carefully between consent to arbitration, consent to court proceedings connected with arbitration and waiver of immunity from enforcement.

Chapter 15 examines service of process and default judgments. These procedural matters have substantial private international law significance because the validity of service and the protection afforded to an absent foreign state may determine whether proceedings can advance and whether a judgment will ultimately be effective.

Chapter 16 addresses enforcement jurisdiction, perhaps the area in which the special position of a sovereign state is most pronounced. Coercive measures—including injunctions, contempt proceedings, orders compelling employee reinstatement and execution against state property—are generally considered inappropriate without a sufficient statutory basis. Even where a claimant has successfully established jurisdiction and obtained judgment, enforcement may therefore remain impossible.

The principal exceptions arise where the state has expressly and unequivocally waived immunity from enforcement or where the relevant property is in use, or intended for use, for commercial purposes. A waiver of immunity from adjudication should not lightly be treated as a waiver of immunity from execution. This separation has major practical consequences: a claimant may win the legal dispute yet be unable to obtain the benefit of the judgment. The chapter reinforces the need for contracts involving states to contain carefully drafted and distinct waivers addressing jurisdiction, interim relief and enforcement.

Chapter 17 discusses the meaning of “the State” and the treatment of separate entities, central banks and constituent territories. Whether a body forms part of the state or is a separate entity may determine both the applicable test for immunity and the availability of assets for enforcement. Central-bank property receives particularly strong protection. These classification questions are often decisive in cross-border litigation, especially where commercial activity is conducted through state-owned corporations or other legally distinct bodies.

The remaining chapters address the power to amend Part I, savings and excluded matters, statutory interpretation, foreign judgments, heads of state and related persons, and certificates concerning facts of state. Chapter 21’s treatment of foreign judgments is particularly relevant to private international law, although the statutory mechanism considered there appears never to have been used against the United Kingdom. More generally, the relationship between foreign judgments and state immunity raises difficult questions: recognition of a judgment, adjudicatory jurisdiction over the state and execution against state property are separate stages and may be governed by different requirements.

Overall, this is a highly specialised work. A sound knowledge of public international law—and, to a lesser extent, private international law—is helpful if the reader is to appreciate its analysis fully. Yet the book is also valuable precisely because it demonstrates that the boundary between the two disciplines is permeable. State immunity is founded in public international law, but it operates through the machinery of private litigation. It affects jurisdiction, choice-of-court agreements, employment disputes, arbitration, service, foreign judgments and enforcement.

Before reading the book, I was sceptical about the practical force of public international law, particularly because powerful states sometimes appear able to disregard its principles without meaningful consequences. This book has caused me to reconsider that view. Public international law is not confined to prominent disputes about war or territorial sovereignty. In the field of jurisdictional immunities, it performs an important stabilising function by mediating between access to national courts and the sovereign equality of states. It thereby contributes to international comity and the orderly conduct of relations among states.

For a private international lawyer, the book’s lasting lesson is that ordinary rules of transnational litigation cannot be applied to foreign states without accounting for their sovereign character. Conversely, public international law principles of immunity acquire practical effect through domestic rules governing civil proceedings. Dickinson and Thompson’s work illuminates that relationship with considerable depth. It merits close attention from practitioners and scholars working on cross-border litigation, international commercial arbitration, employment disputes involving states, and the recognition and enforcement of judgments and awards. It is also a book to which I expect to return as my understanding of the relationship between public and private international law continues to develop.

ABOUT THE BOOK:

Der vorliegende Band ist Dietmar Willoweit (1936-2023) gewidmet, der von 1984 bis 2004 als Ordinarius für Deutsche und Bayerische Rechtsgeschichte, Bürgerliches Recht, Handelsrecht und Kirchenrecht an der Universität Würzburg lehrte und von 2006 bis 2010 Präsident der Bayerischen Akademie der Wissenschaften war. Er versammelt die Vorträge eines Symposiums, das zu seinen Ehren am 17. Juli 2024 in der Neubaukirche der Universität Würzburg stattfand.
Im Zentrum der Beiträge stehen Begriff und Entstehung des Rechts. Ist es vorrangig die autoritative Rechtssetzung, etwa in Form herrschaftlich-staatlicher Gesetzgebung, die Rechtssätze in Kraft setzt oder handelt es sich ursprünglich und auch noch heute zumindest teilweise um einen innergesellschaftlichen Prozess der Rechtsbildung? Mit diesen für die Rechtswissenschaft zentralen Fragestellungen nehmen die Beiträge zugleich auf Dietmar Willoweits posthum erschienene Monographie „Rechtsdenken" (2024) Bezug, in der Willoweit an die gegenseitige Anerkennung subjektiver Rechte als Quelle der Rechtsentstehung erinnert hat. Im Rahmen der Auseinandersetzung mit dieser Thematik treten alle Autoren in einen Dialog mit dem Geehrten.

TABLE OF CONTENT:

Jan-Dirk Harke: Das römische Recht - doch ein Gesetzesrecht? - Ulrike Müßig: Die Aufführung der individuellen Gewissensentscheidung in Tenglers Weltgerichtsspiel - verfassungsgeschichtliche Überlegungen - Joachim Lege: Am Anfang war... Rechtsphilosophische Überlegungen zur Rechtsentstehung - Steffen Schlinker: Die Formen der Rechtsentstehung am Beispiel des ius in bello - Eric Hilgendorf: Rechtsgeschichtsschreibung und Wertfreiheitspostulat. Am Beispiel der Juristischen Zeitgeschichte - Matthias Heilmeier: Kapitalanlagefreiheit versus Kapitalanlegerschutz am historischen Beispiel der Beurkundungspflicht des Gründungsakts bei Aktiengesellschaften - Jan Schröder: Innergesellschaftliches Recht bei Dietmar Willoweit und bei Eugen Ehrlich
Epilog
Wolfgang Riedel: Dietmar Willoweit als Präsident der Bayerischen Akademie der Wissenschaften. Auch eine persönliche Erinnerung - Jan Schröder: Laudatio zur Verleihung der Ehrendoktorwürde durch die Juristische Fakultät der Eberhard-Karls-Universität Tübingen an Dietmar Willoweit am 16. Dezember 2011

Find more here. 

In this weekly feature, I-CONnect publishes a curated reading list of developments in public law. “Developments” may include a selection of links to news, high court decisions, new or recent scholarly books and articles, and blog posts from around the public law blogosphere.

To submit relevant developments for our weekly feature on “What’s New in Public Law,” please email iconnecteditors@gmail.com.

Developments in Constitutional Courts

1. The Supreme Court of India upheld execution by hanging as constitutional under Section 354(5) of the Code of Criminal Procedure, 1973, and Section 393(5) of the Bharatiya Nagarik Suraksha Sanhita, 2023, rejecting a plea to switch to methods like lethal injection or shooting. The Court held that hanging’s constitutionality was already settled in a prior binding decision by a larger bench, which they had no power to overturn, but left the door open for future scientific evidence to prompt a fresh challenge before an appropriately larger bench.
2. The General Court of the European Union upheld the European Commission’s decision not to review its own rules on how much greenhouse gas each EU country is allowed to emit. Two civil society groups had argued the Commission’s climate targets were not ambitious enough, but the Court said the Commission only implements targets set by lawmakers and it cannot be asked to overrule them. The ruling matters because it closes off one of the few legal routes citizens had to challenge whether the EU’s climate goals are strong enough.
3. A US District Court in Maryland issued a preliminary injunction against the enforcement of President Trump’s two August executive orders narrowing birthright citizenship, finding they conflict with the Supreme Court’s ruling in Trump v Barbara that children born in the US to unlawfully or temporarily present parents are citizens under the Fourteenth Amendment. The Court held that stripping constitutional citizenship from members of a class the Supreme Court had already recognized would cause irreparable harm, underscoring that a lower-court injunction can enforce, but not revisit, a binding Supreme Court precedent the executive branch is bound to follow.
4. Romania’s Constitutional Court upheld a new law that will remove Timișoara’s mayor, Dominic Fritz, from office over a conflict-of-interest finding from before the law existed. The Court said this case was different because it was not punishing Fritz again, and only addressing the “ongoing effects” of his past conduct. Three dissenting judges disagreed, calling this reasoning a workaround that guts the ban on retroactive punishment and also violates the voting rights of EU citizens, since Fritz was elected fairly under the old rules.
5. The European Court of Human Rights ruled that Türkiye’s continued detention of civil-society figure Osman Kavala since 2017 is unlawful, finding violations of his rights to free expression, peaceful assembly, a fair trial, and liberty under the European Convention on Human Rights. The majority held that Turkish courts never established a genuine causal link between Kavala’s lawful activism and the violence of others during the 2013 Gezi Park protests, reaffirming that free-speech and assembly rights do not disappear simply because a third party turns violent.

In the News

1. Poland has started legally recognizing same-sex marriages performed in other EU countries. This follows a chain of rulings: the EU’s top court said in late 2025 that Poland must recognize such marriages, Poland’s own top administrative court agreed in March 2026, and registry offices began applying this in practice on 22 August 2026. This happened even though Poland’s president vetoed related bills in July and the country’s Constitutional Tribunal ruled against recognition days later.
2. New Zealand’s Parliament passed a law that makes it impossible to sue companies (or the government) in court for damage caused by their greenhouse gas emissions, even for lawsuits that are already underway. This ended a major ongoing case, Smith v. Fonterra, in which a Māori leader had been suing New Zealand’s biggest polluters over climate harm to his land, and where the courts had already ruled the case could go to trial.
3. The UN Committee on the Elimination of Racial Discrimination stated that states have a legal obligation under the International Convention on the Elimination of All Forms of Racial Discrimination to consider comprehensive reparations for the transatlantic slave trade, framing its continuing effects as an ongoing rather than purely historical harm. General Recommendation No. 40 holds that because slavery’s legacy operates through structural and institutional discrimination against people of African descent, remedies owed under the Convention must extend beyond individual redress to monetary, non-monetary, and structural measures, building on the UN General Assembly’s March resolution recognizing the slave trade as “the gravest crime against humanity,” which the US and some European states opposed.
4. The US House of Representatives failed to advance a Republican-backed joint resolution to amend the Constitution and permanently fix the Supreme Court’s size at nine justices. The Constitution establishes the Court but leaves its size to Congress, which set the current number in 1869 after adjusting it several times since the Judiciary Act of 1789, meaning the proposal’s failure preserves, rather than resolves, the long-running possibility that a future Congress could alter the Court’s composition by ordinary statute.
5. Libya’s rival factions signed a draft agreement charting a path to elections within two years, leaving the permanent constitution to be drafted by the newly elected parliament. The deal gives the House of Representatives and High Council of State one month to ratify it domestically. If either body fails to do so, the parties intend to seek its adoption as a constitutional document through broader national mechanisms backed by the UN Security Council, a fallback that raises questions about the document’s domestic legal authority if it bypasses Libya’s own legislative bodies.

New Scholarship

1. Leonard F.M. Besselink, Nicola Lupo, Mattias Wendel (eds.), Research Handbook on European Constitutional Law (Edward Elgar Publishing, 2026).
2. Yash Sinha, ‘Follow the Wound, Not the Weapon: The Basic Structure Doctrine Can and Must Apply to Laws‘ Comparative Constitutional Law & Administrative Law Journal (2026).
3. Asang Wankhede, ‘The Legal Impossibilty of Maratha Reservations‘ Comparative Constitutional Law & Administrative Law Journal (2026)
4. Ashna Devaprasad, Judges, Speaking Of Death: Criminal Sentencing As A Socio-Cultural Practice In India’s Trial Courts, Socio-Legal Review (2026).
5. Prerna, Recording Transgender Parenthood, Economy & Political Weekly (August 22, 2026)

Calls for Papers and Announcements

1. The Austrian Review of International and European Law invites submissions for volume 31 (2026) by 30 October 2026.
2. The NLUJ Law Review invites submissions for volume XIII, issue 1, by 25 September 2026.
3. Dr Anna Młynarska-Sobaczewska (Institute of Law Studies of the Polish Academy of Sciences) invites submissions for an edited volume titled The Right to Housing – Between Utopia and Justiciable Entitlement. The deadline is 30 September 2026.
4. Applications are invited for The Academy in Advanced Legal Research and Method, convened by the Transnational Association of Legal Scholars. The deadline is 1 October 2026.
5. NUJS Kolkata SILP Blog invites posts marking the 80th anniversary of the International Court of Justice. The deadline is 4 October 2026.

Elsewhere Online

1. Ritwik Sharma, When Must The Supreme Court Answer? Re-Thinking Discretion Under Article 143 Through The ‘Institutional Mechanics Effect’, National Law School of India Review Online (12 August 2026).
2. Angela van der Berg, The Constitution Meets the Climate, Verfassungsblog (3 September 2026).
3. V. Venkatesan, When an AI hallucination enters an executive order, Supreme Court Observer (3 September 2026).
4. Camilo Saavedra Herrera, Bargaining Among Partners: Mexico’s 2026 Constitutional Reforms, ConstitutionNet, International IDEA (3 September 2026). 
5. Sahil Hussain Choudhury, Untouchability and the idea of ‘purity’, The Hindu (2 September 2026).

The post What’s New: Week of September 7 appeared first on www.iconnectblog.com.

• Gábor Levente Kozma & Murilo Lubambo de Melo, Strategic Lawsuits Against Public Participation in a Cross-Border Context: Anti-SLAPP Legislation and the Role of the Private International Law Regimes in the EU and England
• Louisa Handel-Mazzetti, Space Defense or Space Weapon? Assessing the Legality of the Golden Dome Under International Law
• Tamer Morris, Information Warfare and the Protection of Civilians in Armed Conflict
• Shuyuan Zhang & Gustavo Arosemena, Theorizing the Adjudication of Economic, Social and Cultural Rights: A Legal Process Perspective on Jurisprudence from the Global South
• Christian Riffel, Good Faith in Exception Clauses: An Abus de Bonne Foi?

     

The ANZSIL International Economic Law Interest Group (IELIG) was established in 2011 to provide a forum for those interested in international economic law, especially international regulation of trade, investment, intellectual property, and monetary law. The work of the Interest Group covers all areas of international economic law and its implementation in domestic law, embracing both theoretical and practical aspects. The IELIG aims to maintain relevance for government, practitioners and academics alike and encourages discussion and exchange of ideas among all those involved in this field.

2026 Workshop (online)

The 2026 ANZSIL IELIG Workshop will be held via Zoom on Friday 27 November 2026. Its aim is to provide an informal setting for discussion of topical issues and works in progress.

We are honoured to have Professor Jarrod Hepburn, University of Melbourne, as this year’s keynote speaker. He will speak on ‘The Flexible Sources of Investment Law’. Jarrod received the ANZSIL Article Prize this year for ‘The Legal Justification for the Doctrine of Legitimate Expectations in International Investment Law’ (2025) 36 European Journal of International Law 43. As part of the workshop, we celebrate this achievement with panel on Jarrod’s work.

We invite paper proposals from ANZSIL members, practitioners in the field as well as staff from MFAT, DFAT, and the Attorney-General’s Department. We encourage PhD students, early career practitioners and academics to submit a proposal. Paper proposals may be on any topic within the work of the IELIG.

All speakers are invited to submit their paper following the workshop to the Australian Year Book of International Law or the New Zealand Yearbook of International Law for possible publication. We also invite ANZSIL members and MFAT/DFAT/AGD staff to attend the workshop even if not presenting a paper.

Submission of proposals

If you wish to submit a paper proposal, please submit an abstract of 300 words by email to christian.riffel@canterbury.ac.nz by 9 November 2026. Please include the heading on your email message ‘ANZSIL IELIG Workshop Proposal: [Your Name]’.

Prof Chris Riffel, University of Canterbury | Te Whare Wānanga o Waitaha

Dr Jose-Miguel Bello Villarino, University of Sydney ANZSIL IELIG Co-Chairs

A monthslong crackdown within the Trump administration to soften its trade rules all started with a flap over pasta.

In the aftermath, Commerce Secretary Howard Lutnick and other top Commerce Department officials are leaning on agency staff not to drive up tariffs on grocery items and other goods ahead of the midterm elections.

...

Agency leaders first stepped in late last year, after a Commerce Department investigation determined in September that leading Italian pasta makers had been underpricing the products they sold in the U.S., in violation of trade rules. The proposed punishment — sky-high tariffs on the pantry staple — drew headlines at a time when the administration was trying to convince Americans its trade agenda was not driving up prices.

...

In particular, he and other top Commerce officials have discouraged staff from pursuing the most aggressive possible tariffs in the pasta case and other similar investigations into trade violations, according to four people familiar with the matter, granted anonymity to share unreported details about the internal discussions.

In some cases, senior officials instructed staff to recalculate rates that were deemed too high, two of the people said. The result has been much lower duties on violators in recent months compared to the past.

...

Lutnick signaled to staff across meetings and private correspondence in the fall of 2025 that the administration would no longer prioritize the most aggressive forms of enforcement, according to the four people. In a meeting in March, senior Commerce officials told private-sector lawyers about the new approach, stressing that the administration would no longer back the most aggressive form of enforcement, two of the people said.

...

Since the fall, Commerce officials overseeing antidumping and countervailing investigations have selected the lowest tariff option under consideration in the overwhelming majority of cases, two of the people familiar said. One of the people said that career staff initially chose the highest rate 90 percent of the time, but senior leadership would “ask to redraw the numbers” if all the options seemed too high.

I'm not totally sure how this story made its way into the press, although I can imagine that domestic industry lawyers were getting annoyed at the Commerce Department and perhaps looked for ways to make their concerns public.

Thinking about the big picture here, one possible takeaway from recent U.S. trade policy developments is that the unrestrained use of tariffs other than AD/CVDs has brought a bit of restraint to AD/CVDs. But I'd want to hear from practitioners about this before reaching any firm conclusions on the connection.

The last time I remember mainstream media reporting on the inner workings of AD/CVD calculations was a 2003 Washington Post article, which was about Commerce pushing duties in the direction people would generally expect:

... Lawyers who defend foreign companies in dumping cases complain that [Joseph] Spetrini stands out for his tendency to use his discretion in ways that hurt their clients, the result often being higher "dumping margins" set by the department on imported goods, with concomitantly higher duties.

"Bending the rules in favor of petitioners – that's what he views as his job, frankly," said one trade lawyer, speaking of the U.S. parties in dumping cases.

...

... [Spetrini] has considerable latitude in interpreting the rules and deftly skews the outcome toward high margins, according to a number of former employees who relate similar accounts of how he operates. A term several used to describe Spetrini's approach is "margin shopping," or looking at different ways to calculate an importer's costs or prices and choosing the one that helps fatten the prospective margin to a desirably high level.

The collapse of the Central American Court of Justice

Anny Matamoros Pineda examines the collapse of the Central American Court of Justice (CACJ) following Honduras’s withdrawal in May 2026, situating it within the Court’s troubled history as one of the world’s earliest permanent international courts. Despite its ambitious jurisdiction and attempts to emulate CJEU doctrines such as primacy, direct effect, and the role of national courts as Community law courts, the CACJ never secured sufficient political support or authority within the Central American Integration System. Its demise reflects not merely institutional design failures but deeper regional problems of political fragmentation, democratic erosion, corruption, and weakening commitment to regional integration and the rule of law.

State responsibility for historical climate emissions 

Tonmoy Halder argues that the ICJ’s 2025 Climate Change Advisory Opinion does not exclude historical emissions from State responsibility, but leaves unresolved how responsibility for cumulative climate harm should be apportioned among multiple emitting States. Drawing on Article 47 ARSIWA, the ICJ’s judgemtn in Armed Activities, and Judge Simma’s separate opinion in Oil Platforms, he proposes a two-stage model: collective attribution of climate harm to emitting States, followed by proportional or “market-share” allocation of particular losses according to individual contributions. This approach could operationalise the Court’s causation framework in future claims by climate-vulnerable States such as Bangladesh, although substantial evidentiary challenges remain in translating attribution science into quantified reparation.

Managing the Strait of Hormuz

Soheil Golchin and Seyed Hossein Sadat Meidani put the case that debates over Iranian charges for navigation through the Strait of Hormuz should move beyond the legality of transit tolls under Article 26 UNCLOS towards the neglected burden-sharing framework of Article 43 UNCLOS. Read alongside Articles 41–42, Article 43 provides for cooperation between strait and user States in financing navigational and safety infrastructure without making payment a condition of passage. Drawing on the cooperative mechanism developed for the Malacca and Singapore Straits, Soheil and Seyed propose a comparable Iran-Oman framework through which user States could contribute to maritime services while preserving applicable passage rights—as it were, a “Malacca-isation” of Hormuz.

Illegal population transfer in Ukraine

Veronika Vozniuk argues that Russia’s incentives for civilians to settle in occupied Ukrainian territory may constitute a prohibited population transfer under Article 49(6) of the Fourth Geneva Convention, notwithstanding the formally voluntary character of individual relocation. Drawing on the ICJ’s 2004 Wall and 2024 OPT Advisory Opinions, she contends that Article 49(6) encompasses State measures that encourage or sustain settlement, not merely forcible transfers. Russia’s redistribution of confiscated Ukrainian homes, preferential mortgages, tax and investment incentives, and long-term population planning therefore provide strong grounds for finding an organised policy of demographic settlement contrary to Article 49(6), alongside potential violations of Article 46 of the Hague Regulations.

Safe third country return and diplomatic assurances

Tamar Vardiashvili examines the ECtHR’s judgment in J.B. v. Greece. The case concerned the potential removal of a Syrian national from Greece to Türkiye under the EU-Türkiye Statement after the rejection of his asylum claim on safe third country grounds. The Court struck out the applicant’s substantive Article 3 complaint concerning his removal to Türkiye, found no violation of Article 13 taken with Article 3 as regards the examination of his asylum claim, and found a violation of Article 3 concerning the conditions of his detention at Mytilene police station. The judgment’s significant doctrinal question concerns its treatment of assurances supporting return to Türkiye: Tamar argues that it adapts rather than abandons the reliability test for diplomatic assurances established in Othman (Abu Qatada) v. United Kingdom. J.B. suggests that, within structured interstate cooperation frameworks such as the EU-Türkiye Statement, Article 3 ECHR may be satisfied by general rather than individualised assurances where evidence demonstrates that safeguards operate effectively in practice and are not undermined by systemic deficiencies. However, the Court fails to specify what evidence establishes such institutional reliability, a significant omission given Türkiye’s subsequent suspension of readmissions and the CJEU’s insistence in Case C-134/23 that formal safe third country arrangements cannot substitute for their effective operation.

Free education under international law

Bede Sheppard makes the case that international law takes an unjustifiably fragmented approach to free education, imposing clear obligations for primary education while treating free secondary education as something that can be realised progressively and largely omitting pre-primary education. Tracing inconsistencies across the ICESCR, CRC, UNESCO Convention Against Discrimination in Education, treaty-body interpretations, and regional human rights systems, he contends that children’s entitlement to free education currently varies according to age, treaty regime and geography. What is needed is a new Optional Protocol to the CRC guaranteeing free public pre-primary and secondary education: this would harmonise rather than fragment existing international law and strengthen equal access to the right to education.

The relationship between IHL and IHRL

Marko Milanovic gives us an update on the relationship between IHL and IHRL and lex specialis. The ECtHR’s merits judgment in Ukraine and the Netherlands v. Russia and the ICJ’s recent advisory opinions on Policies and Practices, Climate Change, and UNRWA, probably constitute the most significant judicial engagement ever with this relationship: and they have largely abandoned lex specialis as the framework for the relationship between IHL and IHRL in favour of simultaneous application and harmonious interpretation. Contrast this judicial trend with Human Rights Council Resolutions 62/4 and 62/20 (2026), which revive lex specialis terminology; however, this should be understood only as permitting IHL to inform the interpretation of IHRL rather than displacing it. Looking ahead to CESCR’s proposed General Comment on armed conflict, the Committee should avoid using lex specialis, and instead embrace the opportunity to explain that socio-economic rights can be violated in armed conflict even if IHL was not violated, as IHRL can offer a big-picture, macro analysis of the aggregate harms that military operations have inflicted on a civilian population in ways that IHL cannot.

Faulty nuclear reactors on the Moon?

Yunus Emre Bakiler and Güneş Ünüvar examine whether existing international law adequately addresses liability for accidents involving nuclear reactors on the Moon, as nuclear power becomes increasingly central to sustained lunar operations. While the Outer Space Treaty and 1972 Liability Convention impose State responsibility and differing standards of liability for terrestrial and space-based damage, they are poorly adapted to nuclear risks such as contamination, latent injury, and economic loss. The Vienna and Paris nuclear liability regimes provide more tailored rules but their application to lunar installations remains uncertain. A dedicated civil-liability framework for lunar nuclear power is needed, drawing on terrestrial nuclear law’s strict operator liability, financial-security, and compensation mechanisms while preserving existing State responsibility under Articles VI–VII OST and the Liability Convention.

And as ever, announcements can be found here.

England: The second round of Expressions of Interest for the Places of Worship Renewal Fund opened on Friday 4 September. The deadline for submitting an EOI is Friday 2 October 2026 at 5 pm.

Historic England has published a comprehensive Places of Worship Funding Index, described as “A resource to support places of worship in England to identify potential funders for building-focused projects”.

Northern Ireland: The Department for Communities has published a public consultation on Historic Environment Policy. It closes on 23 October.

Wales: The Welsh Government has announced a call for evidence on Culture and Sport Strategy. Question1 asks, “What is the situation now? What is the current state of play for culture, heritage, the arts, creative industries, sport and physical activity in Wales?” It closes on Friday 18 December at noon. In addition, Welsh places of worship, coordinated by Cadw, are collating data to create a report to submit to the new Welsh Government to describe their contribution to Welsh culture and language. [With thanks to the Historic Religious Buildings Alliance.]

Weddings law reform, England & Wales

On Wednesday, Jake Richards, Parliamentary Under-Secretary at the Ministry of Justice, gave the following reply to a series of similar written questions on the reform of weddings law:

“On 16 July, the Government published the consultation ‘Tying the Knot: Reforming weddings law in England and Wales alongside an impact assessment of the proposed reforms. The impact assessment estimates that the reforms could lead to a 3% increase in the overall number of weddings.

In relation to demand for approved wedding venues, allowing couples to marry in a wider range of locations could change patterns of demand, although the estimated increase in the overall number of weddings may also create additional opportunities for existing venues. We will consider evidence from venues and other businesses submitted through the consultation.

The Government has not yet made a final assessment of the financial impact on local authority registration services. We are continuing to work closely with the General Register Office (GRO) and local authorities on the potential implications.

One of the main four principles underpinning the consultation is to protect against forced, predatory and sham marriages. This Government wants to strengthen safeguards and ensure marriages are not used to gain unfair advantage. We are proposing a more effective system of checks and greater transparency to ensure marriages are entered into freely, with informed consent. The consultation asks questions in order to identify how protections against sham marriage can be enhanced, with improved signposting for couples and training for officiants, for example.

The Government has committed to introduce legislation to reform marriage law when parliamentary time allows.”

A review of the Government consultation by Professor Russell Sandberg – Five Suggestions on Wedding Law Reform – will be published on L&RUK tomorrow.

Richard O’Sullivan Memorial Lecture

Prof Mary Ellen O’Connell, of the University of Notre Dame, will deliver the Richard O’Sullivan Memorial Lecture on Thursday 15 October at 6 pm at The University of Notre Dame (USA) in England, 1-4 Suffolk Street, London SW1Y 4HG. The title of her lecture is There is No Just War: Natural Law Teaching on War and Peace, and it is given with the generous support of the Newman Association:

“Is the Iran War a ‘just war’? This question has sparked a global debate over the meaning and relevance of the venerable Just War theory. The debate began in April when two prominent American Catholics, Pope Leo and Vice President J.D. Vance, exchanged deeply differing positions on war and peace. This lecture is about those differences.

It looks to the origins of the Just War theory, demonstrating how it developed based on natural law, which gives it its authentic, enduring meaning—meaning that is now codified in the United Nations Charter prohibition on the use of force. This context has been largely forgotten. Politicians resort to war using self-serving interpretations of the Charter or assertions that they are acting for reasons above the law. These decisions have brought about the highest number of armed conflicts since World War II. They are also undermining the very rule of law upon which democracy and social harmony depend.”

To attend, contact https://osullivanlecture26.eventbrite.co.uk.

“Bitesize Ecclesiastical Law”

Three upcoming sessions:

• ‘What is the law on funerals?‘ with Jon Baldwin, Registrar of the Diocese of Southwark, Winkworth Sherwood Solicitors: 22 September from 5.30-6.00 pm.
• ‘What is the law of marriage?‘ with Jess Gray, Deputy Registrar of the Dioceses of York and Sodor a& Man (and from 1 September, Registrar of the Diocese of Sheffield), Flint Bishop Solicitors: 13 October from 5.30-6.00 pm.
• ‘What is a canon?‘ with Ven Russell Dewhurst, Archdeacon of Hastings: 17 November from 5.30-6.00 pm.

Cathedrals catch-up

On 28 August we noted that links to the decisions made by the Cathedrals Fabric Commission for England (CFCE) for the last five meetings have become available. We have made post facto insertions into the relevant monthly round up posts; starting with the inclusion of the CFCE post of Thursday 11 December 2025, this has been added to each of the ecclesiastical court judgments since the December 2025 round-up. The most recent CFCE meeting was on Thursday 3 September 2026, the determinations of which will be summarized at the end of the month.

Quick links

• Mary Downer and Catherine Pepinster, The Sunday Times: The church with 20 worshippers and an eye-watering bill to go green: on the cost of meeting the C of E’s net-zero targets – and in which David is quoted.
• Fearghas O’Beara, BYU Law: The Rules of Engagement: Identifying the Defining Features of the European Union’s Sui Generis Model of Religion-State Relations.

And finally…

The current post on the Beaker Folk of Husborne Crawley blog, Commendation for a Secular Funeral Where the Celebrant Doesn’t Want to be too Depressing shares a page with a side-bar link to L&RUK’s Regulating the funeral industry in England & Wales.

• Elena Baylis, Returning Looted Cultural Heritage
• Gregory H. Fox, Neutralizing Neutrality: Aid to Victim States in Armed Conflict
• Rosa Kim, Preparing Globally Competent Lawyers

     

For the Balkinization symposium on Mark Tushnet and Bojan Bugaric, Constitutionalism and Its Discontents (University of Chicago Press, 2026).

Roberto Gargarella

For many years, I have followed the work of Mark Tushnet with admiration. Lately, his contributions have been strengthened through his collaboration with Bojan Bugaric. They have been offering us constitutional studies that are informed by contemporary doctrine, marked by a strong attention to comparative law, a consistently critical eye, and a progressive perspective. Characterized by these traits, the new book that Tushnet and Bugaric have just published, Constitutionalism and its Discontents, represents a very good continuation of their previous book, Power to the People (Oxford UP).

Regarding Constitutionalism…, the first thing I want to say is that I share many of the main lines of analysis that are here presented. This is relatively obvious, on the one hand, given that the approach to constitutional law that I propose in my own studies—that of the "law as a conversation among equals"—is taken up and analyzed in some detail in this book. Beyond that convergence, and on the other hand, I have long been drawn to a "thin" reading of constitutionalism, such as the one they propose: an approach that is modest in its ambitions; aware of the inherent limitations of institutional reforms; critical of traditional modes of judicial review; skeptical of resorting to the "old toolbox" of constitutionalism (i.e., more rights, more courts) to solve the new problems we face; and radically more democratic in its spirit.

In any case, and beyond my expressed general agreement with the book's main perspectives, I would like to use the little space I have left to establish a point of partial disagreement, which perhaps suggests the presence of somewhat larger disagreements, both in diagnosis and in proposals. The disagreements I have in mind are particularly evident in chapter ten—the last and most proactive: "Preventing Democratic Decline: The Role of Political Parties." In my opinion, this chapter most clearly exhibits a certain diagnostic error regarding the ills that currently afflict democratic constitutionalism, one that was already apparent in the preceding chapters.

The diagnostic problem seems clear in almost every proposal presented here to prevent democratic decline. Thus, for example, when the authors state that "political leaders need to regain credibility by delivering simple and palpable benefits, such as good salaries, decent pensions..."; when they repeatedly assess that "major parties just miscalculated" how to act in times of crisis; when they suggest new forms of "interactions between party members and the party organizations"; when they advise "patience until party leaders on their own figure out strategies to improve their responsiveness to their 'ordinary workers' members"; when they insist on the idea of ??"strengthening party leadership"; and so on.

I believe that relying on partisan politics; the old (or renewed) political parties; party leadership; social mobilization around parties, etc., as a response to the current crisis, is misguided. This is because the social and economic conditions that gave meaning to political parties, and more generally to traditional forms of political representation, have disappeared. The key—in my opinion—is that we are undergoing a difficult transition from a class society (a few internally homogeneous social classes with stable interests) to a society with significant economic dispersion (self-employed, freelancers, part-time workers, the unemployed, informal workers, etc.) and a radical multiculturalism. In social and cultural terms, our societies not only appear fragmented into a vast diversity of groups with heterogeneous identities and/or interests (women, indigenous people, ethnic minorities, etc.), but also—in addition—each person exhibits a multifaceted identity. Today it is difficult to define someone -as in the past- as a worker, or a feminist, or an anarchist. That person can be, at the same time, a worker, a feminist, anti-immigrant, pro-drug use, anti-gun, anti-abortion: each of these facets, added together, constitute a person's identity. The "problem" that this situation generates is serious because therein lies the promise of an unrepresentable political perspective. The issue is grave because our entire constitutional structure, along with our political-party organization, has been prepared for a society that no longer exists and that cannot be recreated on its old terms. This is why the old constitutional structure is outdated (different branches of government representing different sectors of society, as in the idea of ??"Lords and Commons" or "the few and the many"); and the "old toolbox" of constitutionalism (more constitutional rights, more courts) is no longer useful. This is why it no longer makes sense to redesign political parties, or to continue betting on old forms of political representation, or to make proposals to strengthen party leadership. The fact is that the traditional "constitutional framework" has become a "tight suit" that no longer fits the "body" of these new societies, and the remedy of party politics that we appealed to in the 20th century (in order to continue making political representation possible). It no longer serves us -now, at the beginning of the 21st century- to achieve the old “noble dream” of constitutionalism (full inclusion/full social representation, checks and balances, etc.).

The social, economic, and cultural changes that our societies have been undergoing since the end of the 20th century require new political and constitutional responses. These responses must move beyond nostalgia for a bygone era that we will not recover (the era of strong political parties and unions, of large social movements). Furthermore, these responses must be attentive to the need for new forms of representation (perhaps representation to decide on a single issue and then dissolve, as sometimes happens in the new Citizens' Assemblies). And, of course, these responses must be aware of the troubling legacy of old practices: captured institutions; political elites that are difficult to remove from their public positions; party leaders who, once in power, seek to erode the old system of checks and balances, and so on.

In their new book, Tuhnet and Bugaric show themselves open to some of the alternatives I have just suggested —for instance, they have warmly welcomed initiatives such as Citizens' Assemblies and other renewed forms of political participation—but their underlying analysis remains anchored in assumptions and proposals specific to a society that no longer exists. Nevertheless, the sharpness, curiosity, critical analysis, and open-mindedness that continue to characterize their study of the state of democratic constitutionalism are highly commendable.

Roberto Gargarella is Professor of Constitutional Law at the Universidad de Buenos Aires. You can reach him by e-mail at roberto.gargarella@gmail.com. 

Le cliché a été exposé pendant plus de deux mois dans le cadre du Deauville Sport Images Festival ouvert le 6 juin, sans aucun incident, jusqu'à ce qu'un internaute s'indigne le 11 août de sa légende. Celle-ci mentionne simplement que les bâtiments ont été détruit "lors des opérations terrestres et aériennes israéliennes". Les motifs de cette indignation sont relativement obscurs, car il est tout de même difficile de soutenir que ce paysage en ruines a une autre cause.

Quoi qu'il en soit, le maire de Deauville n'exige pas davantage de précisions et retire la photo le 20 août. Il invoque "un souci d'apaisement" et la nécessité de "faire taire une polémique devenue disproportionnée". Étrange motivation tout de même, car de polémique, il n'y en avait point. Les seuls à s'agiter étaient quelques rares internautes sur les réseaux sociaux.

Le juge des référés, saisi par l'Observatoire de la liberté de création, s'est montré peu réceptif à cette idée d'une nouvelle composante de l'ordre public qui serait, en quelque sorte, le confort des autorités locales. Il suspend donc la décision, et déclare, plutôt sèchement, que la décision de l'élu porte une atteinte grave et manifestement illégale à la liberté d'expression, dont fait partie la liberté de création artistique.

Certes la décision semblait prévisible, et l'affaire pourrait sembler anecdotique. Elle ne l'est pas. Elle pose en effet une question importante à une époque où les lobbies exercent leur puissance sans se cacher. Une personne publique peut-elle retirer une oeuvre qu'elle a choisi d'exposer, lorsque celle-ci devient politiquement embarrassante ?

La liberté de programmation n'est pas un droit à la déprogrammation 

Le moyen essentiel de la commune semblait, a priori, aussi simple que séduisant. Puisque l'organisateur d'une exposition dispose d'une liberté de programmation, cette liberté aurait pour conséquence nécessaire celle de retirer une oeuvre. Autrement dit, celui qui peut programmer peut aussi déprogrammer.

Mais ce raisonnement est précisément trop simple. Il est même totalement faux. La loi du 7 juillet 2016 consacre la liberté de création artistique dans son article 1er. Cette liberté de création a pour conséquence une liberté de diffusion (article 2), et les collectivités publiques ont pour mission de es protéger, y compris en "veillant au respect de la liberté de programmation artistique" (article 3).

Bien entendu, la commune et ses conseils ont mis la poussière sous le tapis, en omettant de faire allusion à ce texte, mais une liberté garantie par la voie législative demeure une liberté digne de protection. En l'espèce, elle protège la programmation contre les ingérences arbitraires. Et pour qu'une déprogrammation ne soit pas arbitraire, elle doit reposer sur un solide motif d'intérêt général.

La jurisprudence antérieure allait déjà dans ce sens. Dans ses ordonnances du 23 décembre 2020 sur la fermeture des lieux de spectacles, théâtres et cinémas, durant le Covid, le juge des référés avait affirmé que la liberté de création artistique était une "liberté fondamentale" de nature à justifier un référé-liberté. Une ordonnance du 14 avril 2021 étend ensuite cette protection aux galeries d'art.

Plus concrètement, le retrait d'un tableau a été débattu à propos de Fuck Abstraction de Miriam Cahn exposé au Palais de Tokyo. La toile, présentée comme pédopornographique par des associations catholiques, a fait l'objet d'une demande de retrait, immédiatement rejetée par les responsables du Musée d'Art Moderne. Le juge des référés refuse de suspendre ce refus et d'ordonner le retrait du tableau dans une ordonnance du 14 avril 2023. L'ordonnance du 3 septembre 2026 s'inscrit dans cette jurisprudence, lorsqu'il affirme que le retrait d'une oeuvre d'art "porte une atteinte grave" à la liberté d'expression, à la liberté de création artistique, et à la liberté d'accès aux oeuvres culturelles.

Photo de Jehad Alshrafi, photographe palestinien travaillant pour l'AFP

De Marseille à Deauville 

Cette dernière affaire montre que le moyen tiré de la sensibilité religieuses ou politique de tel ou tel groupe de personnes n'est pas pertinent pour contester la programmation ou la déprogrammation d'une oeuvre d'art.

Le 25 octobre 2025, le juge des référés du tribunal administratif de Marseille suspend la décision du maire de Marseille qui avait annulé au dernier moment la projection du film Sacré Coeur dans un cinéma municipal. Il considérait que son contenu religieux était contraire à la neutralité du service public. Le juge écarte cet argument, et affirme que la programmation d'une oeuvre n'implique aucunement le fait d'endosser son message. Un film catholique ne transforme pas une équipe municipale en propagandiste religieux. 

A Deauville, la photo des ruines de Gaza ne transforme pas la ville en soutien du Hamas. La commune doit simplement être neutre.

Bien entendu, la situation est très différente lorsque des lieux institutionnels sont utilisés à des fins de propagande. Le Conseil d'État, dans un arrêt du 21 juillet 2025, Commune de La Courneuve sanctionne ainsi, pour manquement à la neutralité, l'apposition d'une banderole sur le fronton de la mairie, portant l'inscription "Gaza, Stop au génocide".

Mais une banderole exposée sur la mairie n'a rien à voir avec une photo exposée dans un festival. Dans le premier cas, c'est la collectivité qui parle, et qui affirme sa conviction, sans souci de la neutralité. Dans le second, la collectivité se borne à donner à voir une oeuvre. La situation est différente car exiger la neutralité pour chaque oeuvre présentée dans une musée ou une expositions imposerait évidemment une programmation aseptisée, sans conflits, sans religion, mais aussi sans intérêt.

Quelques réactions ne font pas un trouble à l'ordre public

Ne restait donc à la commune de Deauville que le moyen traditionnel tiré du trouble à l'ordre public, issu de la célèbre jurisprudence Benjamin de 1933. Mais précisément, selon cette jurisprudence, une interdiction de l'exercice d'une liberté ne peut être prononcée parce que des protestations sont possibles. L'autorité de police doit démontrer qu'elle n'avait pas d'autre moyen que l'interdiction, en l'espèce le retrait de la photo, pour assurer l'ordre public à Deauville.

Or la commune n'apporte pas cette preuve, loin de là. Ses éléments pour démontrer l'atteinte à l'ordre public manquent un peu de sérieux. Le "souci d'apaisement", invoqué en premier lieu, n'est guère recevable puisque, justement, l'ordre public n'est pas le moins du monde troublé. Il n'y a donc pas lieu de l'apaiser. Le juge note que l'affaire a été déclenchée par le message d'un internaute sur les réseaux sociaux, qui a suscité moins de 130 réponses. L'ordre public, en l'espèce purement virtuel, semblait donc modestement menacé. 

En second lieu, la commune invoquait le fait qu'un individu avait été appréhendé à Deauville le 25 mai 2026 alors qu'il proférait des injures antisémites. Or, l'exposition n'a commencé que le 6 juin, ce qui démontre qu'il n'existe aucun lien entre les deux. A cela s'ajoute qu'entre le 6 juin et le 20 août, date du retrait, il ne s'est rien passé. L'ordre public à Deauville n'a pas été troublé le moins de monde. 

Sur ce point, le seul plaidable en l'état de la jurisprudence, le dossier de la commune était maigre, pour ne pas dire squelettique. La décision du juge des référés n'est donc pas une surprise. Mais il est bon de rappeler quelquefois que la liberté d'expression, et surtout la liberté d'expression artistique, ne saurait être limitée dans le seul but de satisfaire des électeurs ou un lobby. 

La photo exposée donnait à voir un math de football au milieu des ruines .. "Regardez travailler les bâtisseurs de ruines", a écrit Paul Éluard.

La liberté d'expression dans le manuel de Libertés publiques : chapitre 9 

•  Sarah Wharton, Harvard Law Library, discusses here experiences this summer attending “Researching Medieval Manuscripts: From Cataloging to Cultural History” at Rare Book School at Oxford University (Amicus Libris).  

• "A discussion between Carolina Law Professor Michael Gerhardt and University of Virginia law professor Saikrishna Prakash on the powers the Constitution grants the president and what they mean today," Monday, September 14, 5:30–7 p.m, UNC Law.

• The legal historian Alan Rogers, emeritus professor of history, Boston College, is dead.   

• Andrew Wender Cohen discusses his book “Gangster of New York on the BBC HistoryExtra podcast. 

• A press release on the research of Andrew Torrance, University of Kansas Law, on the legal history of the kiss. 

• Daniel Immerwahr reviews Nikolas Bowie and Daphna Renan's Supremacy: How Rule by the Court Replaced Government by the People (New Yorker).  

• "Step back into Maine’s early legal history on Thursday, September 24, 2026, from 6:00 PM to 8:00 PM, for a special, free dress rehearsal performance of True Crime: 1815 – The Trial of Dr. Moses Adams. The main event will be held Friday, September 25, 2026 at the Ellsworth Public Library" (Bar Harbor Story).    

• Bronx County Court House, 1933 (NYPL)

  The Historical Society of the New York Courts, the New York City Criminal Court, Bronx County, and the Bronx County Supreme Court, Criminal Term will hold the hybrid program America 250: The Bronx Perspective on Thursday, September 24, 2026, 1:15 - 2:15 PM.  It will trace “the history of Bronx County through legal landmarks from 1776 to today, addressing how the County has changed from an agrarian community to a diverse and bustling borough."

• "The Irish Legal History Society is to take part in the Dublin Festival of History hosting a panel discussion on, ‘courts, crime and hidden lives in Dublin’ on 29 September" (ILN). 

• Lawbook Exchange's September 2026 list on Scholarly Law and Legal History.   

• ICYMI: Richard Re on the sloughing off of originalism within the Marble Palace (SCOTUSblog).  Gautham Rao takes issue with Chief Justice Roberts's biographical sketch of William Howard Taft (Philadelphia Inquirer).  Jodi Kantor's article on Supreme Court justices' papers (NYT). Marcia Coyle on the Constitutional Fight to Preserve [Presidential] History (NCC).

Weekend Roundup is a weekly feature compiled by all the Legal History bloggers. 

• Michelle Qingzi Zang, Rekindling the Multilateral Discourse on Process and Production Methods under the Contemporary Trade-Environment Nexus
• Sébastien Noël, Assessing the Barriers to the EU’s Green and Low-Carbon Hydrogen Imports
• Yanwen Zhang, Investor-State Dispute Settlement Reform in and by International Organisations
• Anastasios Gourgourinis & Alexandros Papadimitriou, Micro, Small and Medium-Sized Enterprises Owned or Led by Members of Under-Represented and Disadvantaged Social Groups: Inclusive Entrepreneurship through Free Trade Agreements

     

The Annual Conference of the American Association of Private International Law (ASADIP) will take place from 20 to 23 October 2026 in San Salvador (El Salvador). It is entitled the transformative spirit of Private International Law (“La vocación transformadora del Derecho Internacional Privado”).

The deadline to submit posters has been extended to 13 September 2026.

We travelled to Halle, the university city on the river Saale and – as some people claim (not the people of Magdeburg) – the largest city in the state of Saxony-Anhalt. On Sunday, the state votes for a new parliament, and as everyone knows, the result could hand legislative and executive power in a German state to the far right for the first time in the country’s post-war history. Their stated aim: to “liberate German scholarship and restore it to itself through fundamental reforms.” How are the people who would be most directly affected by that? The people who live, work, study and do research in Halle? We met a few of them.

I.

Winfried Kluth meets us outside the Juridicum. He has held the chair of public law at the Martin Luther University of Halle-Wittenberg for more than a quarter of a century now. It looks like a vineyard, he says, pointing proudly at the architectural model of the sleek 1990s building with its stepped, terraced façade. Labourers in the vineyard of the law: this is where they’re trained, at the state’s only law faculty. How’s the mood at the university right now? Pretty good, actually. Last year the university landed a Cluster of Excellence for the first time – a real triumph. Student numbers are stable, something many other universities in eastern Germany can only dream of. “As a university, we’re in an incredibly privileged position here,” Kluth says. “Compared to Cologne or Trier, we’re living in paradise.”

What can, should and may scholars do to resist this planned “liberation to itself”? His university has taken “a very clear stance”, Kluth says: back in 2024 it committed itself explicitly to “democracy, diversity, tolerance and openness to the world.” Last year, he co-founded an association that sends academics into schools under a “Rent a Prof” scheme to talk with pupils, and that has put up large posters urging people to “vote for democracy” on Sunday. The AfD’s demand for political “neutrality” doesn’t unsettle the professor of public law in the slightest: under existing higher education law, he says, a university professor is “not merely entitled but obliged to raise his voice.” Since 2020, Saxony-Anhalt’s state constitution has declared it “the duty of all state authority and the responsibility of every individual” to oppose racism, antisemitism, and the revival of National Socialist ideology. Though Kluth doesn’t necessarily read it as a sign of a healthy democratic culture that “the constitution assumes people won’t do this on their own and has to call on them to do it.”

Kluth’s own field, migration law, will most likely soon be in high demand, once the AfD tries to put its “remigration” programme into practice. Legal expertise won’t be in short supply: Hans-Georg Maaßen, the former head of Germany’s domestic intelligence agency and the man tipped as interior minister in a future AfD government, spent years in charge of asylum law at the Federal Interior Ministry. “He knows his way around migration law.” But however much legal know-how the AfD brings to bear, Kluth expects its “remigration” plans to run into practical limits soon enough. Deportation numbers are already falling. “The easy cases have all been dealt with, and no country will take back people without a passport or replacement papers – no matter how determined you are, it won’t help.” Harassing migrants through administrative means to drive them out of the country is possible, in principle, but it takes a lot of work. The immigration offices are already chronically understaffed. “Nobody wants to work there.”

II.

It’s not just Germany – it seems as if the whole world wants to know what’s happening on the ground in Saxony-Anhalt these days. How fortunate, one might think, that Halle happens to be home to a highly renowned Max Planck Institute for Social Anthropology. In a converted nineteenth-century villa alongside modern annexes, researchers from all over the world study the relationship between law and people – and people within the law. What do these field researchers make of what’s unfolding right on their doorstep in Halle? Marie-Claire Foblets, head of the “Law and Anthropology” department, excuses herself: as a Belgian who was never socialised into the German academic system, she says, she’s “not the right person for this conversation,” and besides, she’s about to leave for an extended stay abroad, so she won’t “experience the mood before the state election” first-hand.

Instead, we’re met by two doctoral researchers who are all the more willing and able to give us a personal, first-hand sense of the mood. Niklas Cuno is from Magdeburg, Lukas Bornschein from a village near Zwickau, just across the state border in Saxony. That sets them apart from many of their academic colleagues, who come from all over the world. Both are based at the Max Planck Institute but also teach at the university, where they both studied law. Even though the institute sits geographically at the heart of Halle, they say, the city and the world of scholarship often barely take note of each other. Part of the reason, they suspect, is that for many researchers Halle is just a stopover, which saps their interest in getting actively involved in city life – and that’s not a Halle peculiarity, the two of them argue, but a structural problem facing university towns across eastern Germany.

The lack of interest runs in the other direction too, though. Back in April, Niklas and Lukas published a thorough analysis on our blog of the AfD’s migration policy plans for Saxony-Anhalt. The piece, they tell us, generated substantial media coverage nationally – but not locally, in Saxony-Anhalt itself. The regional papers didn’t even respond.

Still, they read the mood around them rather differently overall. He’s never experienced an election that has electrified people so intensely, Niklas says – both negatively and positively. The university is hosting countless events on academic freedom, neighbourhood initiatives built around solidarity have sprung up, and people are throwing themselves into door-to-door campaigning, pouring enormous amounts of time and energy into it. That gives him hope. “For a lot of people, this election is what’s politicising them in the first place – faced with this blue wall we’re now standing in front of.”

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III.

And the students? We’ve arranged to meet Lui on the Steintor campus – a 21-year-old geography student from Görlitz in eastern Saxony and active with Studis gegen Rechts (Students Against the Right). He has nothing but good things to say about the city and the university. “The university has actually always been fairly steadfast.” When the AfD parliamentarian Hans-Thomas Tillschneider – a possible future science minister – demanded in January 2026 that the state’s universities disclose information on courses taught over the past five years “with a colonial or postcolonial focus”, including student numbers and theses, the University of Halle refused to hand over the information after internal deliberation – unlike, for instance, Merseburg University of Applied Sciences.

For now, Studis gegen Rechts is still recognised as an official student group, which gives them access to rooms and materials. Lui doesn’t much expect that to last past the election. “The university will come under enormous pressure.”

We also tried, unsuccessfully, to talk to conservative students from the Ring of Christian Democratic Students (RCDS). After some back and forth, the board of RCDS Halle let us know that, if we sent our questions in writing beforehand, they would be “willing to consider whether and to what extent we can answer them in writing.” What we’d wanted was to get a feel for the mood by talking to one of these young Christian Democrats – we weren’t in the mood, in the end, for a written exchange.

IV.

In the courtyard of the Moritzburg – once the archbishop’s seat, now a museum – there’s a shaded café. That’s where we meet, for lunch, the constitutional lawyer Dirk Hanschel and the political scientist Petra Dobner. Both have close ties to Verfassungsblog as co-initiators of our recent symposium “Bulwark or Gateway?” on Saxony-Anhalt, and both have spent months tirelessly working out scenarios and countermeasures – including, and especially, how the university where they teach and research should respond to an AfD election victory.

How’s it going? Well, says Dirk. “A mix of brace-for-impact and positive energy.” He recently joined the Greens and has been handing out leaflets at a campaign stand outside the Edeka supermarket – a strange experience, when students walk past and see him standing there. “The most important thing for me – and I keep telling myself this, because I’m not exactly the bravest person around – is that we need to get braver. That we need to link arms.” He draws positive energy “from people who show up from everywhere and say: now it counts!” The latest polls – a slight rise for the SPD and the Greens, a slight dip for the AfD – have given him some hope. “I have this feeling that something’s shifting.”

Petra disagrees. The polls can’t be trusted, she says. That’s a “Paulusviertel feeling” – in Halle’s bourgeois Paulusviertel, a Green stronghold, you’ll barely spot an AfD poster – and it misreads the climate in the rest of the state. In the villages, she says, there’s enormous social pressure to vote AfD. Whatever votes the AfD needs to reach a majority, she says, it will find among CDU renegades lured by the promise of ministerial office. “I’m worried that on Sunday evening a mob will be rampaging through the streets. That the racism that already exists anyway will break loose.”

Is it the right strategy for outsiders to warn the people of Saxony-Anhalt about the economic and political trouble they’d be heading into by putting the AfD in government? Should people be urged to stay in the state if they can, or should those who want to leave be encouraged to go? The two of them argue about this, with each other and with us, with tremendous commitment – until, all of a sudden, the waitress interrupts. She turns out to be one of Petra’s students, has overheard what we’re discussing at the table, and wants to know from her professor: what’s going to happen to her degree? What will she be taught in political science after the election?

Don’t worry, Petra tells her. Nothing is going to happen. In her department, she’s certain, everyone is standing firm.

V.

A little later we ring the bell at Markus Leber’s, a lawyer specialising in higher education law. He spent ten years as chancellor of the University of Halle, and when it comes to university administration and funding in Saxony-Anhalt, few people know more than he does. What happens if a future science minister Tillschneider, as promised in the AfD’s election manifesto, tries to abolish gender studies and postcolonial studies in Saxony-Anhalt? What happens if he offers universities an additional permanent professorship, on condition that it researches, under the euphemism “population science”, countermeasures against the alleged “dying out of our people”?

As for the gender studies and postcolonial studies programmes supposedly on the chopping block, Leber stays cool – mostly because Saxony-Anhalt doesn’t actually have any. “I honestly don’t know what they think they’re going to shoot down.” Universities in Saxony-Anhalt are, in places, still working through staff cuts dating back to the 1990s, he says: “every last drop of fat was squeezed out of the system long ago.” He doesn’t see Tillschneider’s “population science” professorship materialising any time soon either: most universities would simply wave away the offer of structural funding for such a chair, because it wouldn’t fit their academic profile. The one possible exception might be the University of Halle, given its social sciences departments. But as long as the faculty there refuses and resists the temptation to just take the money and try to outmanoeuvre the minister somehow, the plan won’t work out.

How long the universities in Saxony-Anhalt can withstand the financial pressure the government puts on them, though, is another matter. Their funding is set through target agreements with the state government, running until 2029. Until then – and as long as the government doesn’t unilaterally terminate these agreements, as happened in Berlin – the money is secure, for now. But negotiations over the next round of target agreements start a full year in advance. The current agreements have no enforcement mechanism, meaning that missed targets carry no immediate consequences. But whether targets were met becomes the benchmark once negotiations begin. And if the AfD minister goes looking for unmet targets, Leber reckons, he’ll find some.

VI.

On our way back to the station, we pass the Steintor campus once more, completely deserted now during the lecture-free period. By October, when the university term starts again and the campus fills up again, the science minister might no longer be from the SPD, but might instead be named Hans-Thomas Tillschneider. Nobody yet knows what feelings and fears the students, research staff and professors will face once they return to campus. Perhaps they’ll share the worries voiced by the people we spoke to. Or perhaps they’ll turn out to be apolitical, just passing through on their way to the next career step, or they may even have voted AfD themselves, helped carry the far right into office, and be looking forward to an authoritarian overhaul of academia. Either way, the people we spoke to have not resigned themselves to watching the AfD march through unopposed and simply waiting for that overhaul to arrive. Some of them are unsettled, others cautiously optimistic – but everyone we spoke to is preparing for what might be coming, is already active, and committed to remain so after the election. Whatever the result.

Editor’s Pick

by MAXIM BÖNNEMANN

In recent years, our daily work as editors has changed radically. The volume of submissions has exploded, while their quality has declined; language, tone, and structure are becoming increasingly uniform. As we try to keep the (still) unmistakable singsong of language machines away from Verfassungsblog, we watch with a shudder as the ways scholars think and write are changing. What this transformation means for language and knowledge, authorship and morality, and political power and epistemic pluralism is the subject of Roberto Simanowski’s brilliant and eye-opening book.

Roberto Simanowski, Sprachmaschinen. Eine Philosophie der künstlichen Intelligenz, Verlag C.H.Beck, 2025 (only available in German).

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The Summer on Verfassungsblog

summarised by EVA MARIA BREDLER

Here we are again: the skies are grey, the clouds are crying, the days are getting shorter. Personally, I think the best season of the year is now to come: golden leaves, crisp air, evenings you can happily spend at home instead of feeling obliged to catch the last rays of sunshine. Hopefully you built up a little stock of it over August (even if the moon briefly got in the way).

Photo: Pia Löffler

The election in Saxony-Anhalt cast its shadow ahead of time too, as you can see in our ten most-read pieces from August (in no particular order).

As we know, the AfD could win an absolute majority there. And then what? The newly elected state parliament will have to elect a new Minister-President. Exactly when, though, is unclear – or at least it is no longer (clearly) set out in Saxony-Anhalt’s constitution. ROBERT BÖTTNER (GER) explains why that could work in the AfD’s favour.

Anyone reading the AfD Saxony-Anhalt’s governing programme quickly runs into the term “remigration”. The word is not only Germany’s “Unwort” of the Year 2023 – the idea behind it  is also mostly unlawful. Yet many steps of a remigration policy could still draw on legal instruments. DANA SCHMALZ (GER) shows how an authoritarian-populist state government could push forward denaturalisation, expulsion and deportation – and where the limits lie.

Remigration was also at the heart of the Gesellschaft für Freiheitsrechte’s expert opinion, published at the end of June. It examines in detail the AfD’s ethnic-cultural notion of the people and asks whether the AfD is unconstitutional under Article 21(2) of the Basic Law. This opinion was sharply criticised by criminal law scholars Elisa Hoven and Marco Vöhringer, and separately by Frauke Rostalski. BERNHARD STÜER (GER), in turn, argues that their pieces harm factual and constructive discourse and calls for compliance with the ethical standards of debate.

In the spirit of that same factual and constructive discourse, ELISA HOVEN, FRAUKE ROSTALSKI and MARCO VÖHRINGER (GER) respond to Stüer: in their view, several points of his criticism rest on a misrepresentation of their arguments, which need to be corrected.

Ahead of the election in Saxony-Anhalt, the debate over a ban on the AfD is gathering momentum again, not least since Defence Minister Boris Pistorius and Baden-Württemberg’s Minister-President Cem Özdemir came out in favour of it in the Frankfurter Allgemeine Sonntagszeitung. But are judges actually allowed to take such a public stance? That question was raised by an open letter in which hundreds of jurists call for an AfD ban. Weighing judicial restraint against the right to political engagement, ANTJE VON UNGERN-STERNBERG (GER) argues that a militant democracy permits precisely this kind of defence of the constitution.

Defending the constitution is a tricky business – depending on how you interpret it, that defence can demand almost opposite things. Berlin’s population wants to expropriate “Deutsche Wohnen & Co.” in order to give effect to Article 15 of the Basic Law, while the coalition committee is currently seeking to ban the socialisation of housing at state level by federal law. That would bury Berlin’s expropriation initiative for good. QUENTIN HERBSTER (GER) considers such a ban unconstitutional: in his view, the federal government lacks the legislative competence for it.

While the coalition shields private housing construction, it is about to leave families out in the cold: no fewer than five family-policy benefits are set to be cut. SUSANNE DERN and CARA RÖHNER (GER) show how the plan would push women, children and low-income families further into precarity.

Once social benefits disappear, poverty can follow fast. The number of people affected by poverty is rising in Germany – yet its most visible form is being pushed out of the cityscape. Dortmund and Düren have introduced begging-ban zones around outdoor dining areas, banning even silent begging. But the mere sight of a person begging does not, in itself, endanger public safety and order, explains ADIL DEMIRKOL (GER).

Not to be missed, meanwhile, was the crisis on the streets of Ceuta: in late July, 60,000 migrants arrived in the Spanish enclave of Ceuta in North Africa within 24 hours – dozens died attempting the crossing. JONAS BORNEMANN (ENG) examines whether EU law offers real tools to respond, and what the political blame game reveals about solidarity between the Member States.

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The politically easy and established response to crisis and fear is: more security. The federal government has accordingly adopted a draft security-policy legislative package that massively expands the powers of the intelligence services and, in doing so, fundamentally overhauls their legal basis. The subject is technical, but ANNA HÖNING (GER) manages to give a clear overview of this “mega-reform” – and to track down its unconstitutional provisions.

That was also the idea behind our symposium “Measuring Suspicion: Automated Data Analysis and the New Security Architecture” (GER). Automated data analysis promises to turn scattered data into a coherent, consistent picture: systems like Palantir’s Gotham link information from different sources for security agencies, detect patterns and make connections visible. But it is not only the promises that are considerable – so are the risks of automated data analysis. The symposium surveys Germany’s newly emerging security architecture and its consequences for fundamental rights, democratic oversight, and the relationship between the state and Big Tech.

This week, we also launched our symposium “Beyond Sovereignty: Rethinking International Law” (ENG), inspired by a recent essay by Professor Monica Hakimi: Thinking Constructively about International Law. In what sense is international law “law”? How should we think about its existence, effectiveness, and justification? And must we necessarily answer these questions through the lens of a classical, sovereignty-centred conceptual framework?

Ahead of the election in Saxony-Anhalt, it is also worth browsing through our symposium “Bulwark or Gateway?” (GER), which explores the ambivalent role of federalism. The fact that Saxony-Anhalt could become the first German state governed by the far right is itself made possible by the federal order: it allows the states different terms of democratic legitimation than apply at the federal level. At the same time, all the states are bound into numerous federal cooperation and financing mechanisms that sharply constrain a state’s freedom to reinvent itself politically and act with legal autonomy. The contributions explore whether federalism is a bulwark against right-wing extremism – or rather a gateway for it.

By Monday, we’ll know more. Guard your sunshine stock well – we’ll be needing it.

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That’s it for this week. Take care and all the best!

Yours,

the Verfassungsblog Team

If you would like to receive the weekly editorial as an e-mail, you can subscribe here.

The post Facing the Blue Wall appeared first on Verfassungsblog.

Wir sind nach Halle gefahren, der Universitätsstadt an der Saale und, wie manche behaupten (nicht die Magdeburger), größten Metropole des Bundeslands Sachsen-Anhalt. Dort wird am Sonntag ein neuer Landtag gewählt und, wie jeder weiß, könnte danach zum ersten Mal in der Nachkriegsgeschichte Deutschlands staatliche Legislativ- und Exekutivgewalt in die Hände von Rechtsextremen fallen. Deren erklärtes Ziel: „die deutsche Wissenschaft durch grundlegende Reformen wieder zu sich selbst befreien“. Wie geht es den Menschen, die dies am unmittelbarsten treffen wird? Die in Halle leben, arbeiten, studieren und forschen? Wir haben ein paar davon getroffen.

I.

Vor dem Juridicum empfängt uns Winfried Kluth, seit mehr als einem Vierteljahrhundert Lehrstuhlinhaber für Öffentliches Recht an der Martin-Luther-Universität Halle-Wittenberg. Wie ein Weinberg, sagt er und zeigt voll Stolz auf das Architekturmodell des schicken 90er-Jahre-Baus mit seiner gestuften Terrassenarchitektur. Arbeiter:innen im Weinberg des Rechts: Hier werden sie ausgebildet, an der einzigen Jurafakultät des Landes. Wie ist die Stimmung gerade an der Uni? Super eigentlich. Das Exzellenzcluster im letzten Jahr, zum ersten Mal, ein großer Erfolg. Stabile Studierendenzahlen, wovon viele andere Hochschulen in Ostdeutschland nur träumen können. „Wir sind hier als Uni total privilegiert“, sagt Kluth. „Wenn ich unsere Uni mit Köln oder Trier vergleiche, leben wir hier im Paradies.“

Was kann, soll und darf die Wissenschaft tun, um sich gegen die geplante „Befreiung zu sich selbst“ zur Wehr zu setzen? „Sehr klar positioniert“ sei seine Universität, sagt Kluth, habe sich schon 2024 auf ein klares Bekenntnis zu „Demokratie, Vielfalt, Toleranz und Weltoffenheit“ festgelegt. Er selbst hat letztes Jahr einen Verein mitgegründet, der mit dem Programm „Rent a Prof“ in die Schulen geht, um dort das Gespräch mit Schüler:innen zu suchen, und mit großformatigen Plakaten dazu aufruft, am Sonntag „Demokratie zu wählen“. Von der Forderung der AfD nach politischer „Neutralität“ lässt sich der Staatsrechtslehrer kein bisschen beirren: Schon nach geltendem Hochschulrecht sei er als Universitätsprofessor „nicht nur berechtigt, sondern verpflichtet, die Stimme zu erheben“. Seit 2020 erklärt die sachsen-anhaltische Landesverfassung es zur „Verpflichtung aller staatlichen Gewalt und Verantwortung jedes Einzelnen“, sich gegen Rassismus, Antisemitismus und die Wiederbelebung nationalsozialistischen Gedankenguts zu stemmen. Wobei Kluth es nicht unbedingt als Ausweis demokratischer Kultur betrachtet, wenn „die Verfassung davon ausgeht, dass die Leute das nicht von sich aus machen und sie sie erst dazu auffordern muss“.

Kluths Spezialgebiet, das Migrationsrecht, wird vermutlich schon bald sehr gefragt sein, wenn die AfD versucht, ihr „Remigration“-Programm umzusetzen. An rechtlicher Expertise wird es ihr dabei nicht fehlen: Hans-Georg Maaßen, der ehemalige Präsident des Bundesamts für Verfassungsschutz, der als künftiger Innenminister in einer AfD-Regierung gehandelt wird, war im Bundesinnenministerium lange für Asylrecht zuständig. „Der kennt sich im Migrationsrecht aus.“ Aber auch mit noch so viel juristischem Sachverstand werde die AfD mit ihren „Remigration“-Plänen bald an praktische Grenzen stoßen, vermutet Kluth. Die Zahl der Abschiebungen sinke ohnehin schon. „Die einfachen Fälle sind abgearbeitet, und Leute ohne Pass oder Ersatzpapiere nimmt kein Staat auf; da können Sie so entschlossen sein, wie Sie wollen.“ Migrant:innen administrativ zu drangsalieren und so aus dem Land zu ekeln, sei zwar möglich, mache aber viel Arbeit. Die Ausländerbehörden litten ohnehin schon unter größter Personalnot. „Da will keiner hin.“

II.

Nicht nur ganz Deutschland, die ganze Welt interessiert sich anscheinend brennend für das, was in Sachsen-Anhalt on the ground geschieht in diesen Tagen. Wie gut, sollte man meinen, dass es mitten in Halle ein höchst renommiertes Max-Planck-Institut für ethnologische Forschung gibt. In einer umgebauten Gründerzeitvilla nebst modernen Nebengebäuden erforschen dort Wissenschaftler:innen aus aller Welt das Verhältnis von Recht zum Menschen und von Menschen im Recht. Was haben die Feldforscher:innen zu dem zu sagen, was da vor ihrer Hallenser Haustür gerade passiert? Marie-Claire Foblets, die Leiterin der Abteilung „Recht und Ethnologie“, entschuldigt sich: Sie sei als Belgierin, die nicht im deutschen Wissenschaftssystem sozialisiert sei, „nicht die richtige Person für dieses Gespräch“ und stehe obendrein vor einem längeren Auslandsaufenthalt, so dass sie die Stimmung vor der Landtagswahl „nicht persönlich mitbekommen“ werde.

Empfangen werden wir von zwei Doktoranden, die diese Stimmung dafür umso persönlicher und direkter wahrzunehmen bereit und imstande sind. Niklas Cuno kommt aus Magdeburg, Lukas Bornschein aus einem Dorf in der Nähe von Zwickau (jenseits der Landesgrenze in Sachsen). Das unterscheide sie von vielen ihrer wissenschaftlichen Kolleg:innen, die aus aller Welt kämen. Die beiden sind nicht nur am Max-Planck-Institut, sondern geben auch Lehrveranstaltungen an der Uni, wo sie beide Jura studiert haben. Zwar finde Wissenschaft geographisch im Herzen Halles statt, trotzdem bekämen Stadt und Wissenschaft wechselseitig manchmal nur wenig voneinander mit. Das liege wohl auch daran, dass Halle für viele einfach eine Durchlaufstation sei und das Interesse dann eben nicht so groß, sich aktiv in die Stadtgesellschaft einzubringen – das sei keine hallensische Besonderheit, meinen die beiden, sondern ein strukturelles Problem ostdeutscher Universitätsstädte.

Desinteresse gibt es indessen auch in der umgekehrten Richtung. Niklas und Lukas hatten im April bei uns auf dem Blog die migrationspolitischen Pläne der AfD in Sachsen-Anhalt auf das Gründlichste analysiert. Das Gutachten, berichten die beiden, habe überregional ein großes Medienecho ausgelöst – aber nicht vor Ort in Sachsen-Anhalt. Die Regionalzeitungen hätten nicht mal geantwortet.

Doch die Stimmung in ihrem Umfeld nehmen sie insgesamt anders wahr: Er habe noch nie eine Wahl erlebt, sagt Niklas, die die Menschen so krass negativ wie positiv elektrisiert. An der Uni gebe es unzählige Veranstaltungen zu Wissenschaftsfreiheit, Stadtteilinitiativen zu solidarischer Nachbarschaft hätten sich gebildet, die Leute stürzten sich in den Haustürwahlkampf und investierten wahnsinnig viel Zeit und Ressourcen. Das mache Hoffnung. „Viele Menschen politisieren sich jetzt erst durch diese Wahl, im Angesicht dieser blauen Wand, vor der wir jetzt stehen.“

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III.

Und die Studierenden? Auf dem Campus am Steintor sind wir mit Lui verabredet, 21 Jahre alt, Geographiestudent aus Görlitz in Ostsachsen und aktiv bei den Studis gegen Rechts. Über Stadt und Uni Halle hat er nur Gutes zu sagen. „Die Uni war eigentlich immer verhältnismäßig standhaft.“ Als der AfD-Abgeordnete und mögliche künftige Wissenschaftsminister Hans-Thomas Tillschneider im Januar 2026 von den Hochschulen des Landes über Lehrveranstaltungen samt Zahl der teilnehmenden Studierenden und Abschlussarbeiten „mit kolonialem oder postkolonialem Fokus“ in den letzten fünf Jahren Auskunft verlangte, weigerte sich die Uni Halle nach interner Diskussion, diese Informationen herauszugeben – anders als etwa die Hochschule Merseburg.

Noch sind die Studis gegen Rechts als Hochschulgruppe anerkannt, was ihnen Zugang zu Räumen und Material gebe. Dass das so bleibt nach den Wahlen, erwartet Lui eher nicht. „Die Uni wird unter enormen Druck geraten.“

Vergebens hatten wir versucht, auch mit den konservativen Studierenden vom Ring Christlich-Demokratischer Studenten (RCDS) ins Gespräch zu kommen. Der Vorstand des RCDS Halle hatte uns nach einigem Hin und Her wissen lassen, er sei, wenn wir ihm vorab schriftlich unsere Fragen schicken, „bereit zu prüfen, ob und in welchem Umfang wir diese schriftlich beantworten können“. Um einen Eindruck von der Stimmung zu bekommen, hätten wir gerne persönlich mit einem der jungen CDUler gesprochen – auf ein schriftliches Hin und Her hatten wir dann doch keine Lust.

IV.

Im Hof der Moritzburg, einst Sitz des Erzbischofs und jetzt ein Museum, gibt es ein schattiges Café. Dort treffen wir zum Mittagessen den Verfassungsrechtler Dirk Hanschel und die Politikwissenschaftlerin Petra Dobner, beide dem Verfassungsblog verbunden als Co-Initiator:innen unseres jüngsten Blog-Symposiums „Bollwerk oder Einfallstor?“, und beide seit Monaten unermüdlich damit beschäftigt, Szenarien und Gegenstrategien zu entwerfen – auch und insbesondere wie die Uni, an der sie forschen und lehren, auf einen Wahlsieg der AfD reagieren soll.

Wie geht’s? Naja, sagt Dirk. „Eine Mischung aus Brace for Impact und positiver Energie.“ Er ist seit kurzem Mitglied bei den Grünen, hat am Wahlkampfstand vor Edeka Flyer verteilt, eine sonderbare Erfahrung, wenn die Studierenden vorbeikommen und ihn da stehen sehen. „Für mich ist das Allerwichtigste – und das sag ich mir immer selber, weil ich ja nicht der Allermutigste bin: dass wir mutiger werden. Dass wir uns unterhaken.“ Positive Energie bezieht er „von den Leuten, die von überall herkommen und sagen: Jetzt gilt’s!“ Seit den jüngsten Umfragen – leichtes Plus bei SPD und Grünen, leichtes Minus bei der AfD – habe er Hoffnung geschöpft. „Ich habe das Gefühl, es dreht sich was.“

Anders Petra: Den Umfragen sei nicht zu trauen. Das sei ein „Paulusviertel-Feeling“ (im bürgerlichen Hallenser Paulusviertel, einer Grünen-Hochburg, sieht man kaum ein AfD-Plakat) und verkenne die Stimmung im Land. In den Dörfern werde ein enormer sozialer Druck herrschen, AfD zu wählen. Und die Stimmen, die der AfD im Landtag zur Mehrheit fehlen, werde sie sich bei abtrünnigen CDU-Abgeordneten holen, die sie mit der Aussicht auf Ministerämter lockt. „Ich habe die Sorge, dass am Sonntagabend der Mob durch die Straßen tobt. Dass sich der Rassismus, der hier sowieso vorhanden ist, Bahn bricht.“

Ist es die richtige Strategie, von außen den Sachsen-Anhalter:innen zu signalisieren, in welche ökonomischen und politischen Schwierigkeiten sie sich hineinreiten, wenn sie die AfD an die Regierung lassen? Sollte man appellieren, im Land zu bleiben, wenn man kann, oder sollte man die, die wegwollen, zum Gehen ermutigen? Darüber streiten sich die beiden untereinander und mit uns mit der größten Hingabe, bis uns mit einem Mal die Kellnerin unterbricht. Sie ist eine Studentin von Petra, wie sich herausstellt, hat gehört, worüber wir am Tisch sprechen, und will von ihrer Professorin wissen: Was wird aus ihrem Studium? Was wird sie nach der Wahl beigebracht bekommen im Fach Politikwissenschaft?

Keine Sorge, sagt Petra. Nichts wird passieren. In ihrem Fachbereich, da sei sie sich sicher, sind alle stabil.

V.

Wenig später klingeln wir bei Markus Leber, Rechtsanwalt und Spezialist für Hochschulrecht. Zehn Jahre war er Kanzler der Uni Halle, und was es über Hochschulverwaltung und Hochschulfinanzierung in Sachsen-Anhalt zu wissen gibt, weiß kaum jemand besser als er. Was passiert, wenn ein künftiger Wissenschaftsminister Tillschneider, wie im AfD-Wahlprogramm angekündigt, Gender- und Postkolonialismus-Studien in Sachsen-Anhalt abschaffen will? Was passiert, wenn er den Hochschulen einen zusätzlichen unbefristeten Lehrstuhl anbietet, wenn dort unter dem Euphemismus „Bevölkerungswissenschaft“ Gegenmaßnahmen gegen das behauptete „Absterben unseres Volkes“ erforscht werden?

Was die abzuschaffenden Gender- und Postkolonialismus-Studiengänge betrifft, so bleibt Leber schon deshalb cool, weil es die in Sachsen-Anhalt überhaupt nicht gebe. „Ich weiß gar nicht, was die da abschießen wollen.“ Die Hochschulen in Sachsen-Anhalt laborierten zum Teil noch an Stellenkürzungen aus den 90er-Jahren herum, „da ist alles Fett schon längst herausgepresst“. Tillschneiders Lehrstuhl für „Bevölkerungswissenschaft“ sieht er ebenfalls so schnell nicht kommen: Das Angebot einer strukturellen Förderung eines solchen Lehrstuhls würden die meisten Hochschulen von sich aus abwinken, weil das nicht in ihre wissenschaftliche Struktur passt. Anders wäre das höchstens bei der Uni Halle mit ihren Sozialwissenschaften. Solange sich da aber die Fakultät weigere und der Versuchung widerstehe, das Geld zu nehmen und den Minister irgendwie austricksen zu wollen, gehe dieser Plan nicht auf.

Wie lange die sachsen-anhaltischen Hochschulen dem finanziellen Druck, den die Regierung auf sie ausübt, widerstehen können, stehe aber auf einem anderen Blatt. Ihre finanzielle Ausstattung ist über Zielvereinbarungen mit der Landesregierung geregelt, die bis 2029 laufen. Bis dahin, und solange diese Zielvereinbarungen (wie in Berlin geschehen) nicht von der Regierung einseitig gekündigt werden, sind die Mittel erst einmal sicher. Aber die Verhandlungen über die neuen Zielvereinbarungen beginnen mit einem Jahr Vorlauf. Es gibt in den Verträgen zwar keinen Exekutivmechanismus, d.h. wenn Ziele nicht erreicht werden, bleibt das erst einmal folgenlos. Aber für die Verhandlungen ist die Zielerreichung Maßstab. Und wenn der AfD-Minister nach nicht erreichten Zielen sucht, so Lebers Einschätzung, dann wird er auch etwas finden.

VI.

Auf unserem Weg zurück zum Bahnhof gehen wir noch einmal am Steintorcampus vorbei, der jetzt, während der vorlesungsfreien Zeit, völlig verwaist ist. Wenn im Oktober die Uni wieder anfängt und sich der Campus wieder füllt, könnte der Wissenschaftsminister schon nicht mehr von der SPD kommen, sondern Hans-Thomas Tillschneider heißen. Mit welchen Gefühlen und Ängsten die Studierenden, die wissenschaftlichen Mitarbeiter:innen und Professor:innen dann auf den Campus zurückkehren werden, das weiß gerade noch niemand. Vielleicht treiben sie dann ähnliche Sorgen um wie die Menschen, mit denen wir gesprochen haben. Vielleicht sind sie aber auch unpolitisch, nur auf Zeit und für den nächsten Karriereschritt dort, oder haben gar selbst die AfD gewählt, die Rechten mit in ihre Ämter gehievt und freuen sich auf den autoritären Umbau der Wissenschaft. Unsere Gesprächspartner:innen haben sich jedenfalls nicht damit abgefunden, dem Durchmarsch der AfD tatenlos zuzusehen und diesen Umbau abzuwarten. Auch wenn manche von ihnen verunsichert sind und andere vorsichtig optimistisch: Diejenigen, mit denen wir gesprochen haben, bereiten sich vor auf das, was da vielleicht kommt, sind jetzt schon aktiv und werden es auch nach der Wahl bleiben. Egal, wie sie ausgeht.

Editor’s Pick

von MAXIM BÖNNEMANN

In den letzten Jahren hat sich der Alltag für uns Redakteure radikal verändert. Die Anzahl der Zusendungen explodiert, ihre Qualität sinkt und Sprache, Ton und Struktur gleichen sich immer weiter an. Während wir versuchen, den (noch) unverkennbaren Sing-Sang der Sprachmaschinen vom Verfassungsblog fernzuhalten, beobachten wir zugleich mit Schaudern, wie sich das Denken und Schreiben in der Wissenschaft verändert. Welche Folgen diese Entwicklung für Sprache und Erkenntnis, Autorenschaft und Moral sowie politische Macht und epistemischen Pluralismus hat, hat Roberto Simanowski in diesem ebenso brillanten wie augenöffnenden Buch aufgeschrieben.

Roberto Simanowski, Sprachmaschinen. Eine Philosophie der künstlichen Intelligenz.
Verlag C.H.Beck, 2025.

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Der Sommer auf dem Verfassungsblog

zusammengefasst von EVA MARIA BREDLER

Da sind wir wieder, es graut und nieselt, die Tage werden kürzer. Ich finde ja, die beste Jahreszeit steht jetzt bevor: goldene Blätter, klare Luft, man kann abends wieder gelassen in der Wohnung bleiben, statt unbedingt Sonnenstrahlen einfangen zu müssen. Hoffentlich haben Sie sich über den August davon einen kleinen Vorrat angelegt (auch wenn sich kurzzeitig der Mond in den Weg gestellt hat).

Foto: Pia Löffler

Auch die Wahl in Sachsen-Anhalt hat ihre Schatten vorausgeworfen, wie Sie an unseren zehn meistgelesenen Beiträgen im August ab- und nachlesen können (in no particular order).

Wie wir wissen, könnte die AfD dabei eine absolute Mehrheit erringen. Und dann? Dann muss der frisch gewählte Landtag die Ministerpräsident:in neu wählen. Wann genau steht allerdings in den Sternen, oder jedenfalls nicht (mehr) in der sachsen-anhaltischen Verfassung. Warum das der AfD in die Hände spielen könnte, weiß ROBERT BÖTTNER (DE).

Wer das Regierungsprogramm der AfD Sachsen-Anhalt liest, stößt schnell auf „Remigration“. Remigration ist nicht nur Unwort des Jahres 2023, sondern auch Unrecht. Dennoch lassen sich zahlreiche Schritte jener Remigrationsvorhaben auf rechtlichem Wege durchsetzen. DANA SCHMALZ (DE) zeigt, wie eine autoritär-populistische Landesregierung Ausbürgerung, Ausweisung und Abschiebung vorantreiben könnte – und wo ihr Grenzen gesetzt sind.

Um Remigration ging es auch im Ende Juni erschienenen Gutachten der Gesellschaft für Freiheitsrechte, das sich ausführlich mit dem ethnisch-kulturellen Volksbegriff der AfD auseinandersetzt und untersucht, ob die AfD nach Artikel 21 Absatz 2 GG verfassungswidrig ist. Dieses Gutachten haben die Strafrechtler:innen Elisa Hoven und Marco Vöhringer sowie Frauke Rostalski in der F.A.Z. scharf kritisiert. BERNHARD STÜER (DE) kritisiert wiederum deren Beiträge als schädlich für einen sachlichen und konstruktiven Diskurs und fordert die Einhaltung diskursethischer Standards.

Im Sinne dieses sachlichen und konstruktiven Diskurses replizieren ELISA HOVEN, FRAUKE ROSTALSKI und MARCO VÖHRINGER (DE) auf Stüer: Für sie beruhen mehrere Punkte seiner Kritik auf einer unrichtigen Wiedergabe ihrer Beiträge, die der Korrektur bedürfen.

Vor der Wahl in Sachsen-Anhalt nimmt die Diskussion um das AfD-Parteiverbot wieder Fahrt auf, vor allem seitdem Verteidigungsminister Boris Pistorius und Baden-Württembergs Ministerpräsident Cem Özdemir sich in der Frankfurter Allgemeinen Sonntagszeitung dafür ausgesprochen hatten. Doch dürfen sich eigentlich auch Richter:innen dafür aussprechen? Die Frage warf ein offener Brief auf, in dem Hunderte Jurist:innen ein AfD-Verbot fordern. Zwischen richterlicher Mäßigungspflicht und dem Recht zur politischen Betätigung argumentiert ANTJE VON UNGERN-STERNBERG (DE), dass die wehrhafte Demokratie gerade eine solche Verteidigung der Verfassung erlaube.

Mit der Verteidigung der Verfassung ist es so eine Sache – je nachdem, wie man die Verfassung auslegt, fordert deren Verteidigung nahezu Gegensätzliches. So will die Berliner Bevölkerung „Deutsche Wohnen & Co.“ enteignen, um Art. 15 GG zu verwirklichen, während der Koalitionsausschuss die Vergesellschaftung von Wohnraum auf Landesebene per Bundesgesetz gerade verbieten will. Das würde Berlins Enteignungsinitiative beerdigen. QUENTIN HERBSTER (DE) hält ein entsprechendes Verbot für verfassungswidrig: Dem Bund fehle dafür die Gesetzgebungskompetenz.

Während die Koalition eine schützende Hand über den privaten Wohnungsbau hält, will sie Familien bald im Regen stehen lassen: Gleich fünf familienpolitische Leistungen sollen gekürzt werden. SUSANNE DERN und CARA RÖHNER (DE) zeigen, wie das Vorhaben Frauen, Kinder und einkommensschwache Familien weiter prekarisiert.

Fallen Sozialleistungen weg, kann man schnell in Armut geraten. Die Zahl von armutsbetroffenen Personen steigt in Deutschland – doch ihre erkennbarste Erscheinungsform wird aus dem Stadtbild verdrängt. Dortmund und Düren haben Bettelverbotszonen rund um die Außengastronomie eingeführt; sogar stilles Betteln ist verboten. Doch der bloße Anblick eines bettelnden Menschen begründet keine Gefahr für die öffentliche Sicherheit und Ordnung, erklärt ADIL DEMIRKOL (DE).

Nicht zu übersehen war dagegen die Krise im Stadtbild von Ceuta: Ende Juli  kamen 60.000 Migrant:innen innerhalb von 24 Stunden in der spanischen Enklave Ceuta in Nordafrika an – Dutzende starben bei dem Versuch, die Grenze zu überqueren. JONAS BORNEMANN (EN) analysiert, welche wirksamen Antworten das EU-Recht bereithält – und was das politische blame game über die Solidarität zwischen den Mitgliedstaaten verrät.

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Die politisch einfache wie etablierte Antwort auf Angst und Krisen ist: mehr Sicherheit. So hat die Bundesregierung einen Entwurf für ein sicherheitspolitisches Gesetzespaket verabschiedet, das die Befugnisse der Nachrichtendienste massiv ausweitet und dazu die Rechtsgrundlagen tiefgreifend verändert. Das Thema ist technisch, doch ANNA HÖNING (DE) weiß, die „Mega-Reform“ übersichtlich zusammenzufassen – und die verfassungswidrigen Regelungen aufzuspüren.

Das war auch die Idee hinter unserem Symposium „Die Vermessung des Verdachts: Automatisierte Datenanalyse und die neue Sicherheitsarchitektur“ (DE). Automatisierte Datenanalyse verspricht, aus verstreuten Daten ein kohärentes, stimmiges Bild zu machen: Systeme wie Palantirs Gotham verknüpfen für Sicherheitsbehörden Informationen aus unterschiedlichen Quellen, erkennen Muster und machen Zusammenhänge sichtbar. Doch nicht nur die Versprechen, sondern auch die Risiken automatisierter Datenanalyse sind groß. Das Symposium vermisst Deutschlands neu entstehende Sicherheitsarchitektur und ihre Folgen für Grundrechte, demokratische Kontrolle und das Verhältnis von Staat und Big Tech.

Außerdem haben wir diese Woche das Symposium „Beyond Sovereignty: Rethinking International Law“ (EN) gestartet, inspiriert von einem aktuellen Aufsatz von Professorin Monica Hakimi: Thinking Constructively about International Law.  In welchem Sinne ist Völkerrecht „Recht”? Wie lassen sich seine Existenz, Wirksamkeit und Rechtfertigung denken? Und müssen wir diese Fragen zwangsläufig durch die Brille eines klassisch souveränitätszentrierten Begriffsrahmens beantworten?

Vor der Wahl in Sachsen-Anhalt lohnt es sich auch, durch unser Symposium „Bollwerk oder Einfallstor?“ (DE) zu blättern, in dem es um die ambivalente Rolle des Föderalismus geht. Dass Sachsen-Anhalt das erste rechtsextrem regierte Bundesland Deutschlands werden könnte, wird nämlich durch die föderale Ordnung ermöglicht: Sie erlaubt in den Bundesländern andere demokratische Legitimationsverhältnisse als im Bund. Gleichzeitig sind alle Länder aber auch in zahlreiche föderale Kooperations- und Finanzmechanismen eingebunden, die die Freiheit eines Landes, sich politisch selbständig zu erfinden und rechtlich autonom zu handeln, stark einhegen. Die Beiträge loten die Frage aus, ob der Föderalismus ein Bollwerk gegen Rechtsextremismus ist – oder eher ein Einfallstor.

Montag sind wir schlauer. Hüten Sie Ihren Sonnenvorrat gut, wir werden ihn noch brauchen.

*

Das war’s für diese Woche.

The post Vor der blauen Wand appeared first on Verfassungsblog.

For the Balkinization symposium on Mark Tushnet and Bojan Bugaric, Constitutionalism and Its Discontents (University of Chicago Press, 2026). 

Jedediah Britton-Purdy

I admire and enjoy Constitutionalism and Its Discontents. The authors’ careful parsing of exaggerated or one-sided hopes for constitutional salvation is always worth following. I tend to see it as a series of follow-ups to the authors’ important previous book, Power to the People. There they argue that populism is not necessarily anti-democratic but is often an expression of democratic power and aspiration.  Constitutional limitations on popular power, and in particular on majority rule, can be anti-democratic (normatively) and can (in fact) inspire exactly the kind of insurgent and system-revising politics that they are often wrongly imagined as tamping down. I largely agree with this overall view and have given my own version of it in various places, including The Nation (on populism), the Times (on majoritarianism), and The Atlantic (on constitutional entrenchment), and at book length. Because neither loud agreement nor minor quibbling is very interesting, I’ll instead approach the book from a few odd angles.

The first odd angle is to try tendentiously to touch the pulse of the book, its structure of feeling. The historian Marcus Rediker recently wrote that “almost every book has a complex and secret emotional life.” This book’s persistent spirit of skepticism and resistance to grand claims (“One way to construe our argument in part I is that we believe otherwise” is the authors’ Bartleby-like endorsement of democratic constitutional creativity) ended up feeling to me like an attitude of diffidence, if not something chillier, toward a certain version of professional identity. In the past decade of political discontent, law professors, especially constitutional law professors, have often been invited to weigh in with a blend of moral clarity and professional precision on public matters of the highest moment. Yet in the authors’ eyes, I suspect, accepting the invitation can be dangerous because intellectual honesty may require us law professors to conclude that there are severe limits to our helpfulness. As they show, institutional engineering intended to have one effect will often produce a very different result, a tremendous amount depends on context, and there is always temptation to invoke the Constitution, or “constitutionalism,” against politics one opposes.

As I moved into the authors’ discussion of democratic decline, I felt even more that I was in the company of diffidence toward the whole vocation of public and especially constitutional law—at least in its present role as a first responder to democratic crisis. As the book proceeds, it emerges that the most significant drivers of democratic crisis (or decline, to stick with the authors’ preferred term) are factors that public law qua constitutional design does not usually address. Foremost is the set of economic disruptions and dislocations that are sometimes gathered under terms like “globalization” or “neoliberalism.” Part of the problem with rallying “constitutionalism” to address the politics that has followed on these disruptions is that—even setting aside the democratic validity of important forms of populism—the prescription does not address the cause. By the end, the authors refer to a pairing of economic and “spiritual” problems to describe the condition of voters, and emphasize that neither constitutionalism nor they, as (critical) students of constitutions, can say much to these, the real engines of political disruption.

What a student of these institutions can say is that they should not be hastily or complacently deployed to block democratic ferment. As the authors regularly emphasize, one of the things a discontented public has every right to do is to alter the structural principles, the “rules of ruling,” that stand in the way of their efforts to make their lives better. In particular, it is possible to point in directions that seem to promise greater empowerment of ordinary citizens. The authors’ concluding proposal (cautious and heavily qualified though it is) to make political parties sites of ongoing engagement and accountability rather than mere episodic “messaging” and voter mobilization strikes me as promising. But, as I said at the outset, I was more or less with them at “hello.”

So, my second odd angle: to say something cursory about the “spiritual” problems that the book adverts to but, for plenty of good reasons, doesn’t engage. The book left me wondering whether any move to a more empowered ordinary democracy is particularly hard in a country whose “spiritual” problems might be said to include interpersonal and institutional mistrust and intense affective polarization. Democracy incorrigibly puts us in one another’s hands with respect to our most basic commitments and interests. It isn’t surprising that this feels intolerable to many Americans, who are persuaded that their opponents lack good faith and shared values. What Judge Learned Hand famously said of a constitution, that (to paraphrase) if it lives in the hearts of citizens it hardly needs to be written down and if it does not live in the heart then writing it down is no use, is half-true of democracy. To believe in it is to believe that you are among others who can do it with you. If you don’t believe that they can, and neither do they, then democracy is tenuous at best. It’s especially ill-equipped, in that precarious condition, for the kind of democratic creativity that attracts the authors, the breaking with old rules of ruling to clear space for new approaches that can better advance the common good. If that “common” just doesn’t exist, and doesn’t feel achievable, the whole sequence of action can blink out of existence. Although Americans have some tendency to talk about our Constitution in vaulting terms, much of the basis of its appeal is the idea (which has some basis in reality) that it keeps our neighbors from messing too aggressively with us or the institutions we take for granted.

Second is to take on, in a similarly cursory and presumptuous way, one limb of the vast elephant of political economy, specifically where it seems to link up with these theme of political culture. The authors note that “democratic decline” coincides with a period of intensified economic globalization. One could note that it also coincides with the general uptake of the internet and the movement of a lot of the culture to it. As the great Raymond Williams argued, our means of communication is a material basis of our cultural (one could say spiritual) lives, which in turn may do a lot to set the affordances of our culture. As I say in a post at the LPE blog that will roughly contemporaneous with this one,

[T]he ways we see one another and understand ourselves, the pictures of the world that we carry, and the “structures of feeling” in which we move and relate all deeply condition what we can do together, signally including the potentials and limits of our politics. These elements of culture aren’t autonomous, of course: They arise in good part from how we physically live and work together and, especially, how we communicate—how we jointly interpret the world—which in our time is deeply influenced by technological form and by legal structures of ownership and control. Think of broadcast networks, media platforms, attention-gripping algorithms, each a technological fact set within a web of regulation (or the pseudo non-regulation of laissez-faire). Much of our present culture of epistemic fragmentation, political animosity, and generalized mistrust is a side-effect of profit-seeking under these conditions, and of prior decisions to set profit-seeking as the organizing principle for the relevant technologies. But for all these aspects of what feels like determination, the mutual interpretation that makes culture is one of our key resources of freedom, and a necessary condition of any solidaristic politics.

I have come to think that a collapse in trust seriously impedes the prospects of the sorts of legal-political reforms that many readers of this blog think would make for a more democratic and humane society. I have also come to think that we should regard the resources of culture—a shared imaginary, you might say, or a structure of feeling—in the light of the “false commodities” that Karl Polanyi highlighted. Polanyi, recall, argued that money, the natural world, and social reproduction were all necessary conditions of common life which, if they were treated as commodities and therefore governed by conditions of profit, might break down and undermine common life generally. Although the specifics of his arguments are not always satisfactory, he was broadly right about this. We might think of culture in the same way. Ours is now pervasively commodified, from the biggest-budget spectacles to the algorithm-driven micro-interactions that have replaced so much of face-to-face socialization. We are living (or trying to live) with the results.

            This theme touches on one relatively small-bore textual issue that I’ll raise before closing. I appreciate the authors’ suggestion that “grifters” as a class of politician pose less systemic danger than more ideological actors because they just want to take advantage of the institutions, not destroy them. I’m reminded here of Fred Hirsh’s observation in Social Limits to Growth that market competition has an inherent instability based in the incentive to move from competing by the rules to revising the rules in favor of entrenchment, extra rents, etc. Corruption and opportunism has the same colonizing logic, so the willingness to do new and especially destructive things to get especially rich (plus success in doing so) seems to indicate a species of grifter that is also an institution-breaker. Or so the headlines suggest to me.

            I’m very sympathetic to the book’s concluding turn to a wish for more responsive parties. I think this, along with easier constitutional amendment, is the major political-structural path to a more adequate democracy. The democratic gamble is always that more power in organized ordinary people is better than the alternatives—intrinsically better and instrumentally more likely, overall, to result in politics that can address the state of everyday life. My comments have sketched reasons to worry about our capacity to persuade one another of this today.

            Thanks again to Balkinization for the chance to respond to this stimulating and incisive book, and thanks as well to the authors for writing it.

Jedediah Britton-Purdy

Raphael Lemkin Distinguish Professor, Duke University School of Law

purdy@law.duke.edu

Waren Männer der Urgeschichte die einzigen Jäger und haben nur sie Werkzeuge hergestellt? Waren nur Männer Träger von Kunst und Innovationen? Waren Frauen ausschließlich Sammlerinnen, an das Haus gebunden und haben sich um Kinder und Familie gekümmert? Waren alle prähistorischen Darstellungen von Frauen Muttergöttinnen? Haben Männer und Frauen die gleichen Karrierechancen in der Archäologie? Die Kurzantwort auf all diese Fragen ist die gleiche: Nein. Dies sind jedoch Beispiele für Geschlechterstereotype, denen wir in der Archäologie immer noch täglich begegnen. Sie beeinfl ussen, wie Archäolog*innen die Vergangenheit interpretieren und in der Öffentlichkeit präsentieren und auch, wie sie ihren Beruf ausüben.

Dieses Heft versteht sich als kurze, informative und kritische Antwort von Archäolog*innen auf verschiedene Geschlechterstereotype, die in der archäologischen Rekonstruktion der Vergangenheit sowie in der gegenwärtigen berufl ichen Praxis existieren. Geschlechtersensible und feministische Archäolog*innen kämpfen seit Jahrzehnten gegen Geschlechterstereotype, u.a. durch wissenschaftliche Publikationen, Museumsausstellungen und populäre Literatur. Trotz ihrer Bemühungen leben viele Stereotype weiter und gedeihen gut, sowohl in akademischen als auch in nicht-akademischen Kreisen und insbesondere in Ländern, in denen es keine archäologische Geschlechterforschung gibt oder kaum diskutiert wird. Vor diesem Hintergrund und angesichts des Aufstiegs rechtsextremer oder ultrakonservativer Ideologien und Überzeugungen weltweit, versteht sich dieses Heft als zeitgemäßer und zum Nachdenken anregender Beitrag, der offen oft unangenehme Themen im Zusammenhang mit Geschlecht in der Archäologie anspricht, um das Bewusstsein sowohl unter Fachleuten als auch bei anderen, die an der Disziplin interessiert sind, zu schärfen.

Das Heft enthält 24 häufi g anzutreffende Geschlechterstereotype in der Archäologie, die in kurzen Texten von Archäolog*innen mit Fachkenntnissen über Geschlecht in der Vergangenheit und in der zeitgenössischen Archäologie erklärt und dekonstruiert werden. Die meisten dieser Archäolog*innen sind Mitglieder der Arbeitsgemeinschaft Archaeology and Gender in Europe (AGE) der European Association of Archaeologists (EAA). Die Stereotype wurden wunderschön illustriert von dem preisgekrönten serbischen Künstler Nikola Radosavljevic. Die deutsche Übersetzung verdankt sich der großzügigen Förderung durch die Katholische Erwachsenenbildung Bayern e.V.

2026

Paperback ISBN: 9789464264159 | Imprint: Sidestone Press | Format: 200x270mm | 64 pp. | Series: HotAcademia | Language: English | 35 illus. (bw) | Keywords: gender; stereotypes; archaeology; inclusiveness; diversity | download cover | DOI: 10.59641/d30642gp

Herausforderung des Status quo: Dekonstruktion von Geschlechterstereotypen in der Archäologie
Bisserka Gaydarska, Laura Coltofean-Arizancu und Uroš Matić

Stereotyp 1 | Der Mann als Jäger und Archäologe im Feld und die Frau als Sammlerin und Labormaus
Bettina Arnold

Stereotyp 2 | Nur Frauen haben in Gesellschaften der Vergangenheit gekocht
Marga Sánchez Romero

Stereotyp 3 | Aktive Männer, passive Frauen
Bettina Arnold

Stereotyp 4 | Nur Frauen haben sich um die Alten und Kranken gekümmert
Marga Sánchez Romero

Stereotyp 5 | Nur Frauen haben sich um Kinder gekümmert
Katharina Rebay-Salisbury

Stereotyp 6 | Alle Frauen waren jung, schlank und schön, alle Männer waren jung, groß und athletisch
Brigitte Röder

Stereotyp 7 | Nur Männer waren gewalttätig
Uroš Matić

Stereotyp 8 | In der Vergangenheit konnten nur hochrangige Männer lesen und schreiben
Agnès Garcia-Ventura

Stereotyp 9 | Prähistorische Gesellschaften waren entweder matriarchal oder patriarchal
Julia K. Koch

Stereotyp 10 | Prähistorische weibliche Darstellungen zeigen Muttergöttinnen
Bisserka Gaydarska

Stereotyp 11 | Familien bestanden immer aus Vater, Mutter und Kindern
Julia K. Koch

Stereotyp 12 | Wurden zwei Frauen zusammen bestattet, so waren dies die Herrin und ihre Dienerin
Julia K. Koch

Stereotyp 13 | Biologisches und soziales Geschlecht sind dasselbe
Katharina Rebay-Salisbury

Stereotyp 14 | Geschlecht ist binär
Sandra Montón-Subías

Stereotyp 15 | Es gibt nur zwei Geschlechter
Pamela L. Geller

Stereotyp 16 | „Gender“ ist universell
Alice B. Kehoe

Stereotyp 17 | Gender ist eine Ideologie – auch in der Gender-Archäologie
Uroš Matić

Stereotyp 18 | Gender-Archäologie wird nur von Frauen und Schwulen betrieben
Rachel Pope

Stereotyp 19 | In der archäologischen Geschlechterforschung geht es nur um Frauen Doris Gutsmiedl-Schumann
Doris Gutsmiedl-Schümann

Stereotyp 20 | Gender-Archäologie braucht es inzwischen nicht mehr
Nils Müller-Scheeßel

Stereotyp 21 | Gleichgeschlechtliche Praktiken sind eine Erfindun der Moderne oder eine Störung
Uroš Matić

Stereotyp 22 | Queere Archäologie sind letztlich nur LGBTQIA+-Forschende, die sich LGBTQIA+-Personen in der Vergangenheit vorstellen
Bo Jensen

Stereotyp 23 | Frauen haben in der Archäologie die gleichen Karrierechancen wie Männer
Maria Mina

Stereotyp 24 | In der Archäologie gibt es keine Belästigung, Übergriffe, Mobbing und Einschüchterung
Laura Coltofean-Arizancu and Bisserka Gaydarska

Weiterführende Literatur
Autor*innenliste

German language of the  English language version published in 2021

L'Annuaire de l'École pratique des hautes études, section des sciences religieuses, est une publication annuelle qui regroupe principalement les comptes rendus des conférences des enseignants-chercheurs de la section des sciences religieuses, organisés par thèmes et par auteurs.

• L'Annuaire des sciences religieuses, publié sous format papier depuis 1892, est librement accessible en ligne sur Revues.org, depuis l'année 2006-2007 (tome 115), à l'adresse http://asr.revues.org.
  
• L'Annuaire de la section des sciences historiques et philologiques est publié sous format papier depuis 1873 ; il est librement accessible en ligne, sur Revues.org, à compter de l'année 2006-2007 (vol. 139) à l'adresse http://ashp.revues.org.
  
• Leurs collections rétrospectives (1872-2006) ont été entièrement numérisées. Elles sont accessibles en ligne sur le portail Persée, à l'adresse http://www.persee.fr/​web/​ouvrages/​home/​prescript/​fond/​ephe.

Numéros en texte intégral

• 133 | 2026
  Annuaire de l’EPHE, section des Sciences religieuses (2024-2025)

 

• Thèses de doctorat [Texte intégral]
  par ordre chronologique de soutenance
• Diplômes EPHE [Texte intégral]
  par ordre chronologique de soutenance
• Habilitations à diriger des recherches [Texte intégral]
  par ordre chronologique de soutenance
• Diplôme post-doctoral [Texte intégral]
• Professeurs invités (2024-2025) [Texte intégral]
• Mohammad Ali Amir-Moezzi
  Daniel Gimaret [Texte intégral]
  (1933-2026)
• Denis Pelletier
  Claude Langlois [Texte intégral]
  (1937-2024)
• Muriel Debié
  Marie-Joseph Pierre [Texte intégral]
  (1945-2025)
• Frédéric Payraudeau
  Mission française des fouilles de Tanis [Texte intégral]
  Rapport sur la LXIX^e campagne

Résumés des conférences

Lecture Summaries

• Agnieszka Kedzierska Manzon
  New Age, paganismes et nouvelles formes de ritualisation en contextes postcoloniaux [Texte intégral]
• Damien Mottier
  Pratiques et théories de l’anthropologie visuelle [Texte intégral]
• Sylvie Peperstraete
  L’iconographie sacrificielle en Mésoamérique (III) [Texte intégral]
• Oscar Calavia Sáez
  Le sacrifice vu depuis les Amériques [Texte intégral]
• Grégory Delaplace
  Agir à distance. Magie, enchantement, anthropologie [Texte intégral]
• Ippei Shimamura
  Possession and Resistance, or Religion and Nationalism in Contemporary Mongolia [Texte intégral]
• Marianne Bujard
  Histoire de la religion et de la pensée dans la Chine ancienne [Texte intégral]
• Sylvie Hureau
  Bouddhisme chinois [Texte intégral]
• Vincent Goossaert
  Dévotion et relations personnelles avec les dieux en Chine, xvi^e-xix^e siècles [Texte intégral]
• Marta Sernesi
  Historiographie tibétaine : genres et développement (I) [Texte intégral]
• Kunsang Namgyal-Lama
  Les programmes iconographiques singuliers du temple principal de Phuntsokling (Tsang) : tentative d’élucidation à partir des vestiges picturaux et des sources textuelles (suite) [Texte intégral]
• Matthias Hayek
  Religions du Japon [Texte intégral]
• Yannick Bruneton
  Bouddhisme coréen [Texte intégral]
  Conférences des années 2023-2024 et 2024-2025
• Pascal Bourdeaux
  Modernités religieuses et histoire globale vues du Viêt Nam (du premier xix^e siècle au milieu du xx^e siècle) : une introduction [Texte intégral]
• Judit Törzsök
  Religions de l’Inde : études śivaïtes [Texte intégral]
• Péter-Dániel Szántó
  Buddhist Homiletics: Forays into a Neglected Tradition [Texte intégral]
• Vincent Eltschinger
  Le bouddhisme contre le matérialisme (II) : lecture du Tattvasaṅgrahaet Pañjikā, chapitre XXII (2023-2024) [Texte intégral]
  Conférences des années 2023-2024 et 2024-2025
• Andrea Acri
  Études tantriques [Texte intégral]
• Ivan Guermeur
  Entre magie et médecine : le traité de protection de la mère et de son enfant du Brooklyn Museum (Papyrus Brooklyn n^o 47.218.2) [Texte intégral]
  Conférences des années 2023-2024 et 2024-2025
• Robert Hawley
  Religions et cultures du Levant ancien [Texte intégral]
  Conférences des années 2023-2024 et 2024-2025
• Samra Azarnouche
  Le zoroastrisme sassanide et post-sassanide à la lumière du Dēnkard [Texte intégral]
• Gabriella Pironti
  Les dieux au pluriel et les stratégies pour les mettre en récit (et en « cités ») [Texte intégral]
• Alessandro Buccheri
  Polythéisme et botanique en Grèce antique : noms, cultes, récits [Texte intégral]
• Andrei Timotin
  Philosophie et théologie de langue grecque (I^er-VI^e s.) [Texte intégral]
• Rainer Hirsch-Luipold
  Plutarch and the Religious World of Early Roman Imperial Times [Texte intégral]
• Marco Donato
  Une introduction à la théologie médio-platonicienne : le Didaskalikos d’Alcinoos [Texte intégral]
• Francesca Prescendi Morresi
  Écrire la religion, critiquer le sacrifice [Texte intégral]
• Ginevra Benedetti
  Du « corps » et du « symbole ». Présentifier les dieux dans le polythéisme romain [Texte intégral]
• Pierluigi Piovanelli
  Origines du christianisme [Texte intégral]
• Marie-Odile Boulnois
  Controverses entre paganisme et christianisme autour des évangiles de l’enfance de Jésus : étude des fragments du Contre Julien XI de Cyrille d’Alexandrie [Texte intégral]
• Hélène Grelier-Deneux
  Apolinaire de Laodicée, exégète en contexte caténique : le cas de la chaîne vaticane sur l’Épître aux Romains (cod. Vaticanus gr. 762) [Texte intégral]
• Michel-Yves Perrin
  Histoire et doctrines du christianisme latin (Antiquité tardive) [Texte intégral]
• Philippe Bernard
  Morale sévère, ancienne discipline de l’Église et rubriques nouvelles à l’ombre de Port-Royal des Champs : l’affaire Jean Besson, curé de Magny-Lessart (1687-1688) [Texte intégral]
  Partie préliminaire : le dossier documentaire
• Muriel Debié
  Christianismes orientaux [Texte intégral]
• Aram Mardirossian
  Droits et institutions des chrétientés orientales [Texte intégral]
• Ioanna Rapti
  Histoire de l’art et archéologie du monde byzantin et de l’Orient chrétien [Texte intégral]
• Maria Parani
  Towards a reappraisal of daily life in medieval Byzantium: the contribution of Byzantine images and texts [Texte intégral]
• Stamatis Zochios
  L’Au-delà orthodoxe en tant qu’outil rhétorique [Texte intégral]
• Vera Chentsova
  Macaire III ibn al-Za‘îm, patriarche d’Antioche, et les réformes liturgiques en Russie moscovite (1) [Texte intégral]
• Geoffrey Herman
  Judaïsmes antiques et littérature rabbinique classique [Texte intégral]
• Christophe Grellard
  Systèmes de pensées et de croyances médiévaux [Texte intégral]
• Olivier Boulnois
  Philosophie médiévale et métaphysique [Texte intégral]
• Gaetano Lettieri
  Machiavel « pontifical » ? [Texte intégral]
  La genèse de la pensée politique moderne comme sécularisation de la théologie politique pontificale
• Corinne Leveleux-Teixeira
  Doctrines juridiques et tradition canonique [Texte intégral]
• Karol Skrzypczak
  Un chercheur à l’épreuve d’un dossier polémique : narrations concurrentes autour du meurtre de Louis d’Orléans (1408-1410) [Texte intégral]
• Cédric Giraud
  Exégèse chrétienne dans l’Occident médiéval latin [Texte intégral]
• Olivier Christin
  Histoire du catholicisme à l’époque moderne [Texte intégral]
• Sylvio Hermann De Franceschi
  Religions, savoir et politique dans l’Europe de l’âge moderne [Texte intégral]
• Hubert Bost
  Protestantismes et culture dans l’Europe moderne (xvi^e-xviii^e siècles) [Texte intégral]
  Conférence finale du 25 juin : 2003-2025
• Patrick Cabanel
  Histoire des « minorités protestantes » en Europe (II) [Texte intégral]
  Les anabaptistes mennonites
• Isabelle Saint-Martin
  Arts visuels et christianisme (xix^e-xxi^e siècle) [Texte intégral]
  Années universitaires 2023-2024 et 2024-2025
• Lena Salaymeh
  Droit islamique et gouvernance [Texte intégral]
• Ziad Bou Akl
  Les débuts du kalām : les Doctrines des musulmans d’al-Ashʿarī (suite) [Texte intégral]
• Dominique Avon
  Savants et discours religieux à l’épreuve du socialisme [Texte intégral]
• Constance Arminjon
  Muḥammad et les Imāms dans la littérature, l’historiographie religieuse et la théologie de l’Histoire de l’islam contemporain (suite) [Texte intégral]
• Séverine Mathieu
  Sociologie des religions et de l’éthique [Texte intégral]
• Alfonsina Bellio
  Genre, religion, politique : constructions symboliques [Texte intégral]
• Valentine Zuber
  Religions et relations internationales [Texte intégral]
• Vincent Genin
  Laïcités : historiographies, mythologies et corps [Texte intégral]
  France, Belgique, Italie – xix^e-xxi^e siècles (I)
• Mohammad Hocine Benkheira
  Doctrines de la pureté rituelle [Texte intégral]
  (Formation des doctrines juridiques et du rituel en islam [du vii^e au xv^e siècle])
• Jean-Pierre Brach
  Histoire des courants ésotériques dans l’Europe moderne et contemporaine [Texte intégral]
• François de Polignac
  Genèses et mutations des paysages religieux [Texte intégral]
  (Religion, société et institutions dans le monde grec : conférences des années 2023-2024 et 2024-2025)

• 132 | 2025
  Annuaire de l’EPHE, section des Sciences religieuses (2023-2024)
• 131 | 2024
  Annuaire de l’EPHE, section des Sciences religieuses (2022-2023)
• 130 | 2023
  Annuaire de l’EPHE, section des Sciences religieuses (2021-2022)
• 129 | 2022
  Annuaire de l'EPHE, section des Sciences religieuses (2020-2021)
• 128 | 2021
  Annuaire de l'EPHE, section des Sciences religieuses (2019-2020)
• 127 | 2020
  Annuaire de l'EPHE, section des Sciences religieuses (2018-2019)
• 126 | 2019
  Annuaire de l'EPHE, section des Sciences religieuses (2017-2018)
• 125 | 2018
  Annuaire de l'EPHE, section des Sciences religieuses (2016-2017)
• 124 | 2017
  Annuaire de l'EPHE, section des Sciences religieuses (2015-2016)
• 123 | 2016
  Annuaire de l'EPHE, section des Sciences religieuses (2014-2015)
• 122 | 2015
  Annuaire de l'EPHE, section des Sciences religieuses (2013-2014)
• 121 | 2014
  Annuaire de l'EPHE, section des Sciences religieuses (2012-2013)
• 120 | 2013
  Annuaire de l'EPHE, section des Sciences religieuses (2011-2012)
• 119 | 2012
  Annuaire de l'EPHE, section des Sciences religieuses (2010-2011)
• 118 | 2011
  Annuaire de l'EPHE, section des Sciences religieuses (2009-2010)
• 117 | 2010
  Annuaire de l'EPHE, section des Sciences religieuses (2008-2009)
• 116 | 2009
  Annuaire de l'EPHE, section des Sciences religieuses (2007-2008)
• 115 | 2008
  Annuaire de l'EPHE, section des Sciences religieuses (2006-2007)

Tous les numéros

http://www.persee.fr/web/ouvrages/

See AWOL's full List of Open Access Journals in Ancient Studies

Greek papyri are a unique and remarkable group of manuscripts. Written mainly between 2,300 and 1,300 years ago, they offer a rare firsthand glimpse into the ancient world and the early Middle Ages. Preserving everything from everyday documents to literary and religious texts, they provide invaluable evidence for historians, philologists, theologians, and other scholars seeking to understand the people, cultures, and ideas of the past.

Papyrus was the primary writing material in antiquity before the widespread adoption of parchment and paper. As a result, texts written on papyrus shed light on virtually every aspect of ancient life. To name just a few examples, papyrus documents constitute the largest body of administrative, economic, and legal texts surviving from the Roman Empire. Private letters and family archives preserved on papyrus provide evidence about social groups often underrepresented in historical sources, including women and children. Thanks to papyri, we now possess literary works by ancient poets and philosophers that were long thought to have been lost during the Middle Ages. Papyrus texts also include the earliest surviving copies of the Gospels and other works of early Christian literature.

Most papyri were—and still are—found in Egypt, where they survived thanks to the dry climate. After major discoveries of large numbers of papyri in the late 19th century, papyrology was born—the discipline devoted to deciphering, reconstructing, analysing, and understanding fragments of papyri. The main task of every papyrologist is to read and interpret a papyrus correctly and, in doing so, to bring back to life a text that has remained unread and silent for hundreds of years. Since the beginning of the 20th century, several generations of papyrologists have prepared scholarly editions of tens of thousands of new texts, thanks to which our knowledge of the past has grown and deepened immensely.

Papyrology as a discipline has always been open to new technologies and is proud to be one of the most technologically advanced fields in the study of the ancient world. Since the recent progress in machine learning, there has been a great deal of interest in how it can be applied to the papyrological work. The question of whether AI can be trained to transcribe the text on papyrus has been constantly raised, sometimes with concern, in other cases with excitement, and always with a degree of scepticism. Today, we can answer this question with a confident "yes".

We present Anagnostes—the first AI-driven system that automatically transcribes Greek papyri from images, developed by Elena Chepel and Anton Repushko.

The model

Anagnostes is a Handwritten Text Recognition (HTR) system powered by advanced machine-learning methods. It has been trained on both literary and documentary papyri dating from the 3rd century BCE to the 7th century CE and currently has an average character error rate (letters CER) of 17.9 % across all types of handwriting, with the best results reaching as low as 1.9–8.6%. It can read not only well-preserved, neat hands but also cursive handwriting and damaged fragments.

 

Data Identifier	https://doi.org/10.5284/1138791
Collection ID	1007784
Title	Digital Archive from Archaeological Excavations at Kourion's Amathous Gate Cemetery, Cyprus, 1995 to 2000
Description	This collection comprises images, Harris matrices, spreadsheet data, and GIS data from a series of excavations at Kourion's Amathous Gate Cemetery. The excavations were carried out between 1995 and 2000 by the Kourion Amathous Gate Cemetery Group, with the post-excavation and publication of the works occurring between 2017 and 2024. The Early Roman chamber tombs show evidence for commemoration through processions and libations. Following the earthquake of the 370s A.D., they were quarried out, leaving only their rear arcosolia exposed in neatly chiselled vertical facets of rock and new level surfaces for the individual cist tombs of the late fourth-sixth centuries. A well-preserved though largely commingled set of human remains represents at least 73 adults and 62 subadults buried in these tombs.

Explore this collection:

• Introduction
• Downloads
• Collection Metadata
• Usage Statistics
• Open Access Archaeology Fund Archives

 

First up, Colombia explains how the TRIPS Agreement uses intellectual property rights to reward, and therefore encourage, innovation, focusing on the example of patents. A key point of the submission is that there are two separate elements (which it refers to as "prerogatives") – exclusivity and remuneration – of the patent reward system:

1. Colombia notes that the TRIPS Agreement establishes two main mechanisms to reward innovation through the protection of intellectual property rights (IPRs): i) exclusivity and ii) profit potential. Indeed, in the example of patents, Article 28 of the TRIPS Agreement states:

Article 28 – Rights Conferred

1. A patent shall confer on its owner the following exclusive rights:

(a) where the subject matter of a patent is a product, to prevent third parties not having the owner's consent from the acts of: making, using, offering for sale, selling, or importing for these purposes that product;

(b) where the subject matter of a patent is a process, to prevent third parties not having the owner's consent from the act of using the process, and from the acts of: using, offering for sale, selling, or importing for these purposes at least the product obtained directly by that process.

2. Patent owners shall also have the right to assign, or transfer by succession, the patent and to conclude licensing contracts.

2. According to the aforementioned article, a patent holder has two distinct prerogatives. The first is a prerogative of exclusivity, which prevents third parties from performing certain acts with respect to the patented product or process without their consent. The second is a prerogative of remuneration, under which a given use generates an entitlement to compensation. In the ordinary patent bargain, the two are bundled. However, as discussed below, the multilateral IP framework already recognizes configurations in which a right to remuneration is preserved independently of any power to prohibit use. Because the two prerogatives differ in scope and serve different functions, they do have distinct effects on innovation, access, market competition, technological diffusion, industrial learning and development.

(footnote omitted)

Colombia then notes the downsides to the exclusivity element:

4. Regarding the possibility of excluding third parties from using a technology, this prerogative can generate tensions with technology users, limit cumulative innovation, hinder interoperability, restrict competition, or increase barriers to entry, both for companies in industrialized and developing countries. Among countries, this exclusivity often serves as an industry protection, as it creates a "moat" in a specific market, with potential significant effects on other countries and its technological upscaling and development strategies.

On the other hand, Colombia sees the remuneration element as more positive and talks about the possibility of applying it independently of exclusivity:

5. By contrast, the remuneration prerogative – the possibility of receiving remuneration for a technological contribution – is in many cases sufficient on its own as a legitimate and sufficient incentive for innovation, without the negative impacts. The differentiated effects of exercising or privileging one of these two prerogatives over the other are relevant to the design of an optimal IPR reward system. In this context, the question is not whether innovators should be rewarded, but whether the reward should necessarily depend on the possibility of exclusion.

With regard to alternative approaches to remuneration that do not involve exclusivity, Colombia notes the following:

10. Other existing incentive mechanisms can inform this discussion. These include statutory licencing, related rights, pools, innovation awards, innovation inducement prices, reward funds, conditional public funding, open knowledge models, etc., under which the remuneration prerogative is kept, but the exclusivity one is not.

11. Taken together, these experiences demonstrate that the promotion of innovation could be better anchored focusing on the monetary rewards, without the potential adverse effects of granting temporary monopolies of exclusion.

(footnote omitted)

Colombia later elaborates on the point about separating out the two elements:

12. The international community could achieve significant progress on several IP discussions by independently analysing the two described prerogatives. Discussions on technology transfer, IP rights in pandemics, IP rights for environmental objectives, the role of the objectives, principles, and flexibilities of the TRIPS Agreement, VMAT for tech transfer (Voluntary and Mutually agreed terms), industrial protection and competition, etc., have proven to be almost intractable in different international fora. Exploring different models with autonomous prerogatives – for example, using different periods of protection for the two prerogatives, or providing market reward incentives by augmenting the remuneration mechanisms when a commitment to limit the right to exclude is made – could provide venues for better collective solutions. Likewise, the developmental dimension related to technology access and technology learning and technology upgrading, could be better served by treating the two prerogatives independently, and create a better scenario for trust and rule making at the WTO, even in the context of the reform of the organization.

Going forward, Colombia suggests the following discussion:

13. Consequently, Colombia, invites an exploratory thematic discussion on alternative innovation reward mechanisms currently in use, in which exclusivity has been modulated without eliminating the remuneration reward, and its effects on different types of industries and different types of countries.

In the English version of the document, the word "prizes" does not appear, but when I look at the Spanish version I think I see (using Google Translate) "innovation inducement prizes" (or maybe "awards") rather than "innovation inducement prices" (as stated in the English document), and Colombia clearly has something along these lines in mind. Prizes are arguably a better way to encourage innovation than the current patent system, so I'm glad Colombia raised this.

Colombia's communication was discussed at a meeting of the TRIPS Council on July 22-23. So far, all we have is the brief summary of the meeting put out as a WTO news item, which explains the reaction to the communication as follows:

Members also discussed a submission by Colombia entitled "Autonomous examination of TRIPS prerogatives, and existing examples" (IP/C/W/742). The submission invited members to consider thematic discussions on alternative innovation reward mechanisms, with a proposal to assess the impact of IP exclusivity as separate from a right to remuneration, and to discuss their effects across industries and regions. Some members expressed interest in continued dialogue on this topic, while others questioned the premise of the submission and emphasized the adequacy of the existing IP framework.

It's not too difficult to imagine which Members fell on each side of the debate. More details should be available soon when the minutes of the meeting are released, and I'll come back to it then if anything interesting was said.

Before the Civil War, Northern cities like Boston impeded the Fugitive Slave Act of 1793. Residents organized through local uprisings, bail funds, and the Underground Railroad to free people arrested for escaping enslavement. When the federal government responded with the much stricter Fugitive Slave Act of 1850 — complete with criminal liability for anyone who obstructed slave catchers — Black and white Bostonians formed a committee to thwart its enforcement. Other cities codified their resistance in Personal Liberty Acts, like Chicago’s 1850 resolution prohibiting local cooperation with the federal law: “[W]e do not … consider it a part of our duty, or the duty of the City Officers of the City of Chicago, to aid or assist in the arrest of fugitives from oppression.”

Over 175 years later, cities’ historic role as hubs of resistance takes on renewed resonance in today’s era of rising authoritarianism in the United States. Take how cities are responding to attacks on immigrant neighbors. Local opposition to federal immigration policies is multi-faceted, from denying resources and blocking illegal overreach to channeling the moral authority of their residents. During the federal occupation of Minneapolis earlier this year, for example, Mayor Jacob Frey and St. Paul Mayor Melvin Carter staged a press conference at a church with the state governor and faith leaders, and over 100 clergy members were later arrested while protesting ICE.

Even though cities are notably absent from the federal Constitution, state constitutions and laws give cities substantial authority to run their own affairs. They can use local policy and spending power to diverge from federal priorities, withhold local cooperation from the federal government, and increase rights beyond federal guarantees. As constitutional scholar Heather Gerken has termed it, they can “dissent by deciding.” Localities can also litigate to challenge federal policies directly and restrain federal control over city power. And they can marshal collective political leadership to rally public opinion against federal actions. Together, these tactics can expose federal vulnerabilities, slow or halt federal execution, and ultimately help expand the definition of who can access full rights and freedoms. Of course, many of these same tactics have already been deployed by cities against these same rights, such as “sanctuary cities for the unborn” and other anti-abortion tactics Professor Kaitlin Ainsworth Caruso has examined at length.

Immigration

No issue better displays the range of tools available to cities than modern immigration policy. Hundreds of localities have passed what are commonly known as “sanctuary” policies, which restrict how and when they collect and share data, lend local police officers’ time and resources, or honor requests from the federal government to hold people in local jails. While the first wave of sanctuary cities began in the 1970s and ’80s, these policies have taken on new significance during the second Trump administration. Echoing the Personal Liberty Acts of the pre-Civil War period, they force the federal government to bear the significant cost of its own policies — especially in time and personnel — by holding back local support.

Despite intense federal pressure, including efforts to withhold federal funding from local governments, local sanctuary policies have withstood legal scrutiny. In California, San Francisco and Santa Clara Counties defeated the first Trump administration’s attempts to “defund” sanctuary cities in 2017. The cities challenged the federal effort as a violation of the 10th Amendment, which prevents the federal government from commandeering local resources. The second Trump administration has ratcheted up that pressure with direct lawsuits against numerous cities, yet every court to consider the issue — including in a case on behalf of 50 cities and counties — has again sided with local jurisdictions’ power to control their resources free from federal coercion.

Cities have also led the way in resisting the second Trump administration’s violent immigration raids. Boston, Chicago, and Seattle issued executive orders in early 2026 to prevent Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) from using city-owned property to stage enforcement activities, and to collect evidence to prosecute federal officials who abuse their power.

When the administration threatened National Guard and Department of Homeland Security (DHS) deployments to Chicago in the fall of 2025, Mayor Brandon Johnson rallied local officials and community members to push back. City leaders held know-your-rights trainings with faith, business, and advocacy groups, and prepared city agencies for a variety of litigation options, including suing over violations of federal laws that restrict the federal government’s power to deploy the military for domestic purposes. The city’s initial response, with support from the state, delayed federal deployment by several weeks and gave local leaders more time to prepare. Ultimately, the city and state’s joint litigation challenging the legality of federal military deployment to the region was successful in the Supreme Court, and the administration abandoned the deployment.

When over 3,000 ICE agents descended on Minneapolis, federal officials lamented the “difficult operating environment” for federal immigration agents because of the strength of local organizing and the absence of city support. After the January 2026 federal killings of Renée Nicole Good and Alex Pretti, outcry from elected officials and community leaders across the country mobilized a bipartisan group of senators to deny increased funding to DHS (the agency that houses ICE). That, and the resulting shift in public opinion, caused the administration to pull agents from Minneapolis just one month later.

In a number of other contexts, cities and counties have directly challenged the legality of federal laws and policies in court, calling attention to the harms they would inflict on local governments and their communities. Cook County, Illinois, for example, joined a local immigrant rights group to challenge the first Trump administration’s public charge rule, which would have banned immigrants from accessing many public benefits. Other cities, including New York, San Francisco, and Baltimore, did the same, and all secured court orders preventing the rule from taking effect.

Cities have not yet succeeded in changing federal immigration policies writ large. Yet through collective resistance, they have both made it harder for the federal government to execute the full horrors of its discriminatory deportation agenda and begun to build a public case for more sweeping change in federal law and practice.

Marriage Equality

Cities have long been strongholds of activism for LGBTQ+ rights, from local anti-discrimination ordinances to laws protecting transgender access to bathrooms and other public spaces. But no LGBTQ+ rights issue has been shaped by cities more than the fight for marriage equality. Marriage equality burst onto the national political stage in the 1990s, when the Hawaii Supreme Court ruled that banning same-sex marriage was discriminatory. The backlash, locally and nationally, was swift, including the federal Defense of Marriage Act in 1996 alongside multiple state-level bans.

Then in late 2003, Massachusetts became the first state permanently to legalize marriage equality. Inspired by that ruling — and dismayed by President George W. Bush’s call for a national ban on same-sex marriage — then-San Francisco Mayor Gavin Newsom launched a daring act of government-sanctioned civil disobedience in February 2004. Mayor Newsom instructed his city clerk to begin issuing marriage licenses, concluding that refusing to do so violated California’s constitution. A month-long “Winter of Love” began, when more than 4,000 same-sex couples tied the knot while national news covered the daily court battle to stop them. Cities across the country joined in, from New Paltz, New York and Multnomah County, Oregon, to Asbury Park, New Jersey and Sandoval County, New Mexico.

When the California Supreme Court later nullified the marriage licenses, it invited San Francisco to challenge the constitutionality of the state’s marriage ban directly. After four years of litigation led by the city in coalition with LGBTQ+ rights groups, the state’s Supreme Court legalized marriage equality in 2008.

Later that fall, California voters passed Proposition 8, a state constitutional amendment banning same-sex marriage. Two same-sex couples filed a lawsuit against it in federal court, and the San Francisco City Attorney’s Office joined the case on the side of the couples. After trial, Judge Vaughn Walker ruled that Prop 8 was unconstitutional and that forbidding same-sex couples from marrying violated their civil rights under the U.S. Constitution. The Supreme Court ultimately dismissed an appeal of his ruling on standing grounds — a decision that reinstated marriage equality in California and paved the way for nationwide change just a couple of years later.

The fight for marriage equality demonstrates how local jurisdictions can exert significant power. Mayor Newsom’s initial publicity stunt, while unsuccessful in securing immediate rights, had a lasting impact on public opinion. In full view on their television screens, people saw retired women who had been together for decades bring their grandkids to watch them get married; kids with balloons excited to see their parents officially recognized; couples openly weeping at the public recognition of their love. Over the course of a decade, the city wielded all its tools to rally public opinion and courts to overturn a federal regime that oppressed its people.

Abortion

For decades, abortion has been a contentious legal, political, and policy issue. Since Roe v. Wade in 1973, states have driven that national conversation and tested the bounds of the federal right to abortion. The role of local governments has been less well-understood and appreciated when it comes to abortion rights and access to reproductive health care. But especially since the Supreme Court’s 2022 ruling overturning Roe in Dobbs v. Jackson Women’s Health Organization, cities have begun to re-deploy a range of tools from the Fugitive Slave Law era.

Oakland, California, declared itself a sanctuary city in 2022 for women seeking abortions, directly borrowing from the immigration and slavery concepts. Dozens of cities have developed or funded resources for people seeking to travel to abortion care across county and state lines.

Throughout the country, nearly 90 local prosecutors publicly committed not to prosecute abortion cases, blunting the impact of state criminal bans in jurisdictions representing more than 28 million Americans. And several cities have passed versions of the Guarding the Right to Abortion Care for Everyone (Grace) Act, a law instructing local police departments to de-prioritize investigating and prosecuting reproductive healthcare cases.

When local prosecutors do try to build a case, local officials have refused to turn over data or provide assistance. In early 2025, then-Acting Ulster County Clerk Taylor Bruck blocked Texas Attorney General Ken Paxton’s attempt to file a judgment against a New York doctor who had declined to appear in a Texas lawsuit against her. Bruck’s decision ensured that New York State’s shield law — which aims to prevent hostile states from prosecuting doctors who send medication abortion into their jurisdictions — effectively protected the doctors and patients who depend on them.

Like immigration and the pre-Civil War Personal Liberty Acts, cities are still in a defensive posture on abortion, using their tactics to slow and weaken the tools of criminalization and call attention to the moral outrage of denying care. But for a woman in an apartment in Austin, Texas, who received mifepristone in the mail from a New York doctor, or for a doctor who provided care without fear of prosecution in Tucson, Arizona, local resistance and leadership has offered a safe haven.

* * *

Despite being at the bottom of the national pecking order, cities punch well above their weight and continue to deploy tactics developed in the 1850s to challenge the federal government today. They guard their power, limiting the federal government’s attempts to commandeer their policies and resources. They flex their influence in courts of law and public opinion to expose federal overreach and mobilize communities to fight back. And they band together to secure strength in numbers, reducing the ability of authoritarian regimes to isolate, divide, and conquer. The 21st century federal government has much more power to exact revenge against dissenters. That makes solidarity more important than ever.

Collective action within and across communities is a powerful antidote. Boston’s reaction to Anthony Burns’s arrest foretold the response of Minneapolis residents and city leaders in January 2026, when they saw their neighbors terrorized and killed by ICE agents; of San Franciscans in 2004 who saw their neighbors feel the fleeting joy of equality only to have it ripped away; and of city residents across the country in 2022 who saw their neighbors denied care while they miscarried in a hospital parking lot. As Professor Jelani Cobb has said, “In a democracy, the fundamental civic unit is neighbor.” Cities are the unit of government that houses, and speaks up for, neighbors.

The post Cities as Nodes of Resistance appeared first on Just Security.

Nun steht die Landtagswahl in Sachsen-Anhalt unmittelbar bevor und könnte der AfD erstmalig die Möglichkeit geben, ihre Forderungen und Versprechen tatsächlich einzulösen. Gerade die Wissenschaft bietet sich dafür an: Zum einen verfügen die Länder in der Wissenschaftspolitik über weitreichende Kompetenzen, zum anderen ist sie ein zentrales Feld des rechtspopulistischen Kulturkampfs. Selbst ohne absolute Mehrheit der AfD hätte Tillschneider als AfD-Wissenschaftsminister weitreichende Durchgriffsmöglichkeiten. Wie groß der Schaden für den Wissenschaftsstandort geriete, hängt letztlich davon ab, wie destruktiv die AfD vorgeht.

Die Ambivalenzen des Wissenschaftsschutzes

Dass Wissenschaftsinstitutionen im Zuge eines autoritären Staatsumbaus angegriffen werden, ist eigentlich nicht weiter überraschend. Als Orte kritischer Gegenöffentlichkeit und der Wissensproduktion können und sollen sie Herrschaft infrage stellen. Und weil sie zur Elitenbildung beitragen, sind sie anfällig für populistische Rhetorik. In der Türkei, Ungarn oder Polen konnte man sehen, dass demokratische Erosion mit und gegen Hochschulen betrieben wurde. Dennoch ist das Thema hierzulande erst mit Donald Trumps zweiter Amtszeit so richtig in das öffentliche Bewusstsein gerückt und man fragt sich, ob so etwas nicht auch in Deutschland passieren könnte.

Aber bietet Art. 5 Abs. 3 Satz 1 GG nicht ausreichend Schutz gegen einen autoritären Umbau der Wissenschaft? In Deutschland ist die Wissenschaftsfreiheit nicht nur Abwehr-, sondern nach Grimm auch Funktionsgrundrecht.³⁾ Art. 31 Verf ST verpflichtet Sachsen-Anhalt sogar dazu, Hochschulen und andere wissenschaftliche Einrichtungen in ausreichendem Maße einzurichten, zu unterhalten und zu fördern. Da aber im Hochschulrecht selten auf Landesebene geklagt wird, war es das Bundesverfassungsgericht, das der Wissenschaftsfreiheit eine kleinteilige Rechtsprechung zur Seite gestellt und insbesondere die Professor*innen aufgewertet hat. Und tatsächlich: Wer sich als Wissenschaftler*in auf Art. 5 Abs. 3 Satz 1 GG berufen kann und obendrein verbeamtet ist, ist ein erheblicher Resilienzfaktor.⁴⁾ Denn einzelne Professor*innen können die wissenschaftsadäquate Organisation ihrer Hochschule einklagen und sind regelmäßig auch gewillt, dies zu tun. Hingegen ist die Frage, welche Bedeutung den landesverfassungsrechtlichen Selbstverwaltungsgarantien neben den Organisationsgehalten der Wissenschaftsfreiheit zukommt, bislang wenig untersucht – man kann von „unentfaltete[m] Autonomiepotential“⁵⁾ sprechen.

Das Verhältnis von Staat und Wissenschaft ist von Ambivalenzen geprägt. Hochschulen sind sowohl grundrechtsberechtigt als auch -verpflichtet. Es gibt nicht nur eine große föderale Rechtsvielfalt, sondern durch die verschiedenen Statusgruppen, Funktionsträger*innen und Gremien auch innerhalb der Hochschulen Interessenheterogenität. Dass Staat und Wissenschaft so eng verflochten sind, sorgt an der einen Stelle für problematische Abhängigkeiten, an der nächsten für Schutz und Resilienz. Lange wurde versucht, diese Spannung mit dem Konsens zu verdecken, dass „eine von gesellschaftlichen Nützlichkeits- und politischen Zweckmäßigkeitsvorstellungen freie Wissenschaft Staat und Gesellschaft im Ergebnis am besten [dient]“ (BVerfGE 127, 87 (115)). Dieses „liberale Glaubensbekenntnis“⁶⁾ ist allerspätestens mit der ersten AfD-Regierung nichts mehr wert. Was bei anderen Parteien noch als diffuse Versuchung daherkommt, steht im Wahlprogramm der AfD Sachsen-Anhalt schwarz auf weiß: Wissenschaft soll sich frei entfalten, aber eben „zum Wohle der Allgemeinheit“.

Diese Ambivalenz zeigt sich deutlich bei der Hochschulfinanzierung. Die Umstellung auf das neuere Steuerungsmodell in den 2000er-Jahren verschaffte den Hochschulen mehr organisatorische Autonomie, machte sie aber auch finanziell abhängiger vom Vertragspartner Staat. Die AfD stellt korrekt fest: „Um an Universität und Hochschule zu überleben und sich im Wissenschaftsbetrieb zu halten, müssen Wissenschaftler Fördermittel von Stiftungen und anderen außeruniversitären Förderinstitutionen einwerben.“ Die politische Forderung nach einer stärkeren Grundfinanzierung mögen auch Wissenschaftler*innen befürworten; dahinter steht jedoch die strategische Überlegung, Förderentscheidungen aus der angeblich politisierten Wissenschaft (in dem Fall: DFG) herauszuziehen und stattdessen die Entscheidungsmacht an den – bekanntermaßen höchst unpolitischen – Staat zu geben. Der Bund hat sich aus der Hochschulfinanzierung weitgehend zurückgezogen, ist an der Finanzierung der gemeinsam betriebenen außeruniversitären Einrichtungen über Art. 91b GG jedoch weiterhin beteiligt. Das schlägt sich in der Ausstattung nieder: Während die außeruniversitären Einrichtungen finanziell sehr gut dastehen, gibt es auf Länderebene bei den Hochschulen einen Renovierungsstau von geschätzten 70 Milliarden Euro.

Hochschulrecht, zusammengenäht

Wissenschaft findet in Deutschland maßgeblich an oder zumindest in Kooperation mit Hochschulen statt und ist daher vor allem Ländersache. Das hat zu 16 unterschiedlichen Hochschulgesetzen geführt. Man kann sich leicht vorstellen, wie sich eine AfD-Parlamentsmehrheit auf dem Weg „zurück zur alten Ordinarienherrlichkeit“ ihr Traum-Hochschulgesetz nach dem Frankenstate-Prinzip⁷⁾ baut: Aus Bayern schreibt sie sich die Fürstenberufungen ab, aus Berlin die ministeriellen Abweichungsmöglichkeiten im Berufungsverfahren, aus NRW die Notbefugnisse und ein neues Hochschulsicherheitsgesetz.

Das aktuelle Hochschulgesetz in Sachsen-Anhalt gilt hingegen als vergleichsweise wissenschaftsfreundlich: Die Hochschulen sind – wie bundesweit üblich – Körperschaften des öffentlichen Rechts und grundsätzlich zur Selbstverwaltung berufen. Zentrale Organe sind Rektorat, Senat und Kuratorium. Der Senat ist recht stark gestellt. Berufungen sind weitgehend hochschulintern organisiert. Die Finanzierung erfolgt über Globalhaushalte und Zielvereinbarungen zwischen Land und Hochschule. Es gibt kein spezielles Ordnungs- und Sicherheitsrecht und keine ministeriellen Notbefugnisse.

Delegitimierung als Erlaubnistatbestand

Dass die AfD für eine wissenschaftsfeindliche Politik steht, würde sie als (ehemalige) Professorenpartei bestreiten. Im Gegenteil: Sie tritt als Retterin der Wissenschaftsfreiheit auf. Indem sie diesen Begriff besetzt und verdreht, verschafft sie sich Deckung, hinter der sie ihr autoritäres Gesicht verstecken kann – wie sie es auch mit anderen Begriffen (z.B. Grundgesetz, Rechtsstaat und Demokratie) tut.⁸⁾ Die AfD verspricht, Wissenschaft und Hochschulen von der Politisierung durch eine linksliberale Elite zu befreien. Dazu beansprucht sie die Deutungshoheit darüber, was gute Wissenschaft ist (die „kritische deutsche Islamforschung, wie sie beispielsweise durch Tilman Nagel“ betrieben wird, und „Germanistik, die deutsche Identität pflegt, anstatt zu vernichten“), was schlechte Wissenschaft ist (Geisteswissenschaften im Allgemeinen, die „soziologisch statt philologisch arbeitende Islamwissenschaft“ im Konkreten; wohl auch Wissenschaft von Frauen; denn Gleichstellungspolitik führe dazu, dass „das Niveau der akademischen Leistung sinkt“ und die Wissenschaft Schaden nimmt) und was überhaupt keine Wissenschaft ist (Postkolonialismus und Genderstudien).

Aus der Opposition heraus lässt die AfD kaum eine Gelegenheit aus, Wissenschaftsinstitutionen anzugreifen. Neben Äußerungen, parlamentarischer Rede und Gesetzesentwürfen bedient sie sich besonders gerne parlamentarischer Anfragen, mit denen sie nicht nur Verdachtsmomente und Rechtsunsicherheit schürt, sondern auch Informationen sammeln kann.⁹⁾ Die gezielte Instrumentalisierung politischer Rechte dient der Delegitimierung von Wissenschaft und Wissenschaftler*innen. Wer die Wissenschaft angreift, greift nicht nur ihre Vertreter*innen an, sondern die Grundlagen wissenschaftlicher Erkenntnis selbst. Alternative Fakten, Desinformation, die gezielte Mobilisierung vermeintlicher Gegenexpertise und die systematische Infragestellung wissenschaftlicher Verfahren stellen die Maßstäbe infrage, anhand derer sich überhaupt noch zwischen Wissen und Behauptung, zwischen Expertise und bloßer Meinung unterscheiden lässt. Delegitimierung wiederum erfüllt eine wichtige politische Funktion: Sie bereitet den Boden für spätere Eingriffe, indem sie diese als Reaktion auf vermeintliche Missstände erscheinen lässt und ihre politische Akzeptanz erhöht.¹⁰⁾

Durchgriffsmöglichkeiten

Gehen wir mit aktuellen Umfragen davon aus, dass die AfD keine eigene Parlamentsmehrheit haben wird, sondern als Minderheitsregierung von (einem Teil) der CDU geduldet wird oder eine Koalition bildet. In unserem Szenario wird Hans-Thomas Tillschneider „Superminister“ für Bildung, Wissenschaft und Kultur und die AfD erhält zudem das Innenministerium.

Als Zeichen für eine nationale Neuausrichtung der Hochschulen in Sachsen-Anhalt könnte der Minister eine ganzjährige anlasslose Beflaggung aller Hochschulgebäude mit Deutschlandfahnen anordnen, wie für Schulen bereits diskutiert. Bislang regelt ein Erlass des Innenministeriums in Sachsen-Anhalt die Beflaggung. Mit der Frage, ob die Beflaggung von Hochschulen eine Selbstverwaltungs- oder Auftragsangelegenheit darstellt, hat sich soweit ersichtlich bislang niemand beschäftigt. Eine Verletzung von Art. 5 Abs. 3 GG lässt sich nur schwer konstruieren. Hisst eine Hochschule die Regenbogenflagge, verletzt sie jedoch auch nicht das Neutralitätsgebot, weil die Flagge keiner Partei zugeordnet werden und folglich auch nicht die Chancengleichheit der Parteien verletzen kann (vgl. VG Berlin, Urt. v. 03.06.2015 – 33 K 332.14).

Vor gehisster Deutschlandfahne könnte Tillschneider die Hochschulen von der „politisch motivierten Verfremdung der Sprache“ durch ein – politisch motiviertes – Genderverbot befreien. Das Gleichstellungsgesetz Sachsen-Anhalts verpflichtet die Landesverwaltung bereits seit 1992 zu einer geschlechtergerechten Sprache. Ein generelles Verbot müsste daher gesetzlich geregelt werden. Möglich wäre allenfalls, einzelne Schreibweisen – etwa Genderstern oder Binnen-I – durch eine Dienstanweisung auszuschließen. Genau diesen Weg ging das Bildungsministerium 2023 für die Schulen in Sachsen-Anhalt.¹¹⁾ Enger sind die Grenzen bei Forschung und Lehre: Hier schützt Art. 5 Abs. 3 GG nicht nur die Inhalte wissenschaftlicher Arbeit, sondern auch deren sprachliche Darstellung. Ein staatliches Genderverbot würde unmittelbar in die Wissenschaftsfreiheit eingreifen.¹²⁾

Antifeminismus und Nationalismus könnte Tillschneider auch der Landeszentrale für politische Bildung auferlegen. Sie ist als oberste Landesbehörde in Sachsen-Anhalt unmittelbar dem für Wissenschaft zuständigen Ministerium unterstellt.¹³⁾ Durch die Parlamentsreform im Jahr 2026 wurde das Erwachsenenbildungsgesetz Sachsen-Anhalt geändert. Es enthält nun eine einfachgesetzliche Bestandsgarantie der Landeszentrale für politische Bildung (§ 14a EBG LSA). Dies stellt jedoch nur einen kleinen Resilienzgewinn dar: Sie lässt sich ohne Parlamentsmehrheit zwar nicht mehr wie im Regierungsprogramm angekündigt auflösen, aber dennoch reformieren. Zu erwarten wären personeller Austausch, die Abschaffung verschiedener Programme und eine neue Schwerpunktsetzung, z.B. auf Heimatkunde und Linksextremismus. Auf dieses Stichwort hin könnte Tillschneider auch Marco Rubio, Martin Sellner und weitere Akteure der Neuen Rechten zu einem Linksextremismus-Workshop einladen, sollte ihm das Bundesinnenministerium nicht zuvorkommen.

Zwei Handlungsbereiche, die vor der Landtagswahl viel diskutiert wurden, betreffen die „Achillesferse“ Finanzen. Auch wenn die Gemeinsame Wissenschaftskonferenz (GWK) und die Wissenschaftsministerkonferenz in letzter Minute mit der „Notbremse“ noch einige Regeln der Bund-Länder-Zusammenarbeit zur Förderung außeruniversitärer Forschung resilienter gestaltet haben, bleiben erhebliche Blockademöglichkeiten bestehen: Weil Art. 91b Abs. 1 Satz 2 GG nicht rechtzeitig angepasst wurde, kann eine AfD-Landesregierung in Sachsen-Anhalt alle gemeinsamen Finanzierungsprojekte torpedieren, die im Schwerpunkt Hochschulen betreffen. Als Erstes dürfte es das Professorinnenprogramm 2030 treffen, das bald ausläuft. Sachsen-Anhalt könnte die GWK auch mit dreijähriger Kündigungsfrist verlassen, was finanziell jedoch unvorteilhaft wäre. Die Staatsverträge zur Akkreditierung und Hochschulzulassung konnten auch nicht rechtzeitig angepasst werden und ließen sich kündigen – seit der Parlamentsreform 2026 allerdings nur mit Parlamentsmehrheit (Art. 69 Abs. 2 Verf ST).

Die Hochschulen erhalten aus dem Landeshaushalt sogenannte Globalbudgets, die über Ziel- und Leistungsvereinbarungen zwischen Hochschule und Landesregierung nur indirekt gesteuert werden, allerdings unter Haushaltsvorbehalt stehen. Die gute Nachricht: Die aktuellen Vereinbarungen laufen für alle Hochschulen noch mindestens mehrere Jahre und ein blockierter Haushalt würde hier nicht direkt schmerzen. Allerdings ist der Hochschulstrukturplan – die unterste Ebene des Steuerungsmodells – mittlerweile über 15 Jahre alt und eine Landesregierung könnte ihn neu aufsetzen. Je grundlegender die Ebene ist, auf der sie hochschulpolitische und -strategische Punkte festlegt, desto besser begründbar sind spätere Eingriffe oder Vorgaben.

Instrumentalisierung von Aufsichtsbefugnissen

Wo Hochschulen öffentliche Ressourcen verwalten und grundrechtsrelevante Entscheidungen treffen, muss staatliche Verantwortung und damit demokratische Legitimation gewährleistet bleiben. Das Hochschulgesetz Sachsen-Anhalt unterscheidet zwischen Selbstverwaltungs- und Auftragsangelegenheiten. Bei ersterem beschränkt sich die staatliche Kontrolle auf die Rechtsaufsicht (§ 55 Abs. 4 Satz 1 HSG LSA). Geprüft wird nur, ob das Gesetz und höherrangiges Recht eingehalten wurden. Bei Auftragsangelegenheiten tritt die Fachaufsicht hinzu (§ 56 Abs. 2 Satz 1 HSG LSA), die eine inhaltliche Kontrolle des Hochschulhandelns sowie fachliche Weisungen aus dem Ministerium ermöglicht. Tillschneider könnte etwa die Zustimmung zu neuen Grundordnungen verweigern (§ 55 Abs. 3 Satz 2 HSG LSA).

Gegen diese Form der politischen Störung ist das sachsen-anhaltische Hochschulrecht jedoch mit klar formulierten Versagungsgründen vergleichsweise gut gewappnet. Sie ermöglichen, dass die Gerichte überprüfen, ob die Tatbestandsvoraussetzungen vorliegen, und können so Eingriffe aus rein politischen Motiven verhindern. Bei der Rechtsaufsicht kann das Ministerium rechtswidrige Maßnahmen mit aufschiebender Wirkung (!) beanstanden und bei Untätigkeit sogar selbst tätig werden – notfalls ohne Fristsetzung (§ 55 Abs. 4 HSG LSA). Das eröffnet in Eilfällen weitreichende Handlungsmöglichkeiten. Auch wenn der Rechtsweg offensteht, bleibt ein erhebliches Störpotenzial: Die Exekutive ist in der Vorhand, auch Eilrechtsschutz kommt nicht immer rechtzeitig und manche Schäden sind irreversibel. Bereits die Angst vor möglichen Rechtsverstößen kann Akteur*innen handlungsunfähig machen.

Hinzu kommen das Recht des Ministeriums, sich über alle Angelegenheiten der Hochschule einschließlich der Selbstverwaltungsangelegenheiten unterrichten zu lassen und ein Besichtigungsrecht, das nach wohl h. M. auch die Teilnahme an Gremiensitzungen als Gast umfasst (§ 56 Abs. 3 HSG LSA). Es wäre denkbar, dass Tillschneider künftig persönlich an Senatssitzungen teilnehmen möchte oder seinen Lieblingsstaatssekretär schickt. Die bloße Anwesenheit eines wissenschaftsfeindlich eingestellten Ministers in Gremiensitzungen dürfte sowohl chilling effects als auch ein gewisses Eskalationspotenzial beinhalten. Indem ein Minister das Unterrichtungsrecht exzessiv einsetzt, könnte er einer Hochschule verdeutlichen, dass sie unter Beobachtung steht. Zudem ist der Aufwand, den die ständige Kommunikation mit dem Ministerium mit sich bringt, nicht zu unterschätzen.

Gegen einen missbräuchlichen Einsatz der Rechtsaufsicht lässt sich das Gebot hochschulfreundlichen Verhaltens anführen. Es ergibt sich nach wohl überwiegender Auffassung aus Art. 5 Abs. 3 GG und verpflichtet die staatliche Aufsicht zu einem kooperativen Verständnis ihrer Aufsichtsfunktion. Demnach sei die Rechtsaufsicht auf eine bloße Evidenzkontrolle beschränkt. Ein staatliches Einschreiten ist also nur bei offensichtlich rechtswidrigen Maßnahmen geboten.

Antifaschistischer Protest oder Terror?

Veranstaltungs-, Versammlungs– und Protestgeschehen ermöglichen es dem Ministerium, seine Aufsichtsbefugnisse einzusetzen. Friedliche Anti-AfD-Proteste an Hochschulen sind in diesem Szenario mehr als erwartbar, aber auch eine Hörsaalbesetzung ist vorstellbar oder das Entrollen eines Antifa-Banners. Im Zweifel könnten rechtsextreme Vorfeldorganisationen dafür sorgen, diese Proteste zu eskalieren. Gehen wir davon aus, der Innenminister hätte die Bekämpfung der „Antifa“ bereits, wie im Wahlprogramm angekündigt, zur „höchsten Priorität“ erklärt und den Verfassungsschutz angewiesen, seine Tätigkeit in diesem Bereich zu intensivieren. Damit ließe sich ein staatliches Eingreifen bereits als Schutz der übrigen Hochschulangehörigen rechtfertigen; für eine vermeintliche Ermessensreduzierung auf Null, die bei Untätigkeit der Hochschulleitung zu einem staatlichen Eingreifen durch die Polizei zwingt, wäre der Boden dann schon bereitet. Dass solche Proteste dynamisch und schwer überschaubar sind, macht sie für autoritäre Eingriffe so anfällig. Um den Grundrechten der Beteiligten Rechnung zu tragen, braucht es abgestufte Handlungskonzepte.¹⁴⁾ Eine Hochschulleitung, die einen klaren Plan hat, kann staatliche Eingriffe selbstbewusst abwehren.

Nach der Räumung könnte Tillschneider Druck auf die Hochschulleitung ausüben, die beteiligten Studierenden zu exmatrikulieren. Dieser Druck ließe sich durch eine mediale Skandalisierung erhöhen. Das Hochschulgesetz Sachsen-Anhalt enthält zahlreiche sehr weitgehende und teils unbestimmte Exmatrikulationsgründe, etwa bei Gewaltanwendung, Bedrohungen, sexueller Belästigung, wiederholten Verstößen gegen das Hausrecht, Störungen der Ordnung oder von Veranstaltungen der Hochschule oder bei Täuschungsversuchen (§ 30 Abs. 3 HSG LSA). Über die Exmatrikulation entscheidet zwar eigentlich die Leitung der Hochschule in einem durch eine Satzung der Hochschule geregelten Verwaltungsverfahren (§ 30 Abs. 4 HSG LSA). Aber auch hier besteht die Möglichkeit, dass Tillschneider von einer sogenannten Ermessensreduzierung auf Null ausgeht und im Rahmen der Rechtsaufsicht die Exmatrikulation selbst vornimmt. Besonders vulnerabel sind die Studierenden, wenn sie keine deutsche Staatsbürger*innenschaft haben. Denn eine Exmatrikulation kann dazu führen, dass die Grundlage für einen studienbezogenen Aufenthaltstitel (§ 16b AufenthG) entfällt. In diesem Fall kann die Ausländerbehörde die Aufenthaltserlaubnis aufheben (§ 52 Abs. 3 Nr. 3 AufenthG). Eine AfD-Landesregierung betrifft alle, aber sie trifft eben nicht alle in gleicher Weise.

Wissenschaftsfreiheit schlägt Neutralitätspflichten

An der Uni Halle könnte eine Professorin derweil eine Veranstaltung mit dem Titel „Wissenschaftsfeindlichkeit der AfD: Rechtspopulistische Gefahren für die Wissenschaftsfreiheit“ ankündigen. Auf dem Podium sollen Wissenschaftler*innen aus den Rechts-, Politik- und Gesellschaftswissenschaften sitzen sowie Vertreter*innen verschiedener Initiativen, wie z.B. Studis gegen Rechts. Tillschneider sieht einen klaren Verstoß gegen das Neutralitätsgebot und beanstandet mit aufschiebender Wirkung. Rechtlich ist diese Auffassung nicht haltbar: Für die Hochschullehrer*innen gilt, dass eine allgemeine Pflicht zur weltanschaulichen oder politischen Neutralität auch aus dem Beamtenrecht nicht folgt: „Wo Äußerungen von der Wissenschaftsfreiheit geschützt sind, ist für das Neutralitätsdogma kein Raum mehr.“¹⁵⁾ Das Neutralitätsgebot wurde bislang höchstrichterlich nicht auf Hochschulen übertragen. Zwar dürfen auch Hochschulen als staatliche Einrichtungen nicht die Chancengleichheit der Parteien verletzen, aber sie müssen sich auch nicht jede parteipolitische Äußerung an der jeweiligen Einrichtung zurechnen lassen. Die Angehörigen der Hochschulen sind Grundrechtsträger*innen, die ihre Haltung gegen die AfD auch in der Hochschule kundtun dürfen. Tatsächlich braucht es aber Akteur*innen, die das wissen und bereit sind, in die Konfrontation zu gehen – und zwar mit einer Landesregierung, mit der sie in der Zukunft wieder Verhandlungen über die Finanzierung und Ausrichtung der eigenen Institution führen sollen.

Verfassungsfeinde sind immer die anderen

Angenommen, die Veranstaltung findet statt und die eingeladene Rechtswissenschaftlerin äußert sich nicht nur äußerst kritisch gegenüber der AfD, sondern attestiert auch, dass mit der AfD in staatlichen Machtpositionen die wehrhafte Demokratie gescheitert sei. Deutschland befinde sich in einer Verfassungskrise. Sie ruft dazu auf, diese Krise zu nutzen, um eine sozialistisch-demokratische Ordnung an die Stelle der freiheitlich-demokratischen Grundordnung zu stellen. Tillschneider erkennt nun die wahre Verfassungsfeindin und will ein Disziplinarverfahren einleiten. Dienstvorgesetzte des wissenschaftlichen Hochschulpersonals sind nach geltendem Hochschulrecht allerdings grundsätzlich die Hochschulleitungen (§ 42 Abs. 5 Satz 1 HSG LSA). Das schafft zunächst Abstand zwischen Ministerium und einzelnen Wissenschaftler*innen. Nach dem Landesdisziplinargesetz kann die oberste Dienstbehörde ein Verfahren jedoch unter engen gesetzlichen Voraussetzungen an sich ziehen (§ 17 Abs. 1 Satz 2 DG LSA). Auch hier lässt sich der Rahmen des rechtlich Möglichen ausreizen: Verbeamtete Hochschullehrer*innen unterliegen grundsätzlich den beamtenrechtlichen Pflichten zur Verfassungstreue, politischen Loyalität, zum Wohlverhalten und zur Mäßigung als hergebrachten Grundsätzen des Berufsbeamtentums, Art. 33 Abs. 5 GG. Die genauen Grenzen sind in Rechtsprechung und auch in der Literatur nicht geklärt, was die politische Instrumentalisierung erleichtert. Im Bereich der Forschung werden diese Pflichten durch die Wissenschaftsfreiheit (Art. 5 Abs. 3 GG) überlagert. Der Dienstherr darf deshalb weder wissenschaftliche Inhalte noch wissenschaftliche Ergebnisse disziplinarisch oder durch Weisungen beeinflussen. Im Bereich der Lehre ist Art. 5 Abs. 3 Satz 2 GG vorrangig, weil er Hochschullehrer*innen bezüglich der politischen Loyalitäts- und Mäßigungspflicht privilegiert. Dafür, wie die Verfassungstreuepflicht repressiv eingesetzt werden kann, gibt es historisch jedoch ausreichend Beispiele.

Die Verfassungstreue kann auch prospektiv eingesetzt werden und das sogar etwas weniger umständlich. Politische Loyalitätsprüfungen sind wieder en vogue, nicht nur bei der AfD. In Sachsen-Anhalt gibt es seit 2024 wieder Regelanfragen beim Verfassungsschutz für künftige Beamt*innen. Angenommen, an der Uni Magdeburg soll eine neue Professorin verbeamtet werden. Die Regelanfrage nach § 8b LBG LSA stellt die zuständige Dienststelle, also die Hochschule (§ 46 Abs. 11 HSG LSA). Bei ihr liegt auch die Eignungsentscheidung. Die Professorin ist Mitglied der Linken und hat zuletzt als Protestierende an Klimacamps teilgenommen. Denkbar wäre, dass der Minister auch hier einen Weg findet, die Verbeamtung zumindest zu verzögern – etwa wegen ernstlicher Zweifel an der Eignung. Schon die Existenz von Regelanfragen erzeugt chilling effects; sie führt darüber hinaus immer wieder zu Nichternennungen und wird mit guten Gründen kritisch gesehen. Das konkrete Missbrauchsrisiko wird dadurch erhöht, dass die Verfassungsschutzbehörde politisch steuerbar ist und zum „Tatsachenlieferanten“ werden kann. Die Leitung des Landesamtes für Verfassungsschutz ist in Sachsen-Anhalt eine politische Beamtin. Ein neuer Innenminister kann seinen Ministerpräsidenten bitten, sie deshalb in den einstweiligen Ruhestand zu versetzen und die Leitungsstelle neu zu besetzen. Zu erwarten wäre, dass linke und antifaschistische Gruppen (noch) stärker beobachtet werden. Selbst eine verfassungsschutzrechtliche Prüfung der Partei Bündnis 90/Die Grünen wäre denkbar. Entsprechende Forderungen gibt es in Sachsen-Anhalt sogar aus der CDU.

Wie destruktiv würde die AfD agieren?

Heute ist unklar, wie destruktiv eine AfD-Landesregierung agieren würde. Strategisch steht die AfD zwischen zwei Stühlen: Einerseits möchte sie ihren Machtanspruch mit maximaler Disruption ausleben, andererseits zeigen, dass sie regierungsfähig ist. Viele der in Betracht kommenden Maßnahmen würden Sachsen-Anhalt als Wissenschafts- und Hochschulstandort massiv schaden und hätten damit zumindest mittelfristig auch ökonomische Nachteile zur Folge. Ohnehin stellt Geld eine nicht unerhebliche Grenze für die Handlungsmöglichkeiten einer AfD-Regierung dar. Zudem legt der internationale Vergleich nahe, dass autoritäre Populist*innen erst in ihrer zweiten Amtszeit die Wissenschaftsinstitutionen stärker in den Fokus nehmen – wohl auch, weil sie zunächst versuchen, direktere Vetospieler zu schwächen. Viel hängt davon ab, wie resilient die Gerichte blieben, um autoritären Übergriffen den Rechtsstaat entgegenzusetzen. Allerdings: Je wissenschaftsfreundlicher die politisch-soziale Umgebung, desto effektiver schützt Art. 5 Abs. 3 Satz 1 GG.¹⁶⁾ Da hilft nur: Antizipation, Koordination und Solidarität.

Der Beitrag beruht auf einem Gutachten, das die Autor*innen im Auftrag der Hans-Böckler-Stiftung geschrieben haben.

The post Tillschneiders totaler Traum appeared first on Verfassungsblog.

Since its establishment over two decades ago, the International Criminal Court (ICC) has been confronted with huge difficulties. On Feb. 6, 2025, the U.S. administration under President Donald Trump imposed sanctions on the Court, characterizing its investigations into the actions of the United States and Israel as “illegitimate and baseless.” By July 2026, U.S. Secretary of State Marco Rubio expanded upon this rhetoric, labeling the ICC an “intolerable threat to U.S. sovereignty” and launching a campaign to dismantle its influence. Further, on Aug. 18 2026, ICC President Tomoko Akane of Japan and ICC Senior Trial Lawyer, Abdoulaye Seye of Senegal were added as additional targets of sanctions.

In response, ICC President Judge Akane made a statement on the Day of International Criminal Justice, July 17, 2026, that the international court “must always remain independent and free from political influence and coercion.” On Sept. 3, 2027, the current and former Presidents of the Assembly of States parties, in the pages of Just Security, wrote, “Now is the time to strengthen the institutions that uphold international law, not dismantle them. Defending the International Criminal Court is … is about preserving the international legal order.”

There remains strong support for the ICC in response to these moves against it. On Feb. 7, 2025, 79 States Parties to the Rome Statute — including Canada, France, Germany, the Netherlands, and the United Kingdom — issued a joint statement reaffirming the importance of the ICC and expressing their continued support for the Court.

Japan, the ICC President’s home country and this author’s home country as well, also supports the Court. On Jan. 7, 2026, Prime Minister Sanae Takaichi, following a courtesy call by President Akane, stated that “even amid severe international circumstances, Japan places great importance on the rule of law and the Government of Japan will robustly support the ICC and President Akane so that the Court can perform its functions.” After ICC President Akane was added to the sanctions list, the Ministry of Foreign Affairs issued a statement on Aug. 19, 2026 that “the announced measures are very unfortunate,” and that Japan “has consistently supported the ICC” and “will remain committed to strengthening the rule of law in the international community, while maintaining communication with related countries.”

It would be too quick to conclude that the ICC is in decline based solely on this political confrontation. This article offers a perspective that reconceptualizes the ICC not merely as a retrospective judicial body but as a “strategic weapon” that States committed to the rule of law can employ to safeguard their own legitimacy and to maximize the costs of a hegemon’s aggressive actions. This article focuses solely on the ICC’s strategic effectiveness and does not address the Court’s origins, functions, or cases.

1. Beyond the Critique of Politicization: Strategic Alignment

The most common critique of the ICC is its perceived “political” nature. Critics argue that when the Prosecutor initiates investigations proprio motu (on their own initiative), the Court is acting as a political actor rather than a judicial one.

Yet, from a strategic perspective, that “political” facet of the ICC is precisely where its utility lies. In international relations, the pursuit of national security is increasingly inseparable from the maintenance of the international legal order. The crimes within the ICC’s jurisdiction—genocide, war crimes at a certain scale, crimes against humanity, and aggression—are almost always the byproducts of efforts to destabilize the international order. By making illegal conduct visible through formal indictments, the ICC aligns the judicial process with the strategic interests of States seeking to maintain stability. The Court does not “politicize” justice; rather, it “legalizes” the international response to destabilizing violence.

2. Institutional Asymmetry: The Perpetrator’s Dilemma

The Rome Statute creates a unique form of institutional asymmetry that tends to systematically disadvantage the aggressor. Unlike many international treaties that rely on the mutual consent of all parties involved in a dispute, the ICC’s jurisdictional reach is designed to be a “one-way street” against violators.

The ICC’s jurisdiction is based on territoriality and “active personality.” Under Article 12, the Court can exercise jurisdiction if either the State on whose territory the conduct occurred or the State of the suspect’s nationality is a Party. This means that an aggressor from a non-State Party remains legally vulnerable the moment their forces cross the border into a State Party.

Furthermore, Article 12(3) allows non-member States to bridge this gap by making an ad hoc declaration accepting the Court’s jurisdiction. Ukraine’s 2014 declaration is a paradigmatic precedent. It allowed the ICC to investigate crimes on Ukrainian soil long before the 2022 full-scale invasion, effectively “weaponizing” the territory’s legal status against the invader.

The “effects doctrine” further expands this strategic geography. In the Rohingya crisis in Myanmar, although Myanmar is not a State Party, Bangladesh—to which the Rohingya fled—is a State Party. An ICC chamber of three judges found that the Court therefore had jurisdiction over forcible transfers related to Myanmar and authorized the Office of the Prosecutor to investigate. For policymakers, this suggests a powerful deterrent: an aggressor faces legal risk not only from the target of its invasion but from neighboring State Parties that suffer direct spillover effects of the conflict.

3. Complementarity: The Shield of the Law-Abiding State

The principle of complementarity which is foregrounded in the Preamble and Article 1 of the Statute—the rule that the ICC only intervenes when national systems are “unwilling or unable” to investigate or prosecute—is generally understood as a firm limit on the Court’s power. 

For States that maintain robust military justice systems especially if including an effective Judge Advocate General (JAG) corps, the ICC acts as an external “certification” of legitimacy. By maintaining the capacity to investigate their own forces, these States effectively “shield” themselves from ICC intervention under Article 17, which operationalizes the unwilling or unable condition.

Conversely, if genuine investigations and prosecutions are not carried out domestically, the likelihood of ICC intervention increases. Thus, while the ICC poses a risk to States that engage in destabilizing violence such as atrocity crimes, for States that have appropriate legal systems and the willingness to punish core crimes, accession to and support for the ICC functions as a form of external “certification” that their military conduct and judicial processes meet international standards.

4. The Triple Impact: Deterrence, Legitimacy, and Pressure

The disadvantages the ICC imposes on perpetrators are not confined to courtroom proceedings. The ICC operates in three ways: psychological and material deterrence against national leaders; securing an advantage in “cognitive warfare;” and international pressure exerted through the network of States Parties.

4.1. Psychological and Material Deterrence

First, by creating the possibility of individual criminal responsibility, the ICC produces psychological and diplomatic deterrence against leaders contemplating aggressive conduct that involves criminal acts. Article 89 of the Statute imposes on States Parties an obligation to cooperate in arrest and surrender. Under this institutional framework, a suspect is likely well aware of the risk of arrest upon entering a State Party. With 125 States Parties today, the Court places substantial constraints on diplomatic and political activity. It is not a failsafe system, but it is formidable.

The fact that even a State’s highest leaders can be prosecuted for international crimes creates pressures different from the traditional State‑centered international order. An indictment or arrest warrant, even if it does not result in immediate detention, limits travel to States Parties, narrows diplomatic activity, and undermines political legitimacy both domestically and internationally. President Putin’s designation of ICC judges as wanted illustrates how seriously these arrest warrants can affect powerful actors. There are also cases of former heads of state being arrested after leaving office, as with former Philippine President Duterte, who remains under detention in The Hague. For leaders who have governed tyrannically, legal risk may be low at the height of their power but rises sharply after departure from office; this temporal, inescapable pressure serves as a psychological constraint on decision‑making by authoritarian leaders.

Even if a leader is not immediately arrested, the existence of an arrest warrant clearly signals that the leader is regarded as a war crimes “suspect” or similar by the international community. That perception builds a public understanding for viewing the leader with deep suspicion, increasing the burden of justifying policies to their domestic audiences. As discontent over war costs and casualties grows, a leader may face the question “why continue a war that has led to an international arrest warrant?” and cast a stigma on the country, and the foundations of their hold on power can be undermined.

4.2. Securing the “Cognitive Advantage”

Second, the ICC can provide the international community with a legally grounded, impartial assessment amid the tangled cognitive warfare during armed conflict. NATO explains that in cognitive warfare an “adversary is influencing our cognition and behavior to gain advantage on multiple levels: Societal level (democratic rule of law values and social contract), Group level (destabilizing trust and creating polarization) [and] Individual level (attitudes, decision making and behavior).” In wartime, parties disseminate favorable information and disinformation across social media and other channels and portray the opponent as unlawful, making facts and legal assessments easy targets for propaganda. For example, the UK has described Russian operations that “create fake websites and use social media and bot accounts to undermine democratic elections and spread deliberately misleading narratives in support of Russia’s illegal war in Ukraine,” and, in response, the UK has coordinated responses with the EU regarding such Foreign Information Manipulation and Interference (FIMI). In this environment, ICC investigations, prosecutions, or the issuance of arrest warrants clarify which side’s conduct is wrongful amid reciprocal cognitive warfare that can make blame ambiguous. Because ICC involvement is perceived as a determination arising from an international judicial process rather than from any single State’s claim, it substantially strengthens the credibility and legitimacy of those determinations. In short, the ICC is not only a body for punishing criminals but, by impartially identifying who has gravely violated international law, can grant its supporters a “cognitive advantage.”

4.3. Leveraging the States Parties Network

Third, the ICC generates international pressure through the network of States Parties. In the Ukraine case, beginning with Lithuania’s referral of the situation on March 1, 2022 (Lithuania referred to Article 14 of the Rome Statute for an investigation into the situation in Ukraine), referrals were made by 43 States Parties, which led to the opening of an investigation and ultimately to the issuance of arrest warrants against President Putin on suspicion of war crimes (unlawful deportation and transfer). With the UN Security Council’s malfunctions, the gathering of States under the ICC in this manner can transform a collective demand for justice into legal proceedings and concrete action rather than a series of individual judicial choices. Strategically leveraging this States Parties network can corner perpetrator States in a dimension distinct from physical military force.

5. Closing the Aggression Gap: The Baerbock Proposal

The final frontier for the ICC as a strategic weapon is the “crime of aggression.” Currently, the jurisdictional requirements for aggression are more restrictive than for war crimes, crimes against humanity, or genocide, requiring both States to be members or else a Security Council referral (Article 15bis).

The 2023 proposal by German Foreign Minister Annalena Baerbock to amend the Rome Statute is a game-changer. By allowing the ICC to exercise jurisdiction over aggression whenever the victim State is a member, the international community would close the loophole of the lawless.

For States that have no intention of launching a war of aggression, this amendment poses zero risk. However, for a leader contemplating a “land grab” or a “regime change” operation in manifest violation of the UN Charter, it represents a monumental increase in personal risk. The acceleration of this debate in 2025 and 2026 signals a fundamental shift: the international community is no longer willing to allow the “supreme international crime” to go unpunished simply because its potential perpetrators refuse to join the Court.

Conclusion: Supporting ICC as Hard-Headed Security Policy

Supporting the ICC is not a matter of “blind idealism.” It is a pragmatic, hard-headed security policy. In a world where the rules-based order is under assault, the ICC provides a mechanism to impose costs on those who would rule by force.

For the Asia-Pacific region—where ICC membership remains low—the strategic utility of the Court must be urgently re-evaluated. The rule of law constitutes a fundamental pillar of Japan’s national security strategy. In a region facing growing maritime and territorial tensions, expanding the ICC network is a non-kinetic way to strengthen regional deterrence and solidify the “rule of law” as a defensive wall.

The ICC is the most sophisticated strategic weapon yet devised by States that respect the law. It is a weapon of legitimacy, visibility, and accountability. By understanding the Court in these terms, we recognize that justice is not just a moral outcome—it is a strategic necessity for a just and safer world. 

The views expressed in this article are personal and not necessarily the views of any organization with which the author is affiliated.

The post The Int’l Criminal Court as a “Strategic Weapon”: Legal Deterrence, Cognitive Advantage, and the Future of the Rule of Law appeared first on Just Security.

German law provides a tried-and-true mechanism for addressing the lack of accountability for violations that take place in a third-party state. Through a “structural investigation,” or Strukturermittlungsverfahren, German federal prosecutors can investigate an underlying situation involving alleged international crimes without limiting the investigation at its outset to a particular suspect or incident. 

That mechanism has renewed relevance following the violent repression of nationwide protests in Iran between December 2025 and January 2026.

Human Rights Activists in Iran (HRA, where both of us are employed), with support from UpRights, has submitted a criminal complaint to the German Federal Prosecutor General requesting the opening of a structural investigation into the situation in Iran, including alleged crimes against humanity committed during the aforementioned crackdown. The submission argues that the factual threshold for opening an investigation is met and that a sufficient nexus with Germany weighs in favor of exercising prosecutorial discretion to open such an investigation.

That request is grounded in increasingly concrete connections between the situation in Iran and Germany and, more broadly, Europe. Victims and witnesses of Iranian state repression are already present in Europe, current and former Iranian officials have a history of travelling to European states, and many of the state institutions implicated in domestic repression are also linked to the increased transnational activity targeting perceived opponents abroad.

The underlying proposition behind a structural investigation is straightforward: where future opportunities to exercise extra-territorial jurisdiction are foreseeable but inherently unpredictable, investigations should not wait until an individual suspect happens to enter German territory. Instead, Germany can (and should) exercise its authority now to begin investigating crimes against humanity committed in Iran, pursuant to the principle of universal jurisdiction under Section 1 of Germany’s Code of Crimes Against International Law (VStGB) and Section 152(2) of Germany’s Code of Criminal Procedure, thereby preserving evidence and building the capacity to act when opportunities for individual prosecutions arise. 

The December 2025 and January 2026 Crackdown

The protests that began on Dec. 28, 2025, in Tehran’s Grand Bazaar rapidly spread nationwide. HRA recorded 682 protest events across at least 203 cities, in all 31 of Iran’s provinces.

HRA’s documentation, including more than 60 interviews conducted with victims and witnesses over the past six months, indicates that the state response involved multiple, coordinated organs of the Iranian state, including the Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps (IRGC), the Basij (the IRGC’s paramilitary wing), the Law Enforcement Command, intelligence and security forces, and the Judiciary. State authorities employed recurring patterns of disproportionate and unlawful force and violent crowd-dispersal tactics against predominantly unarmed protesters and bystanders. Military-grade weapons were deployed; live ammunition, pellet rounds, and tear gas were fired at close range, resulting in mass killings and large numbers of injuries. The scale of the violence across protest sites, particularly on January 8 and 9, was so extraordinary that witnesses described streets covered in blood, bodies piled into trucks for transport, and overwhelmed morgues where families searched for days for their loved ones. 

HRA documented that at least 7,068 people were killed, including at least 6,548 protesters, 236 children, and 77 bystanders. Additionally, at least 53,987 people were arrested. These numbers are to be understood as verified minimums (meaning, they only include cases that could be methodologically verified). 

The repression extended well beyond the unlawful use of force against demonstrators. HRA documented arbitrary arrests and mass detention, incommunicado detention, enforced disappearances, torture, and other ill-treatment, forced confessions, and interference with medical care. Documentation gathered by HRA demonstrates that protesters who survived gunshot and pellet injuries, appeared in protest footage, or were identified while seeking treatment or searching for a loved one at a hospital were reportedly pursued after the demonstrations. Some were harassed at their homes or workplaces, while others went into hiding to wait for visible injuries and scars to heal to conceal evidence of their protest participation. 

Violence occurred alongside broader measures to obscure the nature and scale of the repression. Iranian authorities imposed the longest nationwide internet and telecommunications shutdown in modern history as the crackdown intensified. In conversation with HRA, witnesses across multiple protest locations described public street lighting being turned off, coinciding with a marked escalation in the use of lethal force. In the aftermath of the protests, bereaved families reported persistent harassment and pressure by state authorities to compel them to characterize relatives killed during the protests as “martyrs” aligned with the state’s narrative of the events.  

The significance of these allegations for German criminal law lies not only in the gravity of individual acts, but in the fact that they amount to a widespread and systematic attack against a civilian population. HRA’s documentation identifies recurring methods across geographically dispersed locations, the coordinated participation of multiple state institutions, and indications that authorities acted with knowledge of the scale and character of the repression. On that basis, HRA argues that there are sufficient factual indications that multiple underlying acts constituting crimes against humanity under Section 7 of the VStGB may have been committed.

The Accountability Gap

HRA’s submission to the German Prosecutor identifies upwards of 50 individuals implicated in the crackdown alongside their role and nexus to the violations documented. 

Opening a structural investigation would not constitute a judicial determination that crimes against humanity occurred, let alone that any particular individual bears criminal responsibility. It would, however, permit German prosecutors to investigate whether the available evidence substantiates those allegations and, if so, who may be responsible. This would enable future criminal proceedings whenever jurisdictional opportunities arise. 

At present, there is no realistic prospect that Iranian authorities will independently investigate and prosecute the alleged crimes, largely due to complicity by the Iranian judiciary. The judiciary has long been implicated in the broader system of repression, including through its participation in practices of arbitrary detention, imprisonment, and violations of fair trial and due process guarantees against dissidents and perceived opponents. In January of 2026, HRA documented 369 televised forced confessions obtained from detained protesters under conditions of torture and coercion, an unprecedented number. Iranian authorities relied on broadly framed national security offenses to prosecute and, ultimately, execute protesters in connection with the January protests (and sentenced many more to death). According to lawyers HRA has spoken to, the aforementioned forced confessions were used in many cases against defendants at trials lasting no longer than 5 minutes, and without the presence of legal counsel.

The International Criminal Court (ICC) does not presently offer a realistic alternative to domestic accountability. Iran is not a State Party to the Rome Statute and has not lodged an Article 12(3) declaration accepting the Court’s jurisdiction for the conduct in question (nor is it at all likely to under the current power structures). Accordingly, absent another jurisdictional basis, crimes committed entirely on Iranian territory fall outside the ICC’s territorial jurisdiction unless the situation is referred to by the U.N. Security Council, a highly unlikely prospect. 

The absence of a realistic avenue for accountability within Iran or before the ICC has not, however, placed serious violations in Iran beyond the scope of international accountability efforts. Germany and other European states have already invested in the infrastructure of future accountability, including by supporting international mechanisms such as the United Nations Fact-Finding Mission on Iran (FFMI), mandated to collect and preserve evidence for future legal proceedings, imposing targeted measures against individuals and entities implicated in serious human rights violations, and repeatedly acting collectively in response to Iranian state conduct. These measures serve distinct purposes, but they reflect a common premise: evidence should be preserved, responsibility identified, and avenues for future accountability maintained even where prosecution is not immediately possible. 

What remains comparatively underdeveloped, for the situation in Iran, is the criminal investigative component capable of translating that groundwork into individual criminal cases when opportunities for prosecution arise. That is where domestic jurisdictions assume particular importance. Germany’s VStGB permits the exercise of universal jurisdiction over core international crimes irrespective of where the conduct occurred. The existence of jurisdiction, however, does not resolve the practical difficulties of investigation and prosecution. International crimes frequently involve large numbers of incidents, complex institutional structures, evidence dispersed across jurisdictions, and suspects who remain outside Germany.

The question is therefore not whether Germany can exercise universal jurisdiction over international crimes committed in Iran, but whether German prosecutors should begin developing the evidentiary basis for potential cases before a particular suspect is present in Germany, and an individual prosecution becomes possible.

The Function of a Structural Investigation

Rather than focusing initially on the criminal responsibility of a named suspect, a structural investigation allows German prosecutors to investigate the broader factual structure of the alleged crimes. The Prosecutor can collect and preserve testimonial, documentary, and digital evidence, examine patterns across individual incidents, identify relevant state institutions and units, and begin assessing the roles of those who may have planned, ordered, facilitated, or perpetrated the underlying acts.

This distinction is particularly important for international crimes committed in different ways by numerous individuals. Establishing individual criminal responsibility for crimes against humanity may require considerably more effort than merely proving that a particular underlying act occurred. Investigators need to establish the existence and character of the broader attack against the civilian population, determine the relationship between particular incidents and that broader attack, reconstruct relevant institutional structures, and establish the accused’s individual contribution, knowledge, and intent.

A structural investigation would not replace the FFMI, targeted measures, or diplomatic action that Germany and other European states already support. Rather, it would complement them by providing a domestic investigative framework through which evidence can be assessed under German criminal law, potential perpetrators and modes of liability identified, and future individual proceedings prepared before a suspect enters the territory. In fact, in this context, evidence already collected and preserved by the FFMI would be particularly valuable. The FFMI’s mandate expressly contemplates cooperation with a variety of legal proceedings, including by collecting and preserving evidence with a view to its use in future legal proceedings. A German structural investigation would therefore provide a concrete domestic avenue through which this body of evidence could contribute to future criminal accountability.

Germany’s Precedent for Structural Investigations

Beginning the evidentiary groundwork only when a suspect becomes available can place investigators at a substantial disadvantage. That understanding is already reflected in Germany’s own prosecutorial strategy. Between 2019 and 2025, the Office of the Federal Prosecutor initiated more than 150 investigations into core crimes under international law, with Germany describing structural investigations as a “central element” enabling that strategy.

For crimes committed in Syria, prosecutors opened a structural investigation in 2011, which subsequently contributed to individual trials and prosecutions beginning in 2020 as suspects came within the jurisdictional reach of German authorities. These included most notably the Koblenz Trials (Al Khatib case), and more recently the conviction of a former Syrian military doctor Alaa Mousa. Following Russia’s full-scale invasion of Ukraine, the Federal Prosecutor General similarly opened a structural investigation allowing German authorities to begin collecting and securing evidence of alleged war crimes and crimes against humanity for potential future proceedings. 

The question presented by the situation in Iran is therefore not whether structural investigations are a useful or appropriate tool of German international-crimes practice. Germany’s own prosecutorial strategy answers that question. Rather, it is whether that established approach should now be applied to Iran. 

Foreseeable but Unpredictable Presence of Perpetrators

There is an established history of current and former Iranian officials travelling to Germany and other European states, including for personal, family, and medical reasons. This does not mean that individuals potentially responsible for crimes allegedly committed during the December 2025 and January 2026 crackdown will definitely enter Germany, but it does demonstrate that future opportunities for individual proceedings should not be ruled out simply because no suspect is presently available. And while a suspect’s presence is not required for Germany to open an investigation for international crimes, it materially changes the prospects for individual proceedings, as under German law, a trial of this nature generally cannot proceed without the accused’s presence. As a result, the suspect’s presence or anticipated presence is relevant to the Federal Prosecutor’s exercise of prosecutorial discretion on whether to open an investigation.

The prosecution of Hamid Noury in Sweden further demonstrates the point. Noury was arrested after travelling to Sweden in 2019 and prosecuted for crimes committed more than three decades earlier during the 1988 prison massacres. Universal jurisdiction cases frequently depend on precisely this type of contingency. Authorities may be unable to predict which suspect will travel, when, or to which state. The effectiveness of universal jurisdiction therefore depends in part on whether prosecutors are prepared to act when that contingency materializes. In this respect, a structural investigation offers a powerful tool to facilitate long-term criminal accountability, particularly given that crimes against humanity are not subject to a statute of limitations under Section 5 of the VStGB. 

The Present Availability of Witnesses and Evidence 

Victims and witnesses to crimes committed in Iran, as well as their family members, are already present across Europe, bringing with them testimony, documentary material, and first-hand accounts that may prove critical to future criminal proceedings. HRA has interviewed dozens of victims, witnesses, and family members in connection with the January protests who are now in Germany, France, Norway, Austria, and Denmark, among other jurisdictions.

Germany is particularly significant in this respect. It is already home to one of the largest Iranian diaspora communities in Europe, with hundreds of thousands of people of Iranian origin living in the country. The number of victims and witnesses accessible to European investigators is also likely to grow. Periods of mass repression in Iran have repeatedly driven victims, witnesses, human rights defenders, and others at risk to leave the country in search of safety. The U.N. Independent International Fact-Finding Mission on Iran has documented this dynamic following the 2022 protests, finding that continued repression and persecution forced victims and survivors, their families, and others supporting them to leave Iran. As repression continues, additional victims and witnesses can reasonably be expected to seek protection abroad.

The availability of evidence in Europe matters independently of whether an individual prosecution is presently possible. The preservation of testimonial evidence is time-sensitive. Digital material can disappear. Witnesses relocate. And evidence that may appear relevant only to an individual incident can assume different significance when analyzed alongside information concerning similar incidents, institutional structures, or orders issued elsewhere – especially when it comes to establishing the widespread or systemic nature of a potential crime against humanity.

A structural investigation would provide a procedural framework within which that evidence could be collected and assessed before those losses occur.

Iranian State Conduct as a European Security Concern

Iranian state-linked conduct is not exclusively an extraterritorial humanitarian concern for Germany. Iranian security and intelligence actors and associated networks have been increasingly linked to surveillance, intimidation, threats, and other forms of transnational repression targeting dissidents and perceived opponents. The consequences for Germany are particularly relevant. Members of the Iranian diaspora have faced threats and intimidation on German soil. While abroad, German-Iranian dual nationals have been subjected to harassment, kidnapping, arbitrary arrest and detention, torture and other ill-treatment, and, in the most extreme cases, execution in Iran.

There is also likely potential institutional overlap between the apparatus responsible for repression inside Iran and those implicated in operations abroad. That overlap does not establish that the same individuals are responsible for crimes in both contexts. But it means that understanding the structures, personnel, chains of command, and relationships involved in alleged international crimes inside Iran may also have relevance to European efforts to understand and counter Iranian transnational repression. Where individual responsibility overlaps, future prosecutions for crimes committed inside Iran could have consequences beyond accountability for those crimes, including by constraining the ability of implicated state actors to participate in or facilitate transnational repression. The prospect of criminal accountability may also have a deterrent effect on others operating within the same structures.

A Political and Institutional Environment Conducive to Accountability

German and European authorities have increasingly treated Iranian state conduct as a matter of serious security, human rights, and foreign-policy concern. German authorities have identified Iranian intelligence activity as a significant security concern amid increasing operations of Iranian state actors and associated networks across Europe. Iranian state conduct has prompted a sustained diplomatic and security response from Germany and other European states.  

Germany’s leading role in pursuing accountability for crimes committed in Syria also reflects an established political and institutional commitment to extra-territorial jurisdiction. Germany itself has emphasized that Syria cases contribute to the development of substantive international criminal law and have enabled its courts and authorities to acquire experience in addressing the practical challenges of complex international-crimes proceedings. It also expressly described its universal jurisdiction practice as ensuring that Germany does not provide a “safe haven” for perpetrators of international crimes. That experience leaves Germany better equipped to address other situations, including Iran, while its stated commitment to preventing safe haven reinforces the rationale for developing cases before potential perpetrators arrive.

The present convergence of sustained scrutiny of Iran’s domestic repression, concern over Iranian state activity in Europe, and existing support for accountability mechanisms creates an opportunity to translate that attention and capacity into criminal investigative preparedness.

Investigative Capacity Is Time-Sensitive

Much of the evidence relevant to future proceedings is currently held or accessible through civil society organizations, including HRA, that have spent years documenting violations, developing trusted relationships with victims and witnesses, and building the technical capacity necessary to collect and preserve material to evidentiary standards. That capacity cannot be assumed to remain static. Civil society documentation is often supported through time-limited funding tied to particular crises or accountability initiatives, while staff, institutional knowledge, access to witnesses, and dedicated investigative resources inevitably change over time. An investigation opened now would allow prosecutors to work with organizations while those networks, expertise, and resources are available, rather than attempting to reconstruct them years later when an individual case happens to become viable.

Early engagement can also reduce the costs and practical difficulties of future investigations. Civil society organizations are presently positioned to help identify witnesses, explain documentation methodologies, provide relevant material, and assist investigators in understanding institutional structures and patterns of alleged violations. The longer that engagement is deferred, the greater the risk that prosecutors will later be required to recreate work that could have been undertaken collaboratively when the evidence, expertise, and institutional capacity were most readily available. Structural investigations therefore preserve not only evidence, but the infrastructure through which that evidence can be effectively identified, understood, and assessed.

The Case for Acting Now

HRA’s submission does not arise on a blank slate. German prosecutors have previously been asked to open a structural investigation into crimes committed in Iran. But the current request must be assessed against the evidence and circumstances that exist today.

The December 2025 and January 2026 crackdown has generated substantial new evidence concerning alleged crimes against humanity, including information relating to victims, witnesses, potential perpetrators, and the state institutions allegedly involved. 

HRA’s submission provides additional factual information concerning those events while also situating them within recurring patterns of serious violations documented during earlier protest movements. At the same time, victims and evidence are increasingly accessible in Europe, future suspect availability remains plausible but unpredictable, and Germany has both the legal framework and institutional experience necessary to begin investigative work before an individual case becomes immediately practicable.

Under Section 152(2) of Germany’s Code of Criminal Procedure, the relevant question at the investigative stage is whether sufficient factual indications of a criminal offense exist. HRA argues that the evidence concerning the December 2025 and January 2026 crackdown satisfies that threshold with respect to potential crimes against humanity under Section 7 of the VStGB. HRA further argues that Germany’s nexus to the situation weighs in favor of the Federal Prosecutor General exercising its authority to investigate. Whether the Federal Prosecutor General accepts that assessment will necessarily depend on its independent evaluation of the evidence and applicable German law. 

At the very least, the Federal Prosecutor General should give serious weight to the exceptional circumstances that strongly favor opening a structural investigation now. 

The post The Case for a German Structural Investigation into Crimes against Humanity in Iran appeared first on Just Security.

A curated weekday guide to major news and developments over the last 24 hours. Here’s today’s news:

RUSSIA-UKRAINE WAR

Russian President Vladimir Putin yesterday said there was a chance of reaching an agreement to end the Ukraine war, adding that a number of countries including the United States and China were ready to support a peace settlement. Vladimir Soldatkin reports for Reuters.

A Ukrainian strike on Belgorod, Russia, yesterday killed four people, including two medical personnel, according to the region’s official headquarters. The head of Russian controlled parts of eastern Ukraine’s Donetsk Region said three civilians died in drone strikes in three separate districts of the region. Reuters reports.

Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy yesterday said an investigation was underway to determine what caused a dispute between two of Ukraine’s security agencies to escalate into a shootout this week. The dispute centers on the nine-day disappearance of a Russian nationalist activist fighting alongside Ukrainian troops who said he was detained by the SBU Security Service and obliged to sign a confession that he collaborated with Russian intelligence, which he later retracted. Reuters reports.

The Slovak Government on Wednesday rejected a 12-month extension for the EU’s individual sanctions package against Russia, three diplomats told POLITICO. Slovakia was the sole holdout in negotiations over the renewal of sanctions. Koen Verhelst reports.

Trump yesterday said he would ask European nations to pay back the United States for military aid and munitions previously sent to Ukraine, and appeared to signal a halt in sales to allied nations. In a social media post, Trump also slammed reports of heavily depleted U.S. munition stockpiles as a result of the Iran war. Reuters reports.

IRAN WAR 

Vice President JD Vance yesterday said he would not call the military conflict with Iran a “war right now,” and described strikes from both sides as occasional flare-ups. Vance claimed he was “skeptical” of Iranian media reports that U.S. strikes hit a wedding, but clarified that the United States was looking into the incident. Maggie Haberman reports for the New York Times; Nilo Tabrizy, Edward Carron, Idrees Ali, and Goerge Sargent report for Reuters.

The U.S. Air Force said they have disabled advertising trackers on a range of phones and computers, according to letters released today by U.S. Senator Ron Wyden (D-OR) and statements given to Reuters. The Air Force told Wyden it disabled the advertising identifiers on computers and mobile phones two months ago. Raphael Satter reports.

IRAN WAR – LEBANON

The Israeli military yesterday said it had cleared Hezbollah militants from tunnels within the Ali al-Taher ridge in southern Lebanon. The IDF said it would “neutralize” the underground complex. Ephrat Livni and Farnaz Fassihi report for the New York Times.

Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu’s office yesterday said that Israel will release five Lebanese citizens under its custody after finding they had no links to militant groups. Sources told Reuters 35 Lebanese detainees remained in Israel, including 20 civilians. Rami Ayyub and Maya Gebelly report.

IRAN WAR – OTHER DEVELOPMENTS

U.S. Commerce Secretary Howard Lutnick yesterday apologized for saying no Americans had died in the Iran war in an interview on Wednesday. He claimed in a social media post that he was thinking about the Venezuelan military operation where no service members died. Katharine Jackson reports for Reuters. 

CLIMATE AND ENVIRONMENT 

French Health Minister Stephanie Rist today said that there were around 7,000 excess deaths recorded during the heatwaves over the summer. This follows Belgium’s announcement that 3,000 excess deaths were recorded in the country over the summer. Inti Landauro reports for Reuters; Reuters reports.

OTHER GLOBAL DEVELOPMENTS

A Philippine court today ordered the arrest of Vice President Sara Duterte in connection with a criminal case accusing her of making threats against President Ferdinand Marcos Jr., the first lady, and his cousin, a former House speaker. The case stems from Duterte’s remarks in November 2024 that she had spoken with an assassin and instructed him to kill Marcos Jr., his wife, and his cousin, if she were killed. Reuters reports.

German police reacted to two fresh suspected attempts against the country’s electricity grid, according to a report today from Bild. Police have received a letter claiming responsibility for one of the attempts in Dormagen. Separately in Munich yesterday, police investigated a suspected arson attack outside a defense firm, during which two people were arrested. Ludwig Burger reports for Reuters; Friederike Heine reports for Reuters.

Argentine President Javier Milei yesterday said he would sanction oil companies drilling in the Falkland Islands, adding that the prospect of two oil firms carrying out exploration in the islands was an urgent threat to Argentine interests. Downing Street today said it was clear that “the Falkland Islanders’ right of self-determination extends to the right to exploit their own natural resources.” Reuters reports; Will Grant, Chris Graham, and Peter Hoskins report for BBC News.

British political party Reform UK received a $5.4 million donation from a crypto investor convicted of a banking secrecy violation in the United States and pardoned by Trump. The donation accounted for 75% of the party’s donations last quarter. Today, Reform leadership’s senior aide Dan Jukes and Reform’s head of policy James Orr stood down pending the outcome of an internal probe relating to an undercover funding sting aired on Channel 4 News yesterday. Andrew Macaskill and Naomi Rovnick report for Reuters; Ewan Somerville and Joe Pike report for BBC News.

A Syrian envoy and U.N. representative yesterday confirmed that Syria has begun destroying the remnants of an Assad-era chemical weapons program that it recovered in May. Reuters reports.

Pacific Island leaders yesterday expressed concern about China’s Pacific missile test at their annual summit in a statement, though Nauru formally dissented. China’s intercontinental ballistic missile test in July passed over several island nations without adequate warning. China’s Foreign Ministry responded by saying the country is committed to peaceful development. Renju Jose reports for Reuters.

Haiti’s Foreign Minister Raina Forbin yesterday urged the U.N. Security Council to renew the 12-month mandate of an international force supporting the country’s police, saying stronger backing is needed if Haiti is to hold its first election in a decade in December. Sarah Morland reports for Reuters.

U.S. FOREIGN AFFAIRS

The Central Bank of the Netherlands, De Nederlandsche Bank, on Wednesday said it had transferred over a quarter of its gold reserves out of the United States to the United Kingdom between March to August, citing “increasing geopolitical unrest.” The Bank of England’s bullion holdings are regarded as the “world’s most tradable and will therefore be the most readily available” should a global crisis arise. Ephrat Livni reports for the New York Times.

The State Department yesterday imposed sanctions on five Cuban companies and the grandson of Raul Castro, Fidel Ernesto Castro. The Department said it was sanctioning Ernesto Castro, for being an adult family member of other sanctioned members of the Castro family. Sanctions were also issued to a state-owned bank, two companies involved in Cuba’s nickel mining industry, and two companies active in Cuba’s energy sector. Sarah Morland reports for Reuters.

The current and former presidents of the International Criminal Court’s governing body said that efforts to isolate the Court diplomatically are “aimed at eroding… confidence in the international legal order itself,” in a joint op-ed published yesterday on Just Security. Kanishka Singh reports for Reuters.

U.S. CARIBBEAN AND PACIFIC OPERATIONS

U.S. Southern Command on Wednesday said the military intercepted and sank a vessel that was allegedly “operating as a floating refueling station” supporting drug trafficking by the Ecuadorian criminal organization Los Choneros. The vessel was cleared without incident and those on board were transferred to Ecuador’s authorities. CBS News reports.

U.S. IMMIGRATION DEVELOPMENTS

An official in charge of evaluating new recruits for ICE filed a whistleblower report last year to the Office of Inspector General in the Department of Homeland Security citing “unprecedented lowering of standards” for recruiting candidates into ICE ranks, the New York Times reported yesterday. In the complaint, he asked for an independent, outside investigation into the matter, and his concerns have become part of an ongoing audit into vetting practices. Alexandra Berzon, Katie Benner, and Hamed Aleaziz report.

ICE agent Christian Castro yesterday returned to custody in Texas after he was indicted by a federal grand jury on charges of making false statements about the shooting of Julio Cesar Sosa-Celis. Dan Rosenzweig-Ziff and Jonathan Allen report for Reuters.

The Government yesterday deported more than 100 people to Haiti. Human Rights First’s ICE Flight Monitor said that this is the third consecutive Thursday deportation flight, “marking a shift from monthly to weekly flights.” AP News reports.

U.S. TECH DEVELOPMENTS

Pentagon official Emil Michael yesterday said Anthropic is still considered a “supply chain risk,” contradicting Lutnick’s Wednesday comments that the company is “back on the right side.” Maria Curi reports for Axios.

LA District officials on Wednesday announced the city’s public school system will vastly restrict use of AI at all grade levels. Students may still see AI summaries on top of Google searches, but will not engage with Google’s Gemini chatbot, or other chatbot helpers offered within Google’s classroom software. Dana Goldstein reports for the New York Times.

META CEO Mark Zuckerberg expressed concerns about plans for a national AI regulator in a previously unreported phone call with Trump last month, a senior White House official has told POLITICO. Another source said Zuckerberg did not ask Trump to not create the regulator, but told the president to appoint members to the regulator’s body that embody Trump’s own approach to AI. Sophia Cai and Charles Rollet report.

U.S. DOMESTIC DEVELOPMENTS

Army doctor Theresa Long told a federal court in August that she’s working with Health Secretary Robert F. Kennedy Jr. and Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth to probe whether troops died from Covid-19 vaccines after former President Joe Biden mandated the shots for service members in 2021, in a deposition published by POLITICO yesterday. The deposition also revealed that Hegseth detailed Long to be Kennedy’s senior medical military advisor, a role which had not previously been reported. Carmen Paun and Josh Gerstein report.

Kennedy Jr. asked his new Centers for Disease Control and Prevention director Erica Schwartz to remove a reference to two Pennsylvania deaths from the agency’s online measles tally after he questioned whether the disease contributed to the fatalities, sources told Reuters, adding that Schwartz agreed with Kennedy’s directive and implemented it without objection. Yasmeen Abutaleb and Dan Levine report.

Florida’s Department of Transportation earlier this week banned local police from placing cameras that read license plates supplied by Flock Safety on its state highways. The department said it would revoke previous permits for the cameras and no longer issue new permits within its jurisdiction. Helen Coster reports for Reuters.

The House of Representatives yesterday passed the “Protect Economic and Academic Freedom Act” to block federal aid for universities that boycott Israel. Patricia Zengerle reports for Reuters.

Founder of Apollo Global Management Leon Black yesterday sued the House Oversight Committee which had ordered him to provide Congress with copies of non-disclosure agreements as part of an investigation into the activities of sex offender Jeffrey Epstein. The lawsuit accuses lawmakers of exceeding their constitutional authority when they subpoenaed him to provide the agreements. Isla Binnie and Pritam Biswas report for Reuters.

Rep. Suhas Subramanyam (D-VA) yesterday said he was informed by the Justice Department that his phone calls with a Virginia state legislator in the spring were wiretapped. Subramanyam said the wiretap was part of the DOJ’s corruption probe into Virginia Senate Leader Louise Lucas. Andrew Solender reports for Axios.

TRUMP ADMINISTRATION ACTIONS 

Trump yesterday said in a social media post that he was appointing assistant secretary of the Army for civil works Adam Telle as the acting U.S. Army Secretary. Reuters reports.

The Pentagon is temporarily rescinding recently published guidance on a mandatory testosterone deficiency screening policy for service members aged 30 and over, a U.S. official told Reuters yesterday. The guidance had been removed from the Pentagon’s website by Thursday. Idrees Ali and Julie Steenhuysen report.

The White House’s Office of Science and Technology pressured U.S. space companies in a call last week not to attend a global space summit in Paris organized by French President Emmanuel Macron, triggering last-minute cancellations yesterday, sources told POLITICO. Joey Roulette and Tim Hepher report for Reuters.

The Treasury Department and Internal Revenue Service yesterday proposed new regulations that would strip schools of tax-exempt status if they offer targeted support to specific racial groups. Jack Queen reports for Reuters.

Interior Secretary Doug Burgum yesterday announced that excavation work on the Great Triumphal Arch and Military Observation Deck would start “over the next two-week period.” The work would begin despite legal challenges and the lack of final approval from a government planning authority. Daniel Trotta reports for Reuters.

TRUMP ADMINISTRATION LITIGATION

The Justice Department yesterday made an emergency request to the Supreme Court to lift a federal judge’s temporary order preventing the Postal Service from enforcing their new rule, based on Trump’s executive order, tightening the use of mail-in ballots. The Supreme Court previously lifted an injunction imposed by another federal judge in June. Andrew Chung reports for Reuters.

Former Pardon Attorney Elizabeth Oyer yesterday filed a lawsuit against the Justice Department for unlawful firing after she said she declined to recommend restoring gun rights to actor Mel Gibson, a vocal supporter of Trump. Oyer refused to ignore concerns surrounding Gibson, and after refusing another request from a staff member of then deputy Attorney General Todd Blanche, she received termination papers. Dan Rosenzweig-Ziff reports for Reuters.

Did you miss this? Stay up-to-date with our Litigation Tracker: Legal Challenges to Trump Administration Actions.

If you enjoy listening, Just Security’s analytic articles are also available in audio form on the justsecurity.org website.

ICYMI: Yesterday on Just Security

The post Early Edition: September 4, 2026 appeared first on Just Security.

For example, the Executive Order at issue in the current litigation starts out by saying: "The right to vote in Federal elections is reserved exclusively for citizens of the United States under the Constitution and Federal law." This is a contestable proposition. The Constitution does not set forth a rule that only US citizens can vote. Section 2 of the Fourteenth Amendment implies only that states can ban aliens from voting. Before and after the Fourteenth Amendment's ratification, some states did permit some aliens to vote. If the Constitution reserves that question for the states, then I'm not sure if Congress can make it illegal for non-citizens to vote, which is part of the statutory basis for the Executive Order.

But there are arguments on the other side. John Bingham was most prominent constitutional leader who thought that the Constitution (at least the 1787 version) barred non-citizens from voting. He made this argument at length to Congress, though his view was rejected in the 1850s for the admission of states like Minnesota that permitted alien voting.

The upshot is that these are deep waters that make a quick ruling with limited filings unwise. 

Veronika Bílková asks what, exactly, is so bad about the sovereigntist theory that permeates contemporary thinking about international law. She rightly notes that most international lawyers no longer adhere to the classical version of the theory; and she suggests that the only surviving remnant might be that international law is still state-centric. I don’t think that’s the only surviving remnant. What survives – and still dominates the field – is the demand that international law today mirror the law of the mythical sovereign. Indeed, many international lawyers suggest that international law must approximate that kind of law if it is to exist, to function, or to be justifiable as law. The theory is bad because it is confused. It defines too narrowly and ultimately misrepresents what international law (in practice) is, what international law (in practice) does, and why international law (as a practice) can be worthwhile. And in so distorting the legal field, it hamstrings those who rely on it from effectively analyzing, responding to, or changing the world around them.

From the Existence to the Practice of Law

Start with the question of what exists – or counts – as international law. The sovereigntist theory posits that law must come from official sources and establish binding obligations for its subjects to obey. The reason to insist that law must come from official sources is to distinguish it from nonlaw and thereby to ensure that it alone establishes identifiable obligations for its subjects to obey. Today, most international lawyers recognize that the doctrines for identifying the official sources of international law are not entirely accurate. However, many still insist on drawing a line between law and nonlaw. And many suggest that the critical distinction is that only law can and at times must be binding.

Bílková seems committed to maintaining this condition for law’s existence. She asks, if authority does not derive only from official sources – “if it emerges through dispersed practices and interpretive communities” – “what makes certain practices specifically legal” in kind so that we can “identify who possesses authority to make binding decisions.” Gemma Lligadas Gonzalez likewise reverts to this condition, when she says that “[i]nternational law’s connection to sovereign authority … is what distinguishes it from other normative frameworks.” My view – supported by both the practice of international law and a good deal of social theory – is that the distinction between law and nonlaw is variable across social contexts, unstable in any given social context, and incapable of being delineated by official sources alone. The sources condition misrepresents what actually counts as law and denies those who rely on it the tools they need to navigate the field.

For example, legal experts widely recognize that international courts and tribunals do not adhere strictly to the sources doctrines when making decisions. Lawyers who appear before these institutions would be less effective in advancing their claims, if they relied only on materials that satisfy the doctrines and ignored the broader web of social practices that routinely inform how courts and tribunals make decisions. Lawyers who practice outside formal legal venues, in the “real world” where law and nonlaw bleed more clearly together, would be even more inept if they relied exclusively on the sources doctrines to advise their clients on what to do.

I do not myself define what counts as international law. My claim is that, to the extent that authority is an essential ingredient of law, as most believe it to be, it cannot be confined to official sources that stand apart from its subjects and impose on them binding obligations to obey. In my paper, I use the example of a sign that reads “no vehicles in the park” to illustrate that authority must be allocated with the people in relation to whom it is used – people whom the sovereigntist theory designates as mere subjects. In practice, if not in formal law, these people have agency in shaping how authority is allocated in their social surroundings, and their allocations are rarely uniform or consistent over time. Outside observers who purport to identify the decisions that “really” have authority as law seem to me to be trying to occupy the role of the sovereign and settle for everyone else what counts as law, stripping them of their rightful agency in the process.

So, rather than ask, “what counts as law?”, I focus on a different question: what happens when people invoke what they contend is law and thereby put the allocation of authority at issue in their interactions? One thing that happens, as they negotiate how authority is allocated, is that they constitute the terms of their relations – their social order – with it. In the language of social theory, it and they are mutually constitutive. Neither stands apart from or above the other, and neither controls what happens with the other. Wouter Werner’s metaphor of a set of nested improvisational scripts describes this dynamic better than I did. Law provides the scripts that enable people to define “who acts, who talks, about whom and how” in their social order.

Lligadas Gonzalez gets at a similar idea by drawing on Martti Koskenniemi’s theory of hegemonic contestation. But Lligadas Gonzalez implies that one participant or another always imposes her will on the law, universalizing her predetermined preferences through it. My account and Werner’s script metaphor both suggest otherwise. Even as the individual participants might try to shape what happens through the practice of law, it also shapes them – so long as they engage with it. This clarification opens for further inquiry a possibility that most international relations and legal scholars fail even to consider: to the extent that a hegemon (if you want to use that term) has disproportionate influence in the practice of law – and in the allocations of authority that occur through it – it will also have a disproportionate influence on the hegemon. Law and the hegemon are constituted together; neither stands apart from or controls what happens with the other. One cannot see how law might influence the hegemon, however, if one assumes, with the sovereigntist theory, that law is nothing more than a set of binding obligations issued by official sources to control the hegemon, along with all its other subjects.

From Controlling People to Constituting their Social Order

The reason the sovereigntist theory fixates on the distinction between sovereign and subject – law and nonlaw – is that it aspires for the former to control the latter. Indeed, the theory’s classical variant posits that law cannot have a practical effect, if its obligations do not control the forces that lie “outside” it, in the hands of its individual subjects. Many contemporary analysts still expect international law to settle strict obligations for states to obey. And many suggest that it works insofar as it brings states under its control. As I just explained, however, the authority element of law does not exert control. To the extent that law is controlling, what makes it controlling is not its authority but the coercion that often lies behind or alongside it. And though coercion might sometimes be necessary to bring under control certain wayward actors, it should, in my view, be used only sparingly.

Meanwhile, the fixation with settling clear obligations that states obey diminishes what authority actually does – and diminishes its constitutive processes that are necessary for the legal system to work. These processes are how people from different walks of life participate together in defining the terms for their collective governance. As they engage in the practice of law, they decide to whom they should (or should not) allocate authority for which of the decisions before them and thus what kind of social order they will create together with it. If they never grant authority to anyone else to make decisions that affect them, or if no one ever grants authority to them, they will have a harder time advancing their preferred governance projects. Conversely, if they grant too much authority to a single source, they will lose their voice and agency in the process and, again, be limited in their capacity to advance their preferred projects. The trick, then, is for them to maintain enough opportunities to participate in at least some of the decisions that affect them, without insisting that they must participate in every such decision or that a single entity (or group) be given the authority to settle the matter once and for all for everyone involved.

To be clear, I share Doruk Erhan’s worry that the “forces of privatization and social fragmentation . . . leave us without an accessible domain of politics.” But I believe that this dynamic reflects one manifestation of the reality that I describe: authority cannot be used to control the “colorless technocrats, PE professionals, and false visionaries” who might try to consolidate authority amongst themselves and box out the masses who are affected by their decisions. Though Erhan suggests that the ICJ might offer a more fruitful alternative, I am more dubious. After all, the ICJ is also inaccessible to the masses, and its technocratic legalese tends to mute, rather than accentuate, the political stakes of its decisions. And again, I do not think that looking to any one entity to settle the obligations for everyone else to obey will work, at least not without attending to the constitutive processes that keep the legal system going. As Judge Tladi says in his declaration in the provisional measures stage of South Africa’s genocide case against Israel, “the Court is only a court!” Though it might define the obligations that some people expect states to obey, that is only a small part of what a legal system might – and must – do.

The current war in the Middle East is revelatory. As far as I can tell, Donald Trump is not effectively being controlled by law (domestic or international). Moreover, even though he has at his disposal the enormous military and economic power of the U.S. government, he is failing to translate this power into the authority he needs to advance his preferred governance projects – and establish a new order in the Middle East. His mode of governance is to rely heavily on coercion, while disavowing the need to earn authority for what he wants done. He seems not to appreciate that, though coercion without authority can destroy the old order, it cannot constitute a new one. A constitutive agenda requires the capacity not (just) for coercion but (also) for authority. And this requires more than someone just assuming the role of sovereign and declaring what everyone else must do. It requires a willingness to work with, and to make compromises and concessions to, those whom one wants or needs in the governance enterprise. Trump’s disregard for authority leaves him without what he needs to constitute the governance arrangements that he might prefer in the Middle East. The more authority he squanders, the less capacity he will have to get what he wants done.

From Equality under Law to Emancipation through Law

But of course, denying Trump authority might not be enough to get him or others to stop sowing destruction. The reason the sovereigntist theory is so alluring is that it promises that law will protect weak and strong alike – by controlling those who might use coercion to dominate the rest. Critical legal scholars have amply demonstrated that international law has never realized the promise of equality “under” law. Formal international law itself codifies the unequal status of the states that it contends are its equal subjects. It most obviously does so in the composition of the UN Security Council. It also codifies their inequality by providing for them to be differently situated, depending on the arrangements within which others are willing to share authority with them. Outside formal international law, the inequalities are even more obvious. Over the past few decades, the United States was regularly permitted – sometimes actively, other times only passively and grudgingly – to make governance decisions that no other state could or would have made. Now that the United States’s global ambitions, authority, and capacity are all dissipating, there are serious questions about who and what will fill the void.

We should not assume that less authority for the United States will automatically translate into more for everyone else. As I have been explaining, authority does not work like coercion, by suppressing the agency of one side in the exchange for the benefit of the other. Authority must instead be shared. It enhances the agency of both sides together, relative to where each would be without it. World events are again instructive. The dissipating authority of the United States seems also to be undermining the authorities – and thus the governance capacities – of its historic allies, with whom it once worked closely to constitute arrangements that let them do together what none of them could (as easily) have done alone. For example, Europe seems increasingly sidelined from the arenas in which globally transformative decisions are being made and unable effectively to claim and exercise the authority it needs to preserve its standing in the international order.

For those who aspire for the world to be saturated with law, the only path forward, it seems to me, is to find new ways to share authority, at different levels of social organization, so that more people, from disparate walks of life, can participate with others in their collective governance. Though this path is unlikely to lead to planetary equality under law, it is, as far as I can tell, the only way to realize more emancipation through law. We do not – and in my view, should not want to – live in a world in which a single person, entity, or group stands in for the mythical sovereign and dictates what everyone else should do. Marcel Brus’s recommendations for the future push in a similar direction. He urges international lawyers to invest in institutions and coalitions – the social spaces in which authority can be allocated among different actors, in the service of the governance projects that enough of them find sufficiently worthwhile to take measures to support. Relinquishing the sovereigntist thirst for control and instead devolving authority to people around the world to exercise voice and agency in the projects that they deem fit is not some concession to weakness. It is the ideal to which we should, in my view, aspire.

The post Thinking Constructively Together appeared first on Verfassungsblog.

The core point of my post appears in one of the three conditions held by what Hakimi calls the “sovereigntist theory”: the condition for law’s existence. I think this is the most important condition discussed by Hakimi, as the other two (efficacy and justifiability) logically follow from it. If one understands law’s existence differently, one holds different opinions on what it means for law to be efficacious and justifiable. According to Hakimi, sovereigntists argue that “Law can exist […]only insofar as a source with authority settles what is to be done in formally binding commands for its subjects.” (49)

Law as a Script

While Hakimi treats this condition as if it contains one single criterion for the existence of law, I argue that there are actually two criteria here. The first is that law has to follow from “a source with authority”. This criterion goes back to the ambition to separate law from non-law: whatever follows from the sources counts as law, what does not follow from these sources does not count as law. This part of the sovereigntist theory is discussed most extensively in the article, and has spurred debates about the pros and cons of giving up a clear demarcation line between law and non-law.  I will not revisit these debates here. Instead, I will focus on the second criterion mentioned above: that law consists of formally binding commands. This point, I argue, is analytically distinct from the question whether law flows from formal sources or is rooted in a more fluid social reality. Even if one sticks to a formal doctrine of sources, one could argue that it contains more than only binding norms of conduct. In other words: the question regarding the legal validity of linguistic utterances should be separated from the question what these utterances do. They could formally ‘bind’, but also do other things, such as express identities, emotions, make assertions etc.¹⁾  My argument is that this richness of legal texts should not be overlooked as it makes it possible for law to function at all. Even if it were possible to have a system that springs from one or a few sources, it would not and could not be a system that only consists of binding norms.

So the point is not only that rules are open and their content cannot be settled once and for all. The point is more radical: the law is not and cannot be only about “binding” norms and rules that make it possible to create and change these binding norms (Hart’s secondary rules). Rather, it is a script, or rather: a series of nested scripts,  that turns people into actors, into personae, with many of the elements that one would normally find in a script. Of course, it is not a script in the traditional sense, which spells out the lines that people should speak on stage. It is a script that allows and requires a lot of improvisation, the addition of new elements, etc. And yet, it does present us with a reality that would not exist without the script. It steers the kind of stories we tell in order to make sense of the script. Moreover, it is a script that is reinforced by all kinds of non-verbal elements, such as rituals (“all rise…”), paratextual elements, such as the title and make-up of legal documents (often reproduced in films and theatre performances, as a signal of how powerful these symbols are).

Some Examples

Let me give a concrete example. Elsewhere, Sarah Nouwen and I have discussed what we call the “deep script” of international criminal law.²⁾ This deep script does not spell out what actors do, but still offers them roles, stock characters, rituals, stock story-lines, typical places to perform. This is obvious in the role that people assume as defence lawyer, prosecution etc. However, it goes deeper than that. The script also affects, for example, the stories that are told about the defendant. International crimes require a combination of collective violence and individual responsibility. As Liana Minkova argues, this pre-structures the stories told by defence counsel about their clients.³⁾ In the Ongwen case, for example, the Defence emphasized how the defendant was a typical LRA member, just as vulnerable to manipulation and duress as anyone else in that organization. Yet, it also told stories that emphasised his individuality, how he was different from other LRA commanders, more intelligent and caring.  Elsewhere, Sofia Stolk has shown how prosecutors in opening statements typically present defendants as “sophisticated beasts”: more controlled and manipulative than others and yet less able to control their animalistic drives. In this way, they appeal to the in- or a-human nature of the crimes, while still maintaining that it is a human individual that should be held accountable.⁴⁾

In other words: law pre-structures: who acts, who talks, about whom and how.

Now the script metaphor may be obvious in a court setting with robes, a theatrical space, performances and ritualistic moves. However, I think it is also helpful outside such settings. Take for example Security Council Resolutions. Discussions on such resolutions tend to focus on the question whether they are taken under Chapter VII and whether they are binding or not. However, such readings completely ignore the actual text as it appears before one’s eyes. The text does not consist of a series of commands, randomly thrown into the world by a sovereign author. Rather, they contain stories about the Security Council itself.⁵⁾ The Council narrates its own past, by recalling earlier Resolutions, expresses all kinds of emotions, recommends and decides and makes a promise to remain seized of the matter. The Council, in other words, acts as a character that secures its own identity through recollections of its past and future, and presents a story that is much richer than formalists or realists want us to believe. The text is filled with paratextual elements, such as the title, the date, the logo, the preamble. Without such elements, it would virtually be impossible to make sense of the Resolution. As the literary critic Gerard Genette said in relation to literary works: “To indicate what is at stake, we can ask one simple question as an example: limited to the text alone and without a guiding set of directions, how would we read Joyce’s Ulysses if it were not entitled Ulysses?”⁶⁾ To paraphrase Genette: How would we read Security Council Resolutions without a guiding set of directions, if they were not entitled “Security Council Resolutions”  and not formatted and narrated in the traditional sense?

A third example is the legal personality of States. The fact that the term “personality” is derived from theatre already suggests that it signifies more than a set of rights, duties and competences. The state is a “person” who not only seeks physical security, but also a relatively stable identity.⁷⁾ Principles such as sovereignty present the person of the State as one among other, equal States. Principles such as pacta sunt servanda help States to secure their identities: by making and keeping a promise, the State signifies that it remains the same person across time.⁸⁾ International law, in other words, is more than a set of rules that are “binding” upon already existing agents. It offers a script that creates characters, assigns roles and instructions on how to act.

Back to Hakimi

This brings me to what I consider to be the main argument of Hakimi in her article, in the part where she diagnoses what the problem is with what she calls the “global crisis in authority” :

“The problem is more serious than the mere paucity of legal controls, because the essential function of law, the thing that it must do before it does anything else, is constitutive. It must draw people into using it” (94).

This use can take many forms, and goes way beyond “control”, the thing that formalists and realists cherish so much. In this context, the current crisis of authority is not only that law fails to exercise authority over people, it is that powerful agents refuse to be authors of their lives in terms of law. Especially the way in which the Trump administration operates is a challenge that runs deeper than illegality. It refuses to act as the persona in the script of law and starts to ridicule, debunk or ignore that very script. Sure, sometimes challenges to international law should be welcomed, as TWAIL and critical scholars have shown. Too often, the script of international law has favored those in positions of power and marginalized others. Sometimes other scripts work more emancipatory, as they allow marginalized voices and forgotten stories to be heard. However, the scripts offered by the Trump administration do away exactly with respect for a plurality of scripts. “I don’t need international law”, Trump said. What limits my power is “My own morality. My own mind. It’s the only thing that can stop me.”⁹⁾ This is a script too, which creates persona, and which is held up through all kinds of rituals, props and performances. It is a script that denies the persona of the State as a character that inhabits a world to be equally shared with other communities. Hakimi rightly warns against the consequences of such attitudes, as they move towards coercive control instead of empowerment. What I take home from her article most of all, is to resist the temptation to counter the turn to coercive control with calls for more legal control. The lesson for me is that to search for solutions may not be the solution. Instead, I feel encouraged to use my imagination,  and to perform scripts that encourage others to do the same.  The authority of law is not something settled, but exists as long as it fosters creative authorship.

The post “All the World’s a Stage” appeared first on Verfassungsblog.

Abstract:

This Research Handbook examines sovereignty as a contested and evolving concept shaped by law, politics, history and culture. Bringing together global experts, it traces the development of sovereignty across plural traditions of authority and legitimacy and analyses its contemporary transformations, from constitutional authority and global governance to political theology, biopower and decolonial critiques.

Read more here: DOI  10.4337/9781803926353.