La Devolution De Escocia Y El Referéndum De 2014: ¿Cuáles Son Las Repercusiones Potenciales En España? (The Scottish Devolution and the 2014 Referendum: What are the Potential Reverberations in Spain?)

Vito Breda 

University of Wales System - Cardiff Law School
November 15, 2002

Teoría y Realidad Constitucional, núm. 31, 69-88, 2013 
Abstract:      
En este artículo se analiza la devolution escocesa y la repercusión potencial en España del referéndum consultivo sobre la independencia de Escocia que tendrá lugar en 2014. Este referéndum podría ser percibido como uno de los muchos efectos del reciente resurgimiento nacionalista y su resultado es todavía objeto de especulaciones. Sin embargo, la posibilidad de asistir a la disolución de una de las más antiguas democracias occidentales como resultado de un referéndum es motivo de gran preocupación para los constitucionalistas en España.

Se argumentará que el riesgo de un referéndum similar en España es bajo. Los procesos que han impulsado el referéndum sobre la independencia de Escocia son el resultado de un discurso pragmático que se produjo dentro de una historia constitucional específicamente británica. Por ejemplo, tanto las tradiciones constitucionales escocesa como británica consideran a sus parlamentos respectivos como los depositariosdel poder constitucional soberano.

El artículo se divide en tres partes, precedidas por una introducción y seguidas de una conclusión. La primera parte contiene una discusión metodológica preliminar que explica el elemento distintivo del Sistema de Derecho Público del Reino Unido. La segunda explica las características distintivas de la devolution escocesa. En particular, se aclaran los efectos de tener dos parlamentos (el escocés y el del Reino Unido) que se aferran a dos conceptos diferentes de soberanía legislativa. En la tercera sección se compara el proceso constitucional a seguir para la celebración del referéndum escocés y un pretendido referéndum sobre la secesión de una de las Comunidades Autónomas españolas.

This article discusses the Scottish Devolution and the potential repercussion of the 2014 consultative referendum over Scottish independence in Spain. The 2014 referendum might be perceived as one of the many effects of the recent nationalist revival and its result is still a matter of speculations, yet, the possibility of seeing the dissolution of one of the UK, one of oldest western democracies, as the result of a referendum is of great concern for constitutional lawyers in Spain.

However, I would argue that a risk of an analogous referendum in Spain is low. The processes that were the proxy for the Scottish referendum over independence are the result of a pragmatic discourse that took place within a distinctively British constitutional history. For instance, both the Scottish and UK constitutional traditions consider their respective parliament the repository of sovereign constitutional power.

The article is divided in three parts, preceded by an introduction and followed by a conclusion. The first part is a preliminary methodological discussion that explains the distinctive element of the UK Public Law System. The second explains the distinctive features of the Scottish Devolution. In particular, I will dwell the effects of having two parliaments (the Scottish and the UK ) that hold on to two different concepts of legislative sovereignty. The third section compares the constitutional process required for the Scottish referendum and a putative referendum over a regional secession in a Spanish autonomous regions (e.g. Catalonia).

Note: Downloadable document is in Spanish.

Number of Pages in PDF File: 20

Full text available at: http://papers.ssrn.com/sol3/papers.cfm?abstract_id=2294381

Method, Community and Comparative Law: An Encounter with Complexity Science

David J. Gerber 

Illinois Institute of Technology - Chicago-Kent College of Law
October 9, 2011

16 Roger Williams University Law Review 110 (2011)
Chicago-Kent College of Law Research Paper 
Abstract:      
Assume that you are attending a symposium on comparative law being held in conjunction with the annual meeting of the American Society for Comparative Law. Comparative law scholars from many universities are present, and a few legal practitioners are attending as well. One speaker begins as follows: "This talk will be about complex adaptive systems — the emerging science of complexity." Based on experience in similar contexts, I would anticipate several common reactions among members of the audience. The most common might be "he’s in the wrong room." Another set of reactions is likely to be "What? What’s that? Never heard of it!" A third might be "What possible relevance can that have for comparative law?" Beneath these specific responses — and less likely to be expressed — is an assumption that this type of scientific discussion is alien and potentially inimical to the world of comparative law. The "scientific" language of the subject is likely to seem foreign to many, and the idea of a tie to comparative law is often perceived as not only foreign, but also perhaps threatening.

I use this imagined scenario as a window into the topic of the symposium: methodological approaches to comparative law. It provides a perspective on thinking about comparative law methods and a means of locating those methods in relation to other potentially relevant academic pursuits. The reactions to which I refer reveal much about comparative law at the outset of the twenty-first century.

Number of Pages in PDF File: 20

Keywords: comparative law, complexity science, community, methodology

Full text available at: http://papers.ssrn.com/sol3/papers.cfm?abstract_id=2159338

The Issue of Values

Dimitry Kochenov 

University of Groningen - Faculty of Law
July 17, 2013

Forthcoming in Roman Petrov and Peter Van Elsuwege (eds.), The Application of EU Law in the Eastern Neighbourhood of the European Union, London: Routledge, 2013. 
Abstract:      
This contribution provides a brief overview of the EU’s engagement with values both internally and externally, to illustrate the problematic nature of a number of deeply-held assumptions which inform the EU’s engagement with the Member States and with the third countries alike. As the analysis of the recent legal-political developments demonstrates, we are only witnessing the first timid attempts to move away from these assumptions. The introduction of Article 7 TEU into the Treaties, treating the Rui Tavares Report seriously, as well as the spirit and the letter of the draft Association Agreement with Ukraine all point in this direction. Essentially, in dealing with values no coherent distinction can be made between the EU on the ‘inside’ as opposed to the third countries: problems can equally arise in both spheres. This makes it clear that the acquis as such is not about the values and should be treated accordingly. Its promotion in the neighbourhood is not necessarily capable of doing the trick of democratizing EU’s partners or ensuring that they adhere to the rule of law. In other words, the rules that the EU promotes are not necessarily about values and should be treated as such. This conclusion is of essential importance also for the procedural side of the EU’s engagement with the neighbours, allowing the questioning of the reported successes of the principle of conditionality. Taking the wide-spread misconceptions into account is of essential importance both when designing the EU’s engagement with the neighbourhood as well as in the context of EU’s internal reform.

Number of Pages in PDF File: 22

Keywords: EU Law, external relations, ENP, neighourhood policy, Ukraine, values, conditionality, human rights, Association Agreement, Rule of Law, Tavares, Hungary, crisis

Full text available at: http://papers.ssrn.com/sol3/papers.cfm?abstract_id=2295154

Domestic Judicial Defiance in the European Union: A Political Economic Approach

Arthur Dyevre 

Max Planck Institute for Comparative and International Law
June 27, 2013

Abstract:      
Drawing on insights from the international relations literature, I develop a formal framework to analyze interactions between domestic and supranational judges in the EU legal order. I find that domestic high courts differ considerably in their ability to influence ECJ decision making but that, overall, overt judicial non-compliance should remain rare. Weak domestic courts have much to lose and little to win from an escalated conflict with the ECJ. But, while they do wield sufficient influence to contain the European Court's activism, domestic judicial superpowers -- such as the German Federal Constitutional Court -- also have a strong incentive to compromise. I demonstrate that, under certain conditions, their opinions may serve as an effective signalling device in a peaceful issue-trading equilibrium. An analysis of the German Court's opinions on European Integration using computer-based text scaling techniques (Wordscores, Wordfish) provides some empirical support for the way in which the model reinterprets the notion of judicial dialogue.

Number of Pages in PDF File: 32

Keywords: game theory, judicial behaviour, European integration, EU judicial politics, German Federal Constitutional Court, judicial dialogue, political economy

Full text available at: http://papers.ssrn.com/sol3/papers.cfm?abstract_id=2295034

Servizio Studi del Senato: Le Camere alte in Europa e negli Stati Uniti

Servizi Studi del Senato: Le Camere alte in Europa e negli Stati Uniti

http://www.senato.it/application/xmanager/projects/leg17/attachments/dossier/file_internets/000/000/186/Dossier_036_vol._I.pdf

Aboriginal Title in Canada: Site-Specific or Territorial?

Kent McNeil 

Osgoode Hall Law School - York University
July 1, 2013

Abstract:      
This paper addresses the issue of Aboriginal title to land, and the relationship I see between Indigenous law and the common law in this context. In my understanding, there have been three judicial approaches to Aboriginal title: 1. A purely proprietary approach, based on occupation of land and the effect given to occupation by the common law (common law Aboriginal title). 2. An Indigenous law approach, whereby Aboriginal title arises from and is defined by pre-existing Indigenous law (Indigenous law title). 3. A territorial approach, whereby Aboriginal title is derived from both common law and Indigenous law and has governmental dimensions (territorial Aboriginal title). I am going to describe each of these, and then offer some critical comments on the Supreme Court of Canada’s decision in R. v. Marshall; R. v. Bernard and the British Columbia Court of Appeal’s more recent decision in William v. British Columbia (the Tsilhqot'in Nation case).

Number of Pages in PDF File: 16

Keywords: aboriginal, title, land, territory, indigenous, court, law

Full text available at: http://papers.ssrn.com/sol3/papers.cfm?abstract_id=2294552

On Fragments and Geometry - The International Legal Order as Metaphor and How it Matters

Nikolas M. Rajkovic 

University of Kent, Canterbury - Kent Law School
July 17, 2013

Erasmus Law Review, Vol. 6, No. 1, 2013 
Abstract:      
This article engages the narrative of fragmentation in international law by asserting that legal academics and professionals have failed to probe more deeply into ‘fragmentation’ as a concept and, more specifically, as a spatial metaphor. The contention here is that however central fragmentation has been to analyses of contemporary international law, this notion has been conceptually assumed, ahistorically accepted and philosophically under-examined. The ‘fragment’ metaphor is tied historically to a cartographic rationality – and thus ‘reality’ – of all social space being reducible to a geometric object and, correspondingly, a planimetric map. The purpose of this article is to generate an appreciation among international lawyers that the problem of ‘fragmentation’ is more deeply rooted in epistemology and conceptual history. This requires an explanation of how the conflation of social space with planimetric reduction came to be constructed historically and used politically, and how that model informs representations of legal practices and perceptions of ‘international legal order’ as an inherently absolute and geometric. This implies the need to dig up and expose background assumptions that have been working to precondition a ‘fragmented’ characterization of worldly space. With the metaphor of ‘digging’ in mind, I draw upon Michel Foucault’s ‘archaeology of knowledge’ and, specifically, his assertion that epochal ideas are grounded by layers of ‘obscure knowledge’ that initially seem unrelated to a discourse. In the case of the fragmentation narrative, I argue obscure but key layers can be found in the Cartesian paradigm of space as a geometric object and the modern States’ imperative to assert (geographic) jurisdiction. To support this claim, I attempt to excavate the fragment metaphor by discussing key developments that led to the production and projection of geometric and planimetric reality since the 16th century.

Number of Pages in PDF File: 11

Keywords: international law, fragmentation, archaelogy, Foucault, geometry

Full text available at: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=xvVCZEiNg_Q