Research Deborah Casalin

Abstract

In recent years, there have been a number of court cases around allegations of businesses cooperating with armed groups in conflict situations. This has included collaboration in international crimes. In international law, it is possible to hold individuals responsible for their involvement in such actions. However, it is complicated to hold a business or armed group itself responsible and enforce legal consequences for corporate/group involvement in international crimes. This is inadequate, since such crimes often arise from the behaviour and policies of the whole organization, and individuals may also not be able to compensate victims. The legal situation is even more complex in situations where businesses and armed groups cooperate with each other, since it must be determined how the responsibility is shared between them. These questions have been researched very little, but as shown by the recent court cases, they are becoming important in practice to make sure that responsible organizations can be held accountable for international crimes. This project will therefore examine legal options to ensure the (shared) international responsibility and accountability of businesses and armed rebel groups where they cooperate in conflict situations in acts that amount to international crimes.

Researcher(s)

• Promoter: Erdem Türkelli Gamze
• Co-promoter: Casalin Deborah

Research team(s)

• Law and Development

Project type(s)

• Research Project

Abstract

The role of an international human rights (IHR) court is to assess whether a state has breached its human rights obligations. While evidence is at the heart of adjudication, evidence in IHR adjudication has never been studied in a systematic and comprehensive way. The EU-funded DISSECT project will address this gap and clarify the 'messy' IHR evidentiary regime with benefit for the scholarly community and practitioners. It will identify 'best' and 'worst' practices and generate specific recommendations for use in IHR adjudication. Moreover, it will develop new insights and create a new strand in critical legal studies. DISSECT is needed by those seeking international redress without knowing exactly what evidence is required of them as well as by IHR adjudicatory bodies at risk of losing their legitimacy.

Researcher(s)

• Promoter: Casalin Deborah
• Co-promoter: De Feyter Koen

Research team(s)

• Law and Development

Project website

Project type(s)

• Research Project

Abstract

This project is part of the researcher's doctoral work, titled 'The role of international (quasi-judicial) mechanisms in ensuring reparation for arbitrary displacement'. This part of the project consists of fieldwork to carry out the empirical part of the doctoral research. This will take place in a local context of forced displacement which has been examined by an international court. Concretely, the fieldwork will consist of interviews with claimants in the case and their representatives, other displaced persons in the context in a comparable situation, and local NGOs, judges and officials working on the issue of forced displacement. The aim is to provide insight into the effect of the chosen decision on the rights user, measured in terms of the user's perception – in particular, whether and how the international decision facilitated them in realizing their rights (or those of others) on the local level. Due attention will be paid to links with the broader social picture of national reparations processes, social mobilization and/or structural causes of displacement. Ultimately, interviews would aim to identify contextual elements (e.g. social, political, etc.) contributing to the impacts identified. On the basis of the totality of the interviews, some more general, initial insights will then be drawn out as to how these elements may be taken into account by international (quasi-)judicial mechanisms and other actors to ensure/maximize positive effects (e.g. safe return, effective restitution/compensation) in future situations. The empirical case study method will be adopted, in particular through the use of qualitative, semi-structured interviews with a relatively defined target group in a specific context (i.e. the context of a specific international (quasi-)judicial decision on reparations for arbitrary displacement). In order to shed light on the perspective of rights-users, the target group of the interviews – categorized according to the users' perspective methodology - will be: 1) Rights claimants - i.e. people directly involved in the international claim as plaintiffs, or people in a comparable position who could be affected by the decision - and/or their representatives (e.g. lawyers, NGO representatives); 2) Rights realizers (i.e. parties in a position to help claimants realize their rights, e.g. local officials) 3) Sympathizers (e.g. representatives of NGOs supportive of the claimants and active on related issues) 4) National judges

Researcher(s)

• Promoter: Casalin Deborah

Research team(s)

• Law and Development

Project type(s)

• Research Project