Face-to-face , second term, 15 hours of theory.

French

The seminar deals with questions related to humanitarian law that can usefully be studied in a multidisciplinary way by the social sciences.

The objective is to enable students to produce a dissertation (of 20 pages maximum) on a subject related to humanitarian law and to undertake a thorough and critical review that takes into account the various related theoretical perspectives and practices.

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SUBJECT IDEAS:


1) Is communicating on international humanitarian law (IHL) in time of peace effective when a conflict arises?  The sociological question we ask here is whether or not the fact that combatants (or non-combatants) are aware of IHL leads to different behaviours when hostilities flare up.

2) Is the lawyer's definition of genocide similar, different, contrary or reconcilable with that of the social sciences?

3) Environmental protection during armed conflicts.

4) What is the responsibility in IHL for the States that have sold weapons to the parties in an armed conflict?

5) Is war being “privatized”? What is the responsibility of the private companies that take part, directly or indirectly, in military engagements? What are the political and legal implications?

6) The legitimacy of a policy of pursuing and judging the major criminals while allowing the executants to go free (policy based on a primarily Western vision of justice, according to which those who plan have greater responsibility than those who carry out).

7) Why judge?  After Nuremberg, it was said: “never again should anything similar happen”!   However “similar” things keep happening, everywhere, an on all continents. We might therefore ask what purpose is served by trial proceedings and judgement? For the guilty, for the victims, for those who knew but who did not intervene? Moreover, if one takes into account the cost of the courts (ad hoc, CPI), and when we measure the efforts of rebuilding of a country after an armed conflict, we might wonder why we invest in criminal proceeding rather than in schools?

8) Child-soldiers, the victims.  Yes.  But what about the victims of the child-soldiers, who were killed/wounded/traumatized?   What sort of justice is there for them?  The paradox of the legal system is that delinquent children in peace time can be judged like adults.   This is not possible in respect of the international courts, even for the children who commit the worst atrocities.

9) The responsibility to protect: a new concept, new applications… (discussion, for example, on the foreign intervention in Libya).

10) The stakes related to the preponderance of the accusatory procedure in international criminal courts

11) Analysis of the principles of distinction and proportionality in IHL

12) How the omission to act punished under IHL and what are the limits of this punishment?

13) What is the future of universal competence to judge the authors of crimes under IHL?

14) What hope can we have in the international criminal courts (or “mixed” courts)?

15) Legal study (and possibly sociological, in particular from the point of view of taking into consideration the sufferings endured by the victims and their experiences, as well as impact of the proceedings on the daily lives of the victims) on the place of the victims before the international criminal courts. Having being given the status of simple witnesses before the ad hoc courts, and while being unable to be a party in the procedure with the same status as the defense or the prosecution, victims do receive broad recognition before the International criminal court.

16) Nuclear arms. A legal and political analysis of the opinion of the International Court of Justice on the admissibility of the threat or the use of nuclear weapons (1996). Interests involved? Statute of the IHL and and of human rights? Answer of the ICJ?

17) The crime of aggression as envisaged in the resolution of the Parliament of the States signatories to the ICC: an international justice constrained by the Security Council? What compromises have been found?

18) The Security Council: a politicisation of international criminal justice? Analysis of the role of the Security Council in the creation of the TPI and of the internationalised courts (the STL and SCSL in particular) and 1) in the procedure of ICC.

19) Targeted assassinations and international humanitarian law: definition, analysis of the situation, considering the future.

20) Cyber-attacks and international humanitarian law.

21) Sexual violence: a weapon of war?

22) From the point of view of “post-conflict” restoration, which mechanisms or procedures should be implemented as part of transitional justice? What are the challenges and hopes of this approach?

23) The protection mechanisms for displaced persons during armed conflicts.

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Dissertation
• Subject specific criteria:
- A subject that is precisely defined
- A clear and structured piece of work
- Use of up-to-date knowledge on the topic (current affairs)
- A personal point of view on the subject
- Quality of the bibliographical sources consulted
- Reminder: all forms of plagiarism are prohibited (it is necessary to accurately quote all sources of inspiration and it is strictly forbidden to adapt extracts borrowed from other authors or sourced from Internet)

• Presentational criteria:
- The dissertation must be typed and be no longer than 20 pages (plan and bibliography not included, with page numbering)
- Traditional Divisions (chapters, sections, paragraphs)
- Sources quoted in a precise way in footnotes
- Style and spelling

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