UN Peacekeepinig in Africa and Good Governance: Challenges and Prospects

While UN peacekeeping operations are in most cases confronted with a multitude of intertwined problems, this seems to be even worse in Africa. Operations on African soil have to react more than averagely to inter- as well as intrastate conflicts based upon ethnic tension, to conflicts starting from extreme poverty or the abuse of natural resources, and to situations in which governments are failing to do what governments should do. In the paper the mandates of the six ongoing UN peacekeeping operations in Africa – as of 1 May 2007, that is, in the Western Sahara, Liberia, the Democratic Republic of the Congo, Ethiopia and Eritrea, Côte d’Ivoire and Sudan – are analysed from the perspective of their (desired) contribution to the establishment of good governance structures. That analysis is followed by some observations upon the changing nature of peacekeeping operations. This includes the need to react to the specificity of African conflicts – which are often characterised by the combination of poverty, weak public institutions, a small private sector, high illiteracy, a narrow skills base, and limited capabilities for guaranteeing security – and the more general move towards 'peace building', which is in so many ways similar to a 'good governance' approach. The paper concludes by formulating a few lessons. These relate to such things as the need for UN peace keepers to take care of the economic root causes of the conflicts they have to deal with, as well as the task to invest systematically in building up governmental structures and legal institutions, while at the same time training police, army and judiciary staff in respect for human rights and in notions such as trying to solve conflicts without the use of violent means. The paper ends by underlining the necessity of a good interplay between the UN peace keepers and all state and non-state actors involved, from land lords and associations of farmers to regional intergovernmental organisations, from NGO’s to the International Financial Institutions and UN Specialised Organisations. If this is not going to happen, the focus is too much upon the military aspects only, and that is – needed as it may be in the short run – a guarantee that conflicts will reoccur as soon as the operations have ended.    &nbsp

Public International Law: A Forerunner in the Field of Global(ization of) Law

Public international law has, in several ways, reached the status of global law. But take care: ‘international’ is not necessarily ‘transnational’ nor is it equal to ‘universal’. In the article, the author draws attention to, 'inter alia', the limits to ‘the consent to be bound’ and to the role of General Principles of international law. Further to that, he discusses aspects of international lawmaking, while underlining that the emphasis should be more on processes of globalization than on global as such: in most cases there is a long way to go

El Grupo del Banco Mundial, el FMI y los derechos humanos: sobre las obligaciones directas y la atribución de la conducta ilícita

The key aim of the article/chapter is to make clear what international human rights norms apply to the World Bank Group (WBG) and the International Monetary Fund (IMF) and to specify points for coining their responsibility for the violations of such norms. After having discussed the way both the WBG and the IMF position themselves in the human rights field (part x), the article/chapter discusses several layers of applicable substantive human rights obligations (part x), followed by an extensive treatment of the attribution of unlawful conduct to both International Financial Institutions (IFIs) and their member states, including concepts such as ‘primary’ and ‘secondary responsibility’ and the legal consequences of ‘being in control’ (part x). The article could have set the legal obligations and the corresponding responsibilities for both IFIs higher, for instance by presenting more extensive interpretations of already existing case-law, but that would according to the author not be realistic, given the complex situations within which both IFIs regularly have to function. According to the author, human rights law is best to be seen as living law: both IFIs have entered the human-rights-doorway, be it to different degrees, and can solidly be confronted with new steps ahead.El objetivo principal del artículo es puntualizar cuáles de las normas presentes en la normativa internacional en materia de derechos humanos son aplicables al Grupo del Banco Mundial (GBM) y al Fondo Monetario Internacional (FMI), así como los puntos específicos en que pueden atribuirseles responsabilidad por violación a esas normas. Después de analizar cómo se posicionan tanto el GBM como el FMI en el ámbito de los derechos humanos (apartado 2), se discuten las numerosas capas de responsabilidades primordiales que pueden aplicarse (apartado 3). A estas secciones, les sigue un tratamiento extenso sobre la atribución de conductas ilícitas a las instituciones financieras internacionales (IFI) y sus Estados miembros, donde se analizan conceptos como “responsabilidad principal” y “secundaria”, así como las consecuencias legales de “tener control” (apartado 4). El artículo podría haber puesto más alta la vara de las obligaciones legales y de las responsabilidades correspondientes para ambas IFI, por ejemplo, mediante la presentación de interpretaciones más extensas de jurisprudencia ya existente. Sin embargo, un análisis de tales características no sería realista, dadas las situaciones complejas en que tienen que funcionar habitualmente ambas IFI. Es mejor considerar la normativa referente a los derechos humanos como una forma de derecho vivo: ambas IFI han atravesado el umbral de los derechos humanos, en diferentes grados, y están en condiciones de ser confrontadas de manera sólida para que den el siguiente paso

The World Bank Group, the IMF and Human Rights: about Direct Obligations and the Attribution of Unlawful Conduct

El objetivo principal del artículo es puntualizar cuáles de las normas presentes en la normativa internacional en materia de derechos humanos son aplicables al Grupo del Banco Mundial (GBM) y al Fondo Monetario Internacional (FMI), así como los puntos específicos en que pueden atribuirseles responsabilidad por violación a esas normas. Después de analizar cómo se posicionan tanto el GBM como el FMI en el ámbito de los derechos humanos (apartado 2), se discuten las numerosas capas de responsabilidades primordiales que pueden aplicarse (apartado 3). A estas secciones, les sigue un tratamiento extenso sobre la atribución de conductas ilícitas a las instituciones financieras internacionales (IFI) y sus Estados miembros, donde se analizan conceptos como “responsabilidad principal” y “secundaria”, así como las consecuencias legales de “tener control” (apartado 4). El artículo podría haber puesto más alta la vara de las obligaciones legales y de las responsabilidades correspondientes para ambas IFI, por ejemplo, mediante la presentación de interpretaciones más extensas de jurisprudencia ya existente. Sin embargo, un análisis de tales características no sería realista, dadas las situaciones complejas en que tienen que funcionar habitualmente ambas IFI. Es mejor considerar la normativa referente a los derechos humanos como una forma de derecho vivo: ambas IFI han atravesado el umbral de los derechos humanos, en diferentes grados, y están en condiciones de ser confrontadas de manera sólida para que den el siguiente paso.The key aim of the article/chapter is to make clear what international human rights norms apply to the World Bank Group (WBG) and the International Monetary Fund (IMF) and to specify points for coining their responsibility for the violations of such norms. After having discussed the way both the WBG and the IMF position themselves in the human rights field (part x), the article/chapter discusses several layers of applicable substantive human rights obligations (part x), followed by an extensive treatment of the attribution of unlawful conduct to both International Financial Institutions (IFIs) and their member states, including concepts such as ‘primary’ and ‘secondary responsibility’ and the legal consequences of ‘being in control’ (part x). The article could have set the legal obligations and the corresponding responsibilities for both IFIs higher, for instance by presenting more extensive interpretations of already existing case-law, but that would according to the author not be realistic, given the complex situations within which both IFIs regularly have to function. According to the author, human rights law is best to be seen as living law: both IFIs have entered the human-rights-doorway, be it to different degrees, and can solidly be confronted with new steps ahead.Facultad de Ciencias Jurídicas y Sociale

Stateless Indigenous People(s): The Right to a Nationality, Including Their Own

According to the 2007 UN Declaration on the Right of Indigenous Peoples, every indigenous individual has the right to a nationality. The present paper focuses on the right to a nationality as a ‘gateway’ to the recognition of a plurality of other rights. Doing so, two issues are given special attention: 1) the lack of adequate birth registration and the consequences of this ‘false start’ for other rights, such as, again, the right to a nationality. 2) The recognition of indigenous identity papers: while regularly Indigenous Peoples do not want to establish an independent sovereign State, many of them strive for the recognition of their own Indigenous identity papers. The paper discusses some of the advantages and consequences thereof