Featured Acquisitions - Alexander Campbell King Law Library

Featured Acquisitions - August 2007

See also: Recent Acquisitions in Selected Subject Areas


		Child Abuse: Law and Policy Across Boundaries by Laura Hoyano & Caroline Keenan Oxford ; New York : Oxford University Press, 2007 K5189 .H69 2007 Balcony While there may be universal agreement that "something must be done" about child abuse, there is much less clarity about what qualifies as child abuse and what should be done about it. Policy makers often invoke the law at times of crisis that are seen to demand a societal response. The presence of legislation on the statute book or the creation of rules and protocols that professionals must follow is one socially acceptable sign that the problem has been recognized and that an effective response has been implemented. In the last two decades of the twentieth century, the numerous controversies about the response of public agencies and the courts to allegations of child abuse, as well as campaigns to reform the treatment of child witnesses in adversarial trial systems, provided the impetus for legal reform in both criminal and civil proceedings in England and Wales. These legal initiatives were ad hoc responses to specific problems, and not part of a coherent and integrated program of reform across the criminal and civil systems. Legislators and the courts in family, criminal, and tort proceedings have constructed different liability and evidential rules in parallel rather than in tandem with the other courts adjudicating the same issues, and often regarding the same child. Similarly, reforms in other common law jurisdictions have often been only partially understood by lawmakers in England and Wales. This book looks across the legal and geographical boundaries within which the legal discussion of child abuse is usually confined. It considers the themes and policy considerations driving each form of legal response to the problem of child abuse. It also provides a detailed discussion of the law governing the trial of allegations of child abuse in the key areas of family, criminal, and tort law in English law, and compares this with the approaches in other common law jurisdictions using the adversarial mode of trial, in particular in Canada, the United States, New Zealand, and Australia. In its breadth and depth, Child Abuse Law and Policy Across Boundaries marks a significant contribution to the rapidly evolving field of child protection law.
		Competition Law Today: Concepts, Issues and the Law in Practice edited by Vinod Dhall Delhi ; New York : Oxford University Press, 2007 K3850 .C654 2007 Balcony The principle objective of competition law is to protect the competitive process. It prohibits activities such as collusive agreements to fix prices or outputs, abuse of dominance, or monopolization, and anti-competitive mergers. Around the world as an increasing number of countries move toward economic liberalization, there is renewed interest in adopting or modernizing competition laws. India, too has taken significant steps away from its post-independence system of governmental controls and protective regimes. The Competition Act, 2002 is on the statute books and is likely to be fully operational within a short period. This unparalleled volume, with contributions from eminent inter- national, as well as Indian specialists, offers a comprehensive survey and analysis of key concepts and issues in competition law. Equally importantly, it contains the essence of the experience of the law in practice in major developed and developing countries. Experts from the respective jurisdictions have written on competition law in Australia, the European Community, Germany, the UK, the USA, Korea, Mexico, and South Africa. This book is particularly relevant for countries such as India, which may be said to have a weak competition culture, and where the need to build a knowledge base is indisputable. The final part of the book is devoted to the evolution of competition law in India, particularly the provisions of the 2002 statute. Throughout, the book highlights the economic context of this law, the role of economic analysis in determining competition cases.
		Investment Treaty Arbitration and Public Law by Gus Van Harten Oxford ; New York : Oxford University Press, 2007 K3830 .V36 2007 Balcony The recent explosion of investment treaty arbitration marks a major transformation of both international and public law, above all because of the manner in which states have delegated core powers of the courts to private arbitrators. This book outlines investment treaty arbitration as a public law system and demonstrates how it goes beyond all other forms of international adjudication in giving arbitrators a comprehensive jurisdiction to determine the legality of sovereign acts, and to award public funds to businesses that sustain loss as a result of government regulation. The analysis also reveals some startling consequences of transplanting rules of commercial arbitration into the regulatory sphere. For instance, the system allows public law to be interpreted by arbitrators in private as a matter of course, with limited scope for judicial review. Further, arbitrators can award compensation to investors in ways that go beyond domestic systems of state liability, and these awards may then be enforced in as many as 165 countries, making them more widely enforceable than any other adjudicative decision in public law. The system's mixture of private arbitration and public law undermines accountability and openness in judicial decision-making. But, most importantly, it poses a unique and fundamental challenge, neglected by other commentators - to the principle of judicial independence. To address this, this book argues that the system be replaced with an international investment court, properly constituted according to public law principles, and made up of tenured judges.
		Extraordinary Justice: Military Tribunals in Historical and International Context by Peter Judson Richards New York : New York University Press, c2007 K4754 .R53 2007 Sohn Library The Al-Qaeda terror attacks of September 11, 2001 aroused a number of extraordinary counter measures in response, including an executive order authorizing the creation of military tribunals or "commissions" for the trial of accused terrorists. The Supreme Court has weighed in on the topic with some controversial and deeply divided decisions, most recently Hamdan v. Rumsfeld. At this critical moment in time, Extraordinary Justice seeks to fill an important gap in our understanding of what military tribunals are, how they function, and how successful they are in administering justice by placing them in comparative and historical context. Peter Judson Richards examines tribunals in four modern conflicts: the American Civil War, the British experience in the Boer War, the French tribunals of the "Great War," and allied practices during the Second World War. Richards also examines the larger context of specific political, legal and military concerns, addressing scholarly and policy debates that continually arise in connection with the implementation of these extraordinary measures. He concludes that while the record of the national tribunals has been mixed, enduring elements in the character of warfare, of justice, and the nature of political reality together justify their continued use in certain situations.
		The Court of Appeal by Gavin Drewry, Louis Blom-Cooper, Charles Blake Oxford ; Portland, Or. : Hart Pub., 2007 KD7216 .D74 2007 Basement Civil justice has been undergoing a massive transformation. There have been big changes in the management of judicial business; the Human Rights Act 1988 has had a pervasive impact; the Constitutional Reform Act 2005 has effected many changes - notably, the prospective transfer of the appellate jurisdiction of the House of Lords to a new Supreme Court. Against this backcloth of radical change, this book looks at the recent history and the present-day operation of the civil division of the Court of Appeal - a court that, despite its pivotal position, has attracted surprisingly little scholarly attention. It examines the impact of the permission to appeal requirements, and the way in which applications - particularly those by litigants in person - are handled; it looks at the working methods of the Lords Justices and at the leadership of the Court by recent Masters of the Rolls; it considers the relationship between the Court and the House of Lords - looking at high-profile cases in which the Court has been reversed by the Lords. Notwithstanding the impending arrival of the Supreme Court, it concludes that 'the Court of Appeal will remain firmly in place, occupying its crucial position as, to all intents and purposes, the court of last resort-indeed, a supreme court-for most civil appellants.'
		Benjamin Franklin, Pennsylvania, and the First Nations: The Treaties of 1736-62 edited by Susan Kalter Urbana, IL : University of Illinois Press, 2006 KF8202 2006 Balcony This is an annotated edition of the treaties between the British colonies and Indian nations, originally printed and sold by Benjamin Franklin. Last published in 1938, Benjamin Franklin, Pennsylvania, and the First Nations makes these important treaties available once again, featuring a simpler, easier-to-read format, extensive explanatory notes, and maps. A detailed introduction by Susan Kalter puts the treaties in their proper historical and cultural context. This carefully researched edition shows these treaties to be complex intercultural documents, and provides significant insight into the British colonists' relationship with native peoples of North America. They also reveal the complexity of Benjamin Franklin's perceptions of Native Americans, showing him in some negotiations as a promoter of the Indian word against the colonial one. Finally, the treaties offer an enormous wealth of linguistic, aesthetic, and cultural information about the Iroquois, the Delawares, and their allies and neighbors.
		The Refugee in International Law by Guy S. Goodwin-Gill and Jane McAdam Oxford ; New York : Oxford University Press, 2007 K3230 .G66 2007 Balcony Millions of people are today forced to flee their homes as a result of conflict, systematic discrimination, or other forms of persecution. The core instruments on which they must rely to secure international protection are the 1951 Convention Relating to the Status of Refugees and its 1967 Protocol. This book, the leading text in the field, examines key challenges to the Convention such as the status of refugees, applications for asylum, and the international and domestic standards of protection. The situation of refugees is one of the most pressing and urgent problems facing the international community and refugee law has grown in recent years to a subject of global importance. In this long-awaited third edition each chapter has been thoroughly revised and updated and every issue, old and new, has received fresh analysis. Features include: analysis of internally displaced persons; so-called preventive protection; access to refugees; safety of refugees and relief personnel; the situation of refugee women and children; a detailed examination of the role of the UNHCR and the Palestinian situation; and an assessment of the protection possibilities (or lack of them) in the European Convention on Human Rights.
		Emerging Issues in Tort Law edited by Jason W. Neyers, Erika Chamberlain and Stephen G.A. Pitel Oxford, [England] ; Portland, Or. : Hart Pub., 2007 KF1250 .E45 2007 Balcony In this book, articles by leading tort scholars from Australia, Canada, Hong Kong, Israel, New Zealand, the United Kingdom and the United States deal with important theoretical and practical issues that are emerging in the law of torts. The articles analyse recent leading developments in areas such as economic negligence, causation, vicarious liability, non-delegable duty, breach of statutory duty, intentional torts, damages, and tort law in the family. They provide a foretaste of the issues that will face tort law in the near future and offer critical viewpoints that should not go unheeded. With its rich breadth of contributors and topics, Emerging Issues in Tort Law will be highly useful to lawyers, judges and academics across the common law world.
		In the Common Defense: National Security Law for Perilous Times by James E. Baker Cambridge ; New York : Cambridge University Press, 2007 KF4850 .B347 2007 Balcony The threat of terrorism places U.S. national security police at the crossroads of security and liberty. This book focuses on the legal issues surrounding the war on terror. This book is essential reading for anyone who wants an honest review of the law and an accessible understanding of how law relates to U.S. national security. This is also a book about national security government and why it is dependent on good process and the moral integrity of those who wield its power. This is at heart a book about the process and practice of government and what we should mean when we refer to "good government."
		Girls on the Stand: How Courts Fail Pregnant Minors by Helena Silverstein New York : New York University Press, c2007 KF9315 .S55 2007 Balcony The U.S. Supreme Court has decided that states may require parental involvement in the abortion decisions of pregnant minors as long as minors have the opportunity to petition for a "bypass" of parental involvement. To date, virtually all of the 34 states that mandate parental involvement have put judges in charge of the bypass process. Individual judges are thereby responsible for deciding whether or not the minor has a legitimate basis to seek an abortion absent parental participation. In this revealing and disturbing book, Helena Silverstein presents a detailed picture of how the bypass process actually functions. Silverstein led a team of researchers who surveyed more than 200 courts designated to handle bypass cases in three states. Her research shows indisputably that laws are being routinely ignored and, when enforced, interpreted by judges in widely divergent ways. In fact, she finds audacious acts of judicial discretion, in which judges structure bypass proceedings in a shameless and calculated effort to communicate their religious and political views and to persuade minors to carry their pregnancies to term. Her investigations uncover judicial mandates that minors receive pro-life counseling from evangelical Christian ministries, as well as the practice of appointing attorneys to represent the interests of unborn children at bypass hearings. Girls on the Stand convincingly demonstrates that safeguards promised by parental involvement laws do not exist in practice and that a legal process designed to help young women make informed decisions instead victimizes them. In making this case, the book casts doubt not only on the structure of parental involvement mandates but also on the nave faith in law that sustains them. It consciously contributes to a growing body of books aimed at debunking the popular myth that, in the land of the free, there is equal justice for all.
		Wired Shut: Copyright and the Shape of Digital Culture by Tarleton Gillespier Cambridge, Mass. : MIT Press, c2007 K1447.15 .G55 2007 Balcony While the public and the media have been distracted by the story of Napster, warnings about the evils of "piracy," and lawsuits by the recording and film industries, the enforcement of copyright law in the digital world has quietly shifted from regulating copying to regulating the design of technology. Lawmakers and commercial interests are pursuing what might be called a technical fix: instead of specifying what can and cannot be done legally with a copyrighted work, this new approach calls for the strategic use of encryption technologies to build standards of copyright directly into digital devices so that some uses are possible and others rendered impossible. In Wired Shut, Tarleton Gillespie examines this shift to “technical copy protection" and its profound political, economic, and cultural implications. Gillespie reveals that the real story is not the technological controls themselves but the political, economic, and cultural arrangements being put in place to make them work. He shows that this approach to digital copyright depends on new kinds of alliances among content and technology industries, legislators, regulators, and the courts, and is changing the relationship between law and technology in the process. The film and music industries, he claims, are deploying copyright in order to funnel digital culture into increasingly commercial patterns that threaten to undermine the democratic potential of a network society. In this broad context, Gillespie examines three recent controversies over digital copyright: the failed effort to develop copy protection for portable music players with the Strategic Digital Music Initiative (SDMI); the encryption system used in DVDs, and the film industry's legal response to the tools that challenged them; and the attempt by the FCC to mandate the "broadcast flag" copy protection system for digital television. In each, he argues that whether or not such technical constraints ever succeed, the political alignments required will profoundly shape the future of cultural expression in a digital age.
		Economic, Social and Cultural Rights in Action edited by Mashood A. Baderin and Robert McCorquodale Cambridge, Mass. : MIT Press, c2007 K1447.15 .G55 2007 Balcony On 16 December 1966 the United Nations adopted the International Covenant on Economic, Social and Cultural Rights. This was the first global treaty that established legal obligations on states to protect a range of important economic, social, and cultural rights. Forty years later the vast majority of States have ratified this treaty. Despite this history, there remains considerable debate, both within the literature and within the international community generally, about the concept and application of economic, social, and cultural rights. This collection gives a coherent analysis of many of the key issues, both in concept and in application, relevant to economic, social, and cultural rights. The authors of the chapters, many of whom are leading scholars in their fields with significant experience in practice, examine how the obligations to protect these rights have been applied today, including their application to the Security Council and to non-state actors, as well as in the context of development and dispossession. They provide important universal and regional comparative perspectives on the development and implementation of these rights, and consider some of the contemporary issues relating to these rights, such as trade, health, and social security.
		Defining Environmental Justice: Theories, Movements, and Nature by David Schlosberg Oxford ; New York : Oxford University Press, 2007 GE220 .S34 2007 Basement The basic task of this book is to explore what, exactly, is meant by 'justice' in definitions of environmental and ecological justice. It examines how the term is used in both self-described environmental justice movements and in theories of environmental and ecological justice. The central argument is that a theory and practice of environmental justice necessarily includes distributive conceptions of justice, but must also embrace notions of justice based in recognition, capabilities, and participation. Throughout, the goal is the development of a broad, multi-faceted, yet integrated notion of justice that can be applied to both relations regarding environmental risks in human populations and relations between human communities and non-human nature.
		From Chinese Exclusion to Guantanamo Bay: Plenary Power and the Prerogative State by Natsu Taylor Saito Boulder, Colo. : University Press of Colorado, c2007 KF5060 .S25 2007 Balcony Continuous expansion of executive power is igniting national debate: Is the administration authorized to detain people without charges or access to counsel, due process, or a fair trial? Is torture acceptable as long as it doesn't happen on U.S. soil? In a new study of the use of plenary power--the doctrine under which U.S. courts have allowed the exercise of U.S. jurisdiction without concomitant constitutional protection--Natsu Taylor Saito puts contemporary policies in historical perspective, illustrating how such extensions of power have been upheld by courts from the 1880s to the present. From Chinese Exclusion to Guantanamo Bay also provides a larger context for understanding problems resulting from the exercise of plenary power. Saito explains how the rights of individuals and groups deemed Other by virtue of race or national origin have been violated under both the Constitution and international law. The differing treatment of Jose Padilla and John Walker Lindh --both Americans accused of terrorism--provides an example of such disparate approaches. Such executive actions and their sanction by Congress and the judiciary, Saito argues, undermine not just individual rights but the very foundations of our national security, democracy and the rule of law. From Chinese Exclusion to Guantanamo Bay will interest readers concerned with the historical background of constitutional protection in times of war and peace and will provide fascinating new material for scholars, teachers, and students of law, history, and ethnic studies.