Civil Society

Economic sanctions are typically viewed as instruments of statecraft — mechanisms for foreign policy and international pressure. They have evolved from blunt, economy-wide measures to increasingly targeted tools directed at specific individuals, entities, and sectors. Though proponents of these more recent "smart" sanctions argue that such measures punish only bad actors while sparing ordinary civilians, Economic Sanctions from Havana to Baghdad challenges this assumption, arguing that no matter how carefully sanctions are designed, adjusted, or targeted, they retain the capacity to cause real harm to civilian populations.

International criminal justice is, by common consent, to at least some degree, victors’ justice. Some have argued, however, that victors’ justice might be giving way, over time, to a more universal justice also capable of holding victors accountable. This hopeful notion is often held up by others as a specifically liberal delusion. In my current project, however, I hope to use the examples of leftist “civil society tribunals” from the late Cold War to show that this idea - delusional or not - was once actually more popular amongst radical critics of the liberal international legal mainstream. Liberals, in this period, could thus be the “realists.” I conclude that geo-political realities do not only produce victors’ justice, they explain ideological responses towards it. They have changed how double standards are perceived.

The African International Economic Law Network (AfIELN) invites the submission of abstracts for its 6th Biennial Conference taking place at the Ghana Institute of Management and Public Administration (GIMPA), Accra, Ghana, from 21 to 24 June 2023.

March 22, 2021

I am thankful to the organisers of this Forum for the invitation to speak on African sovereign debt ahead of the African Finance, Development and Planning Ministers Meeting from March 17th to 21st, 2021. As Civil Society Organizations, we are meeting at a crucial time, as African leaders devise strategies to support the continent’s recovery from COVID-19 induced economic devastation.

I am angry but Hopeful.