Crossing the Rubicon: What is Next for the Constitutional Court of Bosnia and Herzegovina?

Crossing the Rubicon: What is Next for the Constitutional Court of Bosnia and Herzegovina?

Harun ISERIC

When faced with the most serious threat to its functionality since its establishment by the Dayton Peace Accords (1995) – as entity legislatures have been defying the obligation to fill judicial vacancies and with three other judges about to reach their mandated retirement age – the Constitutional Court (the ‘Court’) of Bosnia and Herzegovina (‘BiH’) reached out to the Venice Commission (the ‘Commission’) for help in January 2024.

Read More

Election Observers as an Integral Part of Democratic Elections: The Venice Commission’s Report on Election Observers as Human Rights Defenders

Election Observers as an Integral Part of Democratic Elections: The Venice Commission’s Report on Election Observers as Human Rights Defenders

Selin ESEN

The Venice Commission frequently works in the realm of elections. It has adopted opinions and codes of good practice, guidelines, and other documents on elections, electoral procedures, electoral legislation, and referendums since its foundation in 1990.

Read More

Global Varieties of Constitutionalism and Contestations of Liberalism: How do Theunis Roux’s Grand Narratives on India and South Africa fit in?

Global Varieties of Constitutionalism and Contestations of Liberalism: How do Theunis Roux’s Grand Narratives on India and South Africa fit in?

Michael RIEGNER

In 2016, Mark Tushnet called for “a richer taxonomy of varieties of constitutionalism” that would “unsettle the view that liberal constitutionalism simply is constitutionalism, and that all other varieties are defective”.

Read More

Beyond a Bimodal Southern Democratic Constitutionalism

Beyond a Bimodal Southern Democratic Constitutionalism

Heinz KLUG

Theunis Roux has made an important contribution in stimulating a debate over the nature of ‘Southern Democratic Constitutionalism’ (SDC) and what he describes as the two approaches to SDC which he places in dialogue with one another while arguing that they together reflect and contribute to a single dynamic version of SDC

Read More

Legal Subversion in Pakistan: the Government’s War on the Islamabad High Court

Legal Subversion in Pakistan: the Government’s War on the Islamabad High Court

Hassan ZAHEER

On January 31 2025, the legal landscape of Pakistan was jolted by a letter bearing the signatures of five justices of the capital territory’s High Court, including the senior judges Mohsin Akhtar Kayani and Tariq Mehmood Jahangiri. The letter was severely critical of the reported attempt by the government to import a judge from another high court and install them as the Chief Justice (CJ) of the Islamabad High Court (IHC).

Read More

‘In Defence of Sentient Rights’ – A Response to More Equal than Others by Raffael Fasel

‘In Defence of Sentient Rights’ – A Response to More Equal than Others by Raffael Fasel

Alasdair COCHRANE

More Equal than Others is a tremendous contribution to the literature on human and animal rights: it is lucid, clear and beautifully argued. It offers a genuinely new approach to the award of fundamental rights – the Species Membership Approach (SMA) – that is extremely compelling…

Read More