Author Archives: Steve Allen

“Equality of Arms”: Challenges Confronting the Legal Profession in the Emerging International Criminal Justice System

Elise Groulx*

(2006) Oxford U Comparative L Forum 3 at ouclf.law.ox.ac.uk | How to cite this article
Abstract
The protection of the rule of law requires that the international criminal justice system focus on two key elements: (i) the substantive objective of ending impunity by bringing war criminals to justice, and (ii) the procedural objective of ensuring a fair trial. The prosecutorial bias inherent in the institutional designs of the international criminal tribunals for the former Yugoslavia and for Rwanda, and the International Criminal Court (ICC), poses a serious challenge to the individual’s right to a fair trial. In addition to an independent judiciary and prosecution, the international criminal justice system requires an independent legal profession (including both defence and victims’ counsel). The incorporation of a “third pillar” will help to legitimize the new justice system and strengthen the rule of law by providing a formal voice for lawyers and enabling the protection of individual rights. In the same vein, the international community’s commitment to democracy in post-conflict states should include strong measures to protect the institutional, legal and political independence of lawyers.
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“Did God say, ‘You shall not eat of any tree of the garden’?”* Rethinking the “Fruits of the Poisonous Tree” in Israeli Constitutional Law

Mohammed Saif-Alden Wattad**

(2005) Oxford U Comparative L Forum 5 at ouclf.law.ox.ac.uk | How to cite this article

You may freely eat of every tree of the garden; but of the tree of the knowledge of good and evil you shall not eat, for in the day that you eat of it you shall die.***

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A Note on Comparative Family Law: Problems, Perspectives, Issues and Politics

David Bradley*

(2005) Oxford U Comparative L Forum 4 at ouclf.law.ox.ac.uk | How to cite this article

Abstract

Many comparatists view family law as an impenetrable and unproductive field of legal policy. This perspective invariably draws on Montesquieu and the argument that there are particularly close ties between a system of family law and the jurisdiction in which it has developed and operates. Consequently, there is no incentive to develop a method for comparative analysis in this field. This negative position has been challenged on a variety of grounds: that family laws can operate as legal transplants; that legal policy in different jurisdictions is converging; or that family law can be treated as well as classified as ‘private law’ and affects only parties to domestic relationships. This note reviews the opposing positions and outlines supporting evidence. It provides a perspective on comparative family law to resolve the controversy referred to above. The central argument is that a system of family law operates as a component of political economy and is conditioned by political culture and processes. These inter-related concepts provide a framework and basis for comparative analysis of family laws.

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