Critique internationale - Content
[U.S. perception of the European Constitution (2002-2004)]
When the first draft European Constitution was drawn up by the ad hoc assembly of European Coal and Steel Community in 1952-1953, the Europeans made frequent reference to the 1787 Philadelphia Convention and the United States Constitution, as they did during the work of the European Convention presided by Valéry Giscard d’Estaing in 2002-2003. Reactions in the U.S., however, differ strongly, the obvious support of the 1950s having given way to a more complex and reserved attitude today. Whether they are outwardly hostile, benevolently or critically skeptical, or lean in favor, the comments made about the planned constitution for Europe are strongly tinged by domestic political and legal debates within the United States.
[Argentina vs Its Generals: A Legal Uproar ?]
In Argentina, twenty years after the democratic transition, it has begun to look like the perpetrators of state violence may be prosecuted and punished. This article deals with the latest developments of the debate on military repression. It questions some of the interpretations of this “fight against impunity” that a revival of democracy is credited with.
[A Fresh Start for Mercosur: Ouro Preto II, or the Onset of Political Reforms]
Despite recurrent trade disputes among member states, the political aspect of Mercosur is making headway. The arrival in power of progressive forces in favor of integration in Brazil, Argentina and Uruguay has enabled the integration process, severely hampered by Argentina’s economic crisis in 2001, to get a fresh start. The Mercosur Parliament, set up by the 27th Mercosur summit on December 17, 2004, to be inaugurated in 2006, will probably prove not to be the instrument for a democratization of the integration process imagined by the Technical Secretariat, a veritable “political entrepreneur” created within Mercosur in 2003, but it will enable politicians of the various Mercosur member states to participate more fully and will especially breathe new life into the political aspect of integration.
[European Defense at the Crossroads?]
Despite European tensions and the crisis in transatlantic relations over the war in Iraq, the year 2004 saw significant progress in the area of European Security and Defense Policy (ESDP), to the extent that European Defense today appears as the main source of satisfaction in an otherwise cheerless European landscape. The future of ESDP nevertheless remains full of grave uncertainties. A critical analysis of each of the major undertakings in European Defense will provide an indication of the direction in which the ESDP is heading.
[Myths of Empire and Strategies of Hegemony]
The paradoxical combination of omnipotence and vulnerability gives the United States a nearly irresistible temptation to use its might preventively against potential threats and to organize the world in a way that will make it safe for democracy--or at any rate safe for America. This temptation is magnified by a set of assumptions, which I call “myths of empire,” that exaggerate the prospects of success for a strategy of security through military expansion
[The Greater Middle East Project: A Short Moment of International Utopia?]
The Broader Middle East and North Africa Initiative announced by the Bush administration in early 2004identified new international threats from within the heart of Muslim societies and advocated the establishment of a climate of political freedom and transparency to reduce the risks of terrorism. This initiative, however, suffered from a fundamental contradiction as genuine political democratization would enable sovereignist elements to call into question the underpinnings of American hegemony in the region. Moreover, in neglecting to address the Israeli-Palestinian problem, the instrumentalization of a democratic agenda by an external power weakens Arab democratic opposition movements within their own society. In the hope of building international consensus on Iraq, the version of the initiative adopted at the 2004 G-8 summit may be seen as an attenuated version of the original project in which the concern for “good governance” has prevailed over the desire for democratization
No Abstract
[The “good offices” of international law: the constitution of a non-political authority in the diplomatic concert of the 1920s]
The traditional debate surrounding the “force” of law in international politics is re-examined here through an analysis of the concrete operation of such transnational legal communities as emerged with the development of multilateralism and of international organisations during the 1920s. This article reveals the social mechanisms underpinning the “third power” constituted by jurists on the international stage of the period. It underscores the particular vision of the international general good constructed at the time within these academic transnational communities which were constantly torn between national and international loyalties, on the one hand, and between political and learned logic, on the other.
[The European Constitution. Political Order, Legal Utopia and Cold War]
This article examines the genesis and failure of the first draft European Constitution. By analyzing the political networks and transnational mobilizations that thus fostered the promotion of the Constitution as a category framing a European political order against the backdrop of the Cold War, it intends to illustrate what this utopia owes to the investment of legal specialists in the formalization of a comparativist model of federalism in which the United States Constitution tends to be the principal reference.
[“The Court that Came in from the Cold.” Human Rights in the Building of Europe after the War]
A product of cold war strategies as much as post-war legal and political universalist ideologies, the European Convention for the Protection of Human Rights and Fundamental Freedoms (EHRC) and its institutions have gradually taken on a paramount position in European human rights law. Through the accounts given by key actors responsible for the institutionalization of the Convention and its accession to autonomy, this article shows how the rise in power of the institution can be seen as an example of the process of post-war Europeanization.
[Professorenrecht? The Field of European Private Law]
Over the last decade, the idea of a European civil code has matured into a forceful enterprise, nurtured and sustained by a field of European private law. This contribution sets out to map this field in its institutional, political and intellectual manifestations and enquires into the conditions for its autonomy and success.
S. M. Amadae, Rationalizing Capitalist Democracy : The Cold War Origins of Rational Choice Liberalism, Chicago, University of Chicago Press, 2003, 408 pages.
Serge Gruzinski, Les quatre parties du monde : histoire d’une mondialisation, Paris, Éditions de La Martinière, 2004, 479 pages.
Paul Gifford, Ghana’s New Christianity : Pentecostalism in a Globalising African Economy, Londres, Hurst & Co, 2004, 216 pages
