Mulaj: Postgenocide: Interdisciplinary Reflections on the Effects of Genocide

Klejda Mulaj (Univ. of Exeter - Politics) has published Postgenocide: Interdisciplinary Reflections on the Effects of Genocide (Oxford Univ. Press 2021). Here's the abstract:

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This volume introduces 'postgenocide' as a novel approach to study genocide and its effects after mass killing has ended. It investigates how the material violence of genocide translates into contests over memory, remembrance, and laws, and the re-imagining of political community. Contributions come from academics across a broad range of disciplines, including law, political science, sociology, and ethnography.

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Chapters in this volume explore the various permutations of genocide harms, and scrutinise the efficacy of genocide laws and the prospects for their enforcement. Others engage with socio-political responses to genocide, including efforts to reconciliation, as well as genocide's impacts on victims' communities. Contributions examine the reconstruction of genocide narratives in the display of victims' objects in museums, galleries, and archives.This book brings together cutting edge research from a variety of disciplines, to address formerly overlooked themes and cases, exploring what a diversity of perspectives can bring to bear on genocide scholarship as a whole.

Hoffmann: The Crime of Genocide in its (Nearly) Infinite Domestic Variety

Tamás Hoffmann (Corvinus Univ. of Budapest; Hungarian Academy of Sciences) has posted The Crime of Genocide in its (Nearly) Infinite Domestic Variety (in The Concept of Genocide in International Criminal Law - Developments after Lemkin, Marco Odello & Piotr Łubiński eds., 2020). Here's the abstract:

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Genocide is the "crime of crimes", whose legal definition remained unchanged on the international plane since the adoption of the 1948 Genocide Convention. Hitherto it has been assumed that with some minor modifications domestic definitions of the crime of genocide mirror the internationally accepted definition. However, after conducting for the first time a comprehensive review of the domestic criminal laws of 196 countries (all 193 UN Member States and the Holy See, Kosovo, and Palestine) and the Special Administrative Region of Macao, this article found that the differences are actually much more significant than hitherto assumed, since 100 countries and the Special Administrative Region of Macao have opted to change – through their national implementations – at least some aspects of the internationally-recognized definition of genocide, often significantly expanding or limiting the scope of application of the crime.

This chapter classifies these changes, proposes some potential explanations why so many countries opted to stray from the international definition and draws some preliminary conclusions of their potential ramifications.

Odello & Łubiński: The Concept of Genocide in International Criminal Law: Developments after Lemkin

Marco Odello (Aberystwyth Univ. - Law) & Piotr Łubiński (Pedagogical Univ., Krakow - Institute of Security and Civic Education) have published The Concept of Genocide in International Criminal Law: Developments after Lemkin (Routledge 2021). The table of contents is here. Here's the abstract:

This book presents a review of historical and emerging legal issues that concern the interpretation of the international crime of genocide. The Polish legal expert Raphael Lemkin formulated the concept of genocide during the Nazi occupation of Europe, and it was then incorporated into the 1948 Convention on the Prevention and Punishment of the Crime of Genocide. This volume looks at the issues that are raised both by the existing international law definition of genocide and by the possible developments that continue to emerge under international criminal law. The authors consider how the concept of genocide might be used in different contexts, and see whether the definition in the 1948 convention may need some revision, also in the light of the original ideas that were expressed by Lemkin. The book focuses on specific themes that allow the reader to understand some of the problems related to the legal definition of genocide, in the context of historical and recent developments.

Mundorff: A Cultural Interpretation of the Genocide Convention

Kurt Mundorff has published A Cultural Interpretation of the Genocide Convention (Routledge 2020). Here's the abstract:

This book critiques the dominant physical and biological interpretation of the Genocide Convention and argues that the idea of "culture" is central to properly understanding the crime of genocide.

Using Raphael Lemkin’s personal papers, archival materials from the State Department and the UN, as well as the mid-century secondary literature, it situates the convention in the longstanding debate between Enlightenment notions of universality and individualism, and Romantic notions of particularism and holism. The author conducts a thorough review of the treaty and its preparatory work to show that the drafters brought strong culturalist ideas to the debate and that Lemkin’s ideas were held widely in the immediate postwar period. Reconstructing the mid-century conversation on genocide and situating it in the much broader mid-century discourse on justice and society he demonstrates that culture is not a distraction to be read out of the Genocide Convention; it is the very reason it exists.

This volume poses a forceful challenge to the materialist interpretation and calls into question decades of international case law. It will be of interest to scholars of genocide, human rights, international law, the history of international law and human rights, and treaty interpretation.

Rist: What Does the ICJ Decision on The Gambia v. Myanmar Mean?

D. Wes Rist (American Society of International Law) has posted an ASIL Insight on What Does the ICJ Decision on The Gambia v. Myanmar Mean?

Conference: Le crime de génocide à la lumière de la jurisprudence des juridictions pénales internationales et nationales : du Tribunal militaire international (TMI) de Nuremberg à la Cour pénale internationale (CPI)

Today and tomorrow, November 7-8, 2019, a conference on "Le crime de génocide à la lumière de la jurisprudence des juridictions pénales internationales et nationales : du Tribunal militaire international (TMI) de Nuremberg à la Cour pénale internationale (CPI)" will take place at Université Catholique de Lyon. The program is here.

Rist: Implementing the Genocide Convention at the Domestic Level: The Elie Wiesel Genocide and Atrocity Prevention Act 2018

D. Wes Rist (American Society of International Law) has posted an ASIL Insight on Implementing the Genocide Convention at the Domestic Level: The Elie Wiesel Genocide and Atrocity Prevention Act 2018.

Mettraux: International Crimes: Law and Practice - Volume I: Genocide

Guénaël Mettraux (Judge, Kosovo Specialist Chambers) has published International Crimes: Law and Practice - Volume I: Genocide (Oxford Univ. Press 2019). Here's the abstract:

Judge Mettraux's four-volume compendium, International Crimes: Law and Practice, will provide the most detailed and authoritative account to-date of the law of international crimes. It is a scholarly tour de force providing a unique blend of academic rigour and an insight into the practice of international criminal law. The compendium is un-rivalled in its breadth and depth, covering almost a century of legal practice, dozens of jurisdictions (national and international), thousands of decisions and judgments and hundreds of cases. This first volume discusses in detail the law of genocide: its definition, elements, normative status, and relationship to the other core international crimes. While the book is an invaluable tool for academics and researchers, it is particularly suited to legal practitioners, guiding the reader through the practical and evidential challenges associated with the prosecution of international crimes.

Oliveira Santos: Der Bedeutungsgehalt der Wendung intent to destroy, in whole or in part, a national, ethnical, racial or religious group, as such in Art. 2 der Convention on the Prevention and Punishment of the Crime of Genocide

Claudia Susann de Oliveira Santos has published Der Bedeutungsgehalt der Wendung intent to destroy, in whole or in part, a national, ethnical, racial or religious group, as such in Art. 2 der Convention on the Prevention and Punishment of the Crime of Genocide (Duncker & Humblot 2019). Here's the abstract:

Die Arbeit analysiert die Wendung intent to destroy, in whole or in part, a national, ethnical, racial or religious group, as such aus Art. II der Völkermordkonvention. Die Untersuchung des Gruppenbegriffs kommt zu dem Ergebnis, dass die einzelnen Gruppentypen positiv und anhand möglichst objektiver Kriterien zu definieren sind. Zudem erfolgt eine Auseinandersetzung mit dem Teilgruppenbegriff mit dem Resultat, dass dieser die Feststellung der relativen Quantität des Gruppenteils in Bezug auf die Gruppe voraussetzt. Schließlich befasst die Arbeit sich mit der Definition des den Völkermord charakterisierenden »special intent«. Der Täter muss in Hinblick auf die Gruppenzerstörung mit zielgerichteter Absicht vorgehen und dabei wissen, dass es bei ungestörtem Geschehensverlauf zu einer tatsächlichen Existenzgefährdung der Gruppe kommt. Im Rahmen der Untersuchung der Wendung »as such« erfolgt eine gründliche Auseinandersetzung mit dem Motivbegriff. Der Ausdruck reichert die Zerstörungsabsicht im Ergebnis insoweit an, als der Täter die Gruppenvernichtung in Anbetracht ihrer inneren Zusammensetzung zielgerichtet verfolgt haben muss.

Petrossian: »Staatenverantwortlichkeit für Völkermord«

Gurgen Petrossian has published »Staatenverantwortlichkeit für Völkermord«: Unter besonderer Berücksichtigung der Ereignisse der Jahre 1915–1923 im Hinblick auf die armenisch-türkischen Beziehungen (Duncker & Humblot 2019). Here's the abstract:

Die Arbeit befasst sich mit der Völkerrechtsanalyse des Völkermordes an den Armeniern und der daraus resultierenden staatlichen Verantwortlichkeit für die Republik Türkei als Nachfolgestaat des Osmanischen Reiches. Die Komplexität der Ereignisse des Völkermordes erfordert die gleichzeitige Beachtung der verschiedenen Rechtsgebiete. Im Mittelpunkt steht neben der Darstellung des Untersuchungsgegenstandes im Vergleich zu ähnlichen historischen Fällen die juristische Analyse des Tatbestandes des Völkermordes und der Rückwirkung der Konvention. Im Anschluss setzt sich der Autor mit den Fragen auseinander, wie die Staatenverantwortlichkeit für die völkerrechtswidrige Handlung vor 100 Jahren sowie eine Wiedergutmachung auf völkerrechtlicher Ebene aussehen könnten.

Conference: 70 ans de la Convention pour la prévention et la répression du crime de génocide

On December 3-4, 2018, a conference will be held on "70 ans de la Convention pour la prévention et la répression du crime de génocide," in Aix-en-Provence. The program is here.

Curran: The Foreign Sovereign Immunities Act's Evolving Genocide Exception

Vivian Grosswald Curran (Univ. of Pittsburgh - Law) has posted The Foreign Sovereign Immunities Act's Evolving Genocide Exception (UCLA Journal of International Law and Foreign Affairs, forthcoming). Here's the abstract:

The Foreign Sovereign Immunities Act (FSIA) was passed by Congress as a comprehensive statute to cover all instances when foreign states are to be immune from suit in the courts of the United States, as well as when foreign state immunity is to be limited. Judicial interpretation of one of the FSIA’s exceptions to immunity has undergone significant evolution over the years with respect to foreign state property expropriations committed in violation of international law. U.S. courts initially construed this FSIA exception by denying immunity only if the defendant state had expropriated property of a citizen of a nation other than itself. Later, such suits were allowed even where the plaintiffs were deemed by the court to have been formal citizens so long as they had not been treated as such at the time of the expropriation. This tended to occur where states had dispossessed groups of citizens, often minority populations, of their property rights, and often coincided with grave human rights violations.

In the most recent appellate decisions to consider the issue, two circuits, the Seventh and D.C., nationality has been discarded entirely as a criterion to abrogate immunity if a court considers the defendant state’s expropriation to have been part of a policy of genocide. The D.C. circuit has gone still further in the later of the cases and equates the act of property expropriation with genocide. Both circuits initially also imposed a new exhaustion of local remedies requirement. As of 2018, a conflict exists between the two circuits on that issue.

The genocide interpretation with the imposition of exhaustion distorts both the FSIA and international customary law. It risks trivializing the concept of genocide, and in the Seventh Circuit it removes exhaustion from its international law roots in cases that occur exclusively in international tribunals by inserting the requirement into a domestic court framework. Neither development is consistent with the FSIA statute. Coupling the new genocide category with an exhaustion requirement also has a net effect of depriving plaintiffs of recovery inasmuch as lawsuits in the foreign defendant states are unlikely to succeed, and the obstacles are steep for persuading U.S. federal courts subsequently to retry a case once an adverse foreign judgment has been issued.

Call for Papers: 70th Anniversary of the Genocide Convention

The Nottingham International Law and Security Centre has issued a call for papers for a conference on "70th Anniversary of the Genocide Convention." The call is here.

Koursami: The 'Contextual Elements' of the Crime of Genocide

Nasour Koursami (National School of Administration, Chad) has published The 'Contextual Elements' of the Crime of Genocide (Asser Press 2018). Here's the abstract:

This book examines the position of ‘contextual elements’ as a constitutive element of the legal definition of the crime of genocide, and determines the extent to which an individual génocidaire is required to act within a particular genocidal context. Unlike other books in the field of the study of the crime of genocide, this book captures the nuance and the complex issues of the debate by providing a book-length comprehensive examination of the position of contextual elements in light of the evolution of genocide as a concept and the literal legal definition of the crime of genocide, which expressly characterized the crime with only the existence of an individualistic intent to destroy a group. With scholars of international criminal law, students, researchers, practitioners in the field, and international criminal tribunals in mind, the author tackles many of the issues raised on the position of contextual elements in both academic literature and judicial decisions.

Call for Papers: Genocide after 1948: 70 Years of Genocide Convention

A call for papers has been issued for a conference on "Genocide after 1948: 70 Years of Genocide Convention," to be held December 7-8, 2018. Here's the call:

Genocide after 1948: 70 Years of Genocide Convention

Call for Papers

NIOD Amsterdam / Utrecht University, 7 and 8 December 2018

On 9 December 1948, the United Nations adopted the Convention on the Prevention and Punishment of the Crime of Genocide. Despite this commitment to prevent genocide and punish its perpetrators, several cases of genocide have occurred since, e.g. in Asia, Africa, and the European mainland itself. Millions of people have been categorically murdered on account of their real or perceived group identity – national, ethnic, racial, religious, political. What kind of impact(s) did the Convention have, and what type of changes were relevant in the postwar period? This multi-disciplinary conference will bring together historians, social scientists, and others, to explore the causes, courses, and consequences of genocide from a global perspective. The conference acknowledges the differences between genocide as a legal, historical, and social-scientific concept, and intends to include a variety of approaches.

We welcome papers on different cases across continents and decades, as well as critical issues that relate to mass violence, including, but not limited to, for example, the context of post-colonialism, the context of the Cold War and the contemporary context; the context of war, civil war and insurgency; intrastate power dynamics and political polarization; forms and institutions of violence; political economy, demography, ecology and geography; ideology, nationalism and identity politics; perpetration and individual perpetrators, victims and third parties; democratization; non-state actors.

The conference will consist of six main themes:

• The concept of genocide and international law
• (Civil) war and genocide
• Perpetration
• Genocide in Asia
• Genocide in the Middle East
• Genocide in Africa

We encourage both theoretical and empirical submissions. The conference will consist of a combination of formats, including pre-circulated paper sessions, public events, and book panels.

Abstracts for papers or panels (max 300 words) including a short biographical statement (max 100 words) can be submitted by 1 May 2018 to: [email protected]

Contact Info: 

For all general enquiries, please contact Barbara Boender at [email protected], or Martine van den Heuvel at [email protected]

Call for Papers: 6th Global Conference on Genocide

The International Network of Genocide Scholars has issued a call for papers for its Sixth Global Conference on Genocide. The theme is "Genocide and Mass Violence: diagnosis, treatment, and recovery?" The call is here (English/Français/Español).

Lang: Genocide: The Act as Idea

Berel Lang (State Univ. of New York, Albany - Philosophy) has published Genocide: The Act as Idea (Univ. of Pennsylvania Press 2016). Here's the abstract:

The term "genocide"—"group killing"—which first appeared in Raphael Lemkin's 1944 book, Axis Rule in Occupied Europe, had by 1948 established itself in international law through the United Nations Convention on the Prevention and Punishment of the Crime of Genocide. Since then the charge of genocide has been both widely applied but also contested. In Genocide: The Act as Idea, Berel Lang examines and illuminates the concept of genocide, at once articulating difficulties in its definition and proposing solutions to them. In his analysis, Lang explores the relation of genocide to group identity, individual and corporate moral responsibility, the concept of individual and group intentions, and the concept of evil more generally. The idea of genocide, Lang argues, represents a notable advance in the history of political and ethical thought which proposed alternatives to it, like "crimes against humanity," fail to take into account.

Bazyler: Holocaust, Genocide, and the Law

Michael Bazyler (Chapman Univ. - Law) has published Holocaust, Genocide, and the Law: A Quest for Justice in a Post-Holocaust World (Oxford Univ. Press 2016). Here's the abstract:

A great deal of contemporary law has a direct connection to the Holocaust. That connection, however, is seldom acknowledged in legal texts and has never been the subject of a full-length scholarly work. This book examines the background of the Holocaust and genocide through the prism of the law; the criminal and civil prosecution of the Nazis and their collaborators for Holocaust-era crimes; and contemporary attempts to criminally prosecute perpetrators for the crime of genocide. It provides the history of the Holocaust as a legal event, and sets out how genocide has become known as the "crime of crimes" under both international law and in popular discourse. It goes on to discuss specific post-Holocaust legal topics, and examines the Holocaust as a catalyst for post-Holocaust international justice. Together, this collection of subjects establishes a new legal discipline, which the author Michael Bazyler labels "Post-Holocaust Law."

Irvin-Erickson: Raphaël Lemkin and the Concept of Genocide

Douglas Irvin-Erickson (George Mason Univ. - Genocide Prevention Program) has published Raphaël Lemkin and the Concept of Genocide (Univ. of Pennsylvania Press 2016). Here's the abstract:

Raphaël Lemkin (1900-1959) coined the word "genocide" in the winter of 1942 and led a movement in the United Nations to outlaw the crime, setting his sights on reimagining human rights institutions and humanitarian law after World War II. After the UN adopted the Convention on the Prevention and Punishment of the Crime of Genocide in 1948, Lemkin slipped into obscurity, and within a few short years many of the same governments that had agreed to outlaw genocide and draft a Universal Declaration of Human Rights tried to undermine these principles.

This intellectual biography of one of the twentieth century's most influential theorists and human rights figures sheds new light on the origins of the concept and word "genocide," contextualizing Lemkin's intellectual development in interwar Poland and exploring the evolving connection between his philosophical writings, juridical works, and politics over the following decades. The book presents Lemkin's childhood experience of anti-Jewish violence in imperial Russia; his youthful arguments to expand the laws of war to protect people from their own governments; his early scholarship on Soviet criminal law and nationalities violence; his work in the 1930s to advance a rights-based approach to international law; his efforts in the 1940s to outlaw genocide; and his forays in the 1950s into a social-scientific and historical study of genocide, which he left unfinished.

Revealing what the word "genocide" meant to people in the wake of World War II—as the USSR and Western powers sought to undermine the Genocide Convention at the UN, while delegations from small states and former colonies became the strongest supporters of Lemkin's law—Raphaël Lemkin and the Concept of Genocide examines how the meaning of genocide changed over the decades and highlights the relevance of Lemkin's thought to our own time.

Jackson: A Conspiracy to Commit Genocide: Anti-Fertility Research in Apartheid's Chemical and Biological Weapons Programme

Miles Jackson (Univ. of Oxford - Law) has posted A Conspiracy to Commit Genocide: Anti-Fertility Research in Apartheid's Chemical and Biological Weapons Programme (Journal of International Criminal Justice, Vol. 13, no. 5, 2015). Here's the abstract:

In late 2013, the Health Professions Council of South Africa found Dr Wouter Basson guilty of unprofessional conduct. The charges stemmed from Basson’s time as head of apartheid South Africa’s chemical and biological weapons programme — a programme implicated in kidnappings, poisonings and murders. Very little attention has been paid to a different aspect of the programme — anti-fertility research. This article argues that testimony from the Truth and Reconciliation Commission founds a reasonable basis to believe that scientists at the programme and their principals were engaged in a conspiracy to commit genocide — a conspiracy to surreptitiously deliver anti-fertility drugs to black South Africans with the intention of curtailing birth rates. A conspiracy of this kind gives rise to individual criminal responsibility under international criminal law and, given South Africa’s approach to the incorporation of international crimes, may be prosecuted as such in a domestic court. Regardless of whether it would be a good idea to prosecute the conspirators now, 30 years after the fact, South Africa’s research into anti-fertility drugs ought to play a far greater role in contemporary discussions of apartheid-era wrongs.