Lucas Lixinski

Between orthodoxy and heterodoxy: the troubled relationships between heritage studies and heritage law

This article discusses the relationships between heritage law (HL) and heritage studies (HS) from the perspective of international law. More specifically, it focuses on the ways in which HL scholars have integrated (or failed to integrate) HS considerations into their work, and vice versa. The paper shows that the relationship between HL and HS is better resolved with respect to orthodox approaches to both law and heritage. More specifically, orthodox HS and HL take each other into account only lightly, a strategy that, while unsatisfactory on many grounds, is balanced on both sides. However, when it comes to heterodox (critical) analyses in these fields, the relationship is far more fragile and unbalanced, from the point of view of heterodox HS, the law tends to be neglected or even sometimes rejected; whereas from the point of view of HL, there is a more conscious effort to fully engage with HS, which is made difficult by heterodox HS’s push against the law. This dissonance can lead to severe difficulties in understanding heritage work and even the field itself.

Domestic Judicial Design by International Human Rights Courts

Regional human rights courts in Europe and the Americas came into being in the wake of World War II. The European Court of Human Rights (ECHR) and Inter-American Court of Human Rights (IACHR) were established in order to adjudicate on alleged violations of the rights of individuals. Yet, since their inception these courts have also influenced other areas of international law. A part from their impact on general international law, their case law has had significant spill over effects on international criminal law, international refugee law, international environmental law, the law of armed conflicts, and the law of the sea.

Case of the Kaliña and Lokono peoples v. Suriname

On November 25, 2015, the Inter-American Court of Human Rights (Court) held that the state of Suriname had violated the rights of two indigenous groups by denying recognition of their juridical personality and their entitlement to collective property and judicial protection. In Kaliña and Lokono Peoples v. Suriname, the Court also considered the impact of nature reserves on indigenous land rights, as well as the legitimacy of private titling of property that encroaches on land for which collective title has not been attained. The decision pushes the Courts previous jurisprudence significantly—and somewhat controversially—by asserting that under the American Convention on Human Rights, indigenous peoples are entitled, as collective entities, to recognition of their legal personality. In so doing, the Court challenged ordinary assumptions about the individualized character of most adjudication regarding international human rights and made the possibility of enforcing collective rights more palpable.

Towards a Humanized International “Constitution”?

The paper argues that, by bringing a number of changes of systemic proportions in the order of international law, the internationalisation of national constitutional human rights law has led to the “constitutionalisation” of international law. To build that argument, the paper first critically assesses the constitutionalisation narrative. To that end it explains the reasons for its agnostic stance vis-a-vis it and highlights the fact that international law has always contained some general, “constitutional” features that are particular to its systemic physiognomy. The paper then explains how human rights as a special branch of international law expand beyond the so-called humanisation of international law narrative, acting as an important ingredient in a number of other narratives such as the constitutionalisation of international law and the ones that are comparable to it, like legal pluralism and fragmentation. As to the systemic changes the internationalisation of human rights has brought to the order of public international law, the examples given are those of collective enforcement at the decentralised level for the protection of common interests/values, sui generis normative hierarchy beyond jus cogens and the idea of the responsibility of states to act in a protective manner linked with the principle of due diligence and the so-called positive effect that human rights develop.

Comparative International Human Rights Law: An Analysis of the Right to Private and Family Life across Human Rights “Jurisdictions”

This article compares the application of the right to private and family life across different human rights jurisdictions. It chooses instances of “convergence” (that is, situations that fall under the purview of this right for all jurisdictions) and of “divergence” (situations that fall under the right for some jurisdictions, but under a different right in others). Through this exercise, the article demonstrates how the similarity in the language of the relevant treaties influences treaty application for the “easy” cases, but how, when faced with a “hard” case, a human rights jurisdiction is more likely to follow its own path, which is often more attuned to the legal sensitivities around the implementing body. Therefore, while at the same time institutional fragmentation is avoided in the instances of convergence, the hegemonic tendencies of international human rights law as a European project are also skirted, as seen in the “divergence” cases.