Search

This paper briefly discusses the presence of gender stereotypes in the treatment of adolescent girls deprived of their liberty in Chile. The paper begins by presenting the concept of gender stereotypes and reviewing the main recommendations from the international human rights framework regarding the need to eliminate stereotypes in the justice system in general and in the treatment of adolescent girls deprived of their liberty in particular. It then uses interviews with professionals who work directly with adolescent girls deprived of their liberty to explain, through their words, the main gender stereotypes present in relation to them, which are mainly related to characteristics such as the emotionality, intensity and complexity of adolescent girls. In addition, the analysis of the interviews conducted with the adolescent girls who were in the centres at the time of the visits and who agreed to participate in the study is also included. Finally, a brief reflection is presented on the presence of these stereotypes and how they have their origin in the gender order, the socialisation that the girls receive, and also the violence to which they are exposed, to conclude by reflecting on the State's inability, to date, to provide the conditions and tools for the treatment of adolescent girls deprived of liberty free of gender stereotypes, thus complying with human rights recommendations.

The paper analyses the topic to understand how the legal and judicial practices in two Amazonian municipalities (Apuí and Lábrea) respond to the dynamics of environmental crimes in the region. The research project is a based in a qualitative and quantitative methodology. This paper discusses the initial results from interviews gathered in the city of Manaus with a Judge from the Amazonas State, a Prosecutor from Public Ministry, a Federal Police Commissar, and a member of the Environmental Agency of Amazonas. Thus, it is possible to understand: a) the context of environmental crimes in the cities of Apuí and Lábrea, b) the responses of criminal justice institutions to the occurrence of environmental crimes in the region. El artículo analiza el tema para comprender cómo las prácticas legales y judiciales en dos municipios amazónicos (Apuí y Lábrea) responden a la dinámica de los delitos ambientales en la región. El proyecto de investigación se basa en una metodología cualitativa y cuantitativa. Las entrevistas fueran realizadas en la ciudad de Manaus con un juez del estado de Amazonas, un fiscal del Ministerio Público, un comisario de la Policía Federal y un miembro de la Agencia Ambiental de Amazonas. Así, es posible comprender: a) el contexto de los delitos ambientales en las ciudades de Apuí y Lábrea, b) las respuestas de las instituciones de justicia penal ante la ocurrencia de delitos ambientales en la región.

As in other dictatorships in the Southern Cone, during the last military dictatorships in Argentina (1976-1983) and Uruguay (1973-1985), women prisoners were victims of different forms of sexual violence. In Argentina, only in recent years, after the reopening of trials for crimes against humanity and with considerable resistance, the possibility of trying sexual violence as a crime distinct from torture began to be considered, and in 2010 the first conviction for this crime was handed down. In 2011, a criminal complaint was filed for the first time for rape and sexual abuse committed during the period of the Uruguayan military dictatorship made collectively by 28 former female political prisoners. In this paper we will describe the paths taken by the justice system in each of the countries and the changing moments of memory in order to finally analyze the process of shaping and organizing these complaints and to report on the main legal debates about the possibility of prosecuting these crimes in both countries. Studying the Argentine and Uruguayan cases together will allow us to address the specific characteristics of each national historical development but, at the same time, will seek to account for a process that exceeds national boundaries.

One of the most significant institutional developments in Bosnia and Herzegovina after the last war (1992-1995) was the establishment of the state-level Court of Bosnia and Herzegovina. Its relevance increased when, as part of the International Criminal Tribunal for the former Yugoslavia’s exit strategy, it was decided that a War Crimes Chamber would be established in the Court to continue the trial process. It should be noted that the very existence of an integral state of Bosnia and Herzegovina (one of the reasons for the war) is still in question today. Thus the creation of the Court was interpreted as a bid to strengthen state capacities. For this reason, since its very establishment, and even more so for its task of judging the war, it has been resented by the political leadership of one of the country's entities, the Republika Srpska, which has even tried to eliminate it. Against this background, the aim of this paper is to analyze how the Court itself perceives its actions (through statements of its presidency and official publications), especially the adjudication of war crimes, in the context of the debates on what the state of Bosnia-Herzegovina should be. The focus is on the period 2004-2017, when the presidency of the Court was held by Meddžida Kreso, particularly active in promoting her institution and in helping to identify it as an expression of the state.

Al evaluar los efectos de la juridificación de la política indígena y dilucidar si han conducido a resultados de empoderamiento o dominación para los movimientos indígenas, deben considerarse los resultados del litigio desde una dimensión estrecha (efectos materiales directos) pero también los efectos indirectos y simbólicos de la movilización legal indígena, es decir, evaluar los efectos de la movilización legal desde una dimensión más amplia. Tras revisar el disperso cuerpo de literatura sobre los efectos de la juridificación de la política indígena (Sieder), en este artículo se propone adoptar el modelo de estudio propuesto por Gloppen y Wilson (2017) que compagina este doble análisis desde una dimensión estrecha y amplia, y para la dimensión amplia se sugiere seguir las categorías planteadas por Dugard en 2022 (power-with, power-to, power-within y power-from dimensions). De esta manera, se logra abordar integralmente los efectos de la movilización legal indígena y obtener conclusiones más consistentes al realizar los estudios de casos. To assess the effects of juridifcation of indigenous politics and conclude whether it has led to the empowerment or domination of indigenous movements, it shall be considered not only trial outcomes from a narrow dimension (direct, material effects), but also indirect and symbolic effects of indigenous legal mobilizations; that is, assess the effects of legal mobilizations from a broader dimension. After reviewing the limited body of literature on the effects of juridification of indigenous politics (Sieder), it is recommended in this paper to follow the study model proposed by Gloppen and Wilson (2017). This model combines this double analysis from a narrow and broad dimension. Besides, for the broad dimension, it is suggested to follow the categories set out by Dugard in 2022 (power-with, power-to, power-within and power-from dimensions). This way, it is possible to comprehensively address the effects of indigenous legal mobilizations and reach more consistent findings when undertaking case studies.

This paper describes theoretical and methodological tools deployed for contextual readings of legislation. The paper argues that unpacking the power relations and ideologies embedded within text becomes especially important when researching law in hegemonic polities in which the public domain is state dominated. Because legislation, as finished product, masks the contestations and contexts which have informed, precipitated and contextualised it, discursive readings of legislation repair the exclusion of non-state voices by interrogating and de-coding legislative text.

This paper introduces and explores the use of social research methods, with some influence of gender scholarship, in relation to the interminable legal and social science ‘problem’ of how and why it seems that women commit less crime than men and how that imbalance occurs and remains relatively stable. Essentially, a summary of the background to and methodology of a current research project, which employs closed circuit television (CCTV) surveillance as the empirical lens of enquiry, is presented and discussed, along with some initial findings and observations, provoking questions of how and where else the criminal law has been and can be read, interpreted and practised. In particular, notions of subjectivity and authority as causes of criminalisation, as opposed to the criminal law itself, are considered. As a result of sociologically conceived field-based findings, this paper addresses concerns relevant to modern jurisprudence and so too implications for both policy and practice both in relation to the criminal law. The key reflection, however, is the use of qualitative methods, rooted in the social sciences, to address a legal research question: a matter of legal scholarship.

This paper aims to analyze the processes of identity formation comprised within social movement actions. The case of the 8-N movement occurred in 2012 in Argentina is used as a central example of a collective identity formation through the use of new technologies in favor of political activism. The theoretical approach to this topic contains a convergence of notions coming from Social Movement Studies and from Political Studies. I take certain notions from Action-Identity Theory regarding social movements’ doctrine. Regarding political doctrines, I review the impact of the Theory of Populism (developed by Ernesto Laclau) on the study of social movements. Populism proposes an adequate framework of political and social inclusion to analyze those marginalized masses intending to construct their own identity and mobilize. Finally, the paper reflects on whether or not the generation of a collective identity is a crucial requirement for the emergence of a social movement.

This paper describes the Colombian legal framework applicable for the mining industry and identifies the problematic issues within and then proposes some straightforward reforms. To accomplish this objective the presents some information about the importance of this activity in the current political and economic setting and describes the fast growth of this industry as well as the influence of the global markets with regard to the needs of the mining activity. The paper proposes six basic reforms to adjust the legal framework to the current challenges of the industry.

This paper is part of a longer research project that works towards a critical reading of the role of law in reinscribing and even producing structural and institutional violence. For introducing such a complex multi-sited topic, the present article focuses on the socio-juridical approach to violence against women by unpacking (i) the terminology of “femicide” and “feminicidio”; (ii) the main instruments and decisions from the international human rights system; (iii) the implementation of the international discourses and documents. In a materialistic framework, we examine the Brazilian context, especially regarding the institutional answers on: public information, statistics, police stations, and shelters to women and children experiencing violence. Through this itinerary, the analysis moves from the legal discourse towards questioning what lies at the limits of justice praxis within the framework of femicide. Este artículo forma parte de un proyecto de investigación más largo que trabaja en pos de una lectura crítica del papel del derecho en la reinscripción e incluso la producción de la violencia estructural e institucional. Para introducir un tema tan complejo y multisituado, el presente artículo se centra en el enfoque socio-jurídico de la violencia contra las mujeres, desentrañando (i) la terminología de “femicidio” y “feminicidio”; (ii) los principales instrumentos y decisiones del sistema internacional de derechos humanos; (iii) la aplicación de los discursos y documentos internacionales. En un marco materialista, examinamos el contexto brasileño, especialmente en lo que se refiere a las respuestas institucionales sobre información pública, estadísticas, comisarías y lugares de acogida para mujeres y niños que sufren violencia. A través de este itinerario, el análisis se desplaza desde el discurso jurídico hacia el cuestionamiento de los límites de la praxis de la justicia en el marco del feminicidio.

In this article we strive to problematize and unsettle the regime of human rights, critically reflecting around their potential for decolonization. Although the discourse of human rights has been used by multiple actors for the last decades as a tool to channel social claims, the material and substantial conditions of people in the Global South have not really improved. Human rights have not been able to dismantle the oppressive structures of capitalism, patriarchy, and colonialism, furthermore, they have been used to uphold and reproduce them. Our reflections in this paper particularly revolve around the coloniality of human rights. Drawing from postcolonial philosophy, decolonial thought, and poststructuralist understandings of power, we start by critiquing the basic premises of the main trends of legal epistemology, establishing our understanding of the coloniality of law, and we continue with a deconstruction of human rights’ pretended universality, problematizing their subject. Finally, we conclude that despite their potential for a strategic use in resistance, human rights will not be able to be decolonized until the ongoing structures of power that were instituted by coloniality five hundred years ago are abolished. En este artículo tratamos de problematizar y desasentar el régimen de los derechos humanos, reflexionando críticamente en torno a su potencial descolonizador. Si bien el discurso de los derechos humanos ha sido utilizado por múltiples actores durante las últimas décadas como herramienta para canalizar reclamos sociales, las condiciones materiales y sustanciales de las personas en el Sur Global en realidad no han mejorado. Los derechos humanos no han podido desmantelar las estructuras opresivas del capitalismo, el patriarcado y el colonialismo, es más, han sido utilizados para sostenerlas y profundizarlas. Nuestras reflexiones en este artículo giran particularmente en torno a la colonialidad de los derechos humanos. A partir de la filosofía poscolonial, el pensamiento descolonial y las interpretaciones posestructuralistas del poder, comenzamos por criticar las premisas básicas de las principales tendencias de la epistemología jurídica, estableciendo nuestra comprensión de la colonialidad del derecho, y continuamos con una deconstrucción de la pretendida universalidad de los derechos humanos, problematizando su sujeto. Finalmente, concluimos que, a pesar de su potencial para un uso estratégico en la resistencia, los derechos humanos no podrán ser descolonizados hasta que las estructuras de poder vigentes que fueron instituidas por la colonialidad hace quinientos años sean abolidas.

The concept of gender is based on the roles built by society, based on beliefs, principles, norms, and/or models that over time have designed the actions expected by both men and women and have an impact on individuals’ perceptions and perspectives. Based on an analysis of the jurisprudence of the European Court of Human Rights, this paper aims to understand the phenomena associated with gender violence, in particular intimate partner violence, and to what extent violent acts are based on and encouraged by sociocultural learning of gender roles, contributing for a critical reflection on the challenges of gender asymmetries and stereotyped discourse. El concepto de género se fundamenta en los papeles construidos por la sociedad, a partir de creencias, principios, normas y/o modelos que a lo largo del tiempo han diseñado las acciones esperadas tanto por hombres como por mujeres e impactan en las percepciones y perspectivas de los individuos. A partir de un análisis de la jurisprudencia del Tribunal Europeo de Derechos Humanos, este trabajo tiene como objetivo comprender los fenómenos asociados a la violencia de género, en particular la violencia em la intimidad, y en qué medida los actos violentos se basan y fomentan en el aprendizaje sociocultural de los papeles de género contribuyendo a una reflexión crítica sobre los desafíos de las asimetrías de género y los discursos estereotipados.

This paper discusses the challenges and opportunities of carrying out empirical work during the COVID-19 pandemic. By these means, it aims to contribute to the yet incipient analyses of how the circumstances created by the global spread of the SARS-CoV-2 virus, such as government restrictions on gatherings and mobility, impacted social research practice during 2020. For this purpose, the article presents two experiences of qualitative socio-legal fieldwork at graduate degree level, carried out during the early months of the COVID-19 outbreak, one in Brazil and the other in Colombia. In doing so, it also emphasizes particularities of the pandemic response in Latin America. Our central arguments are (i) that the flexible logic that characterizes qualitative research practice allowed for creative solutions to the problems posed by COVID-19, and (ii) that careful examination and heightened sensibility were needed to deal with the novel ethical dilemmas that arose during this process. El presente artículo analiza los desafíos y oportunidades de realizar un trabajo empírico durante la pandemia de COVID-19. De esta manera, pretende contribuir a los emergentes estudios sobre las formas en que las circunstancias creadas por la propagación global del virus SARS-CoV-2, tales como restricciones gubernamentales a reuniones sociales y a la movilidad, impactaron la práctica de la investigación social durante 2020. Para tal fin, el artículo presenta dos experiencias cualitativas de trabajo de campo socio-jurídico a nivel de posgrado, realizadas durante los primeros meses del brote de COVID-19, una en Brasil y otra en Colombia, enfatizando las particularidades de la respuesta a la pandemia en Latinoamerica. Nuestros argumentos centrales son (i) que la lógica flexible que caracteriza la práctica de la investigación cualitativa permitió la creación de soluciones creativas a los problemas planteados por COVID-19, y (ii) que, para abordar dilemas que surgieron durante el desarrollo de las investigación aquí descritas, fue necesaria una examinación compleja y sensible de la coyuntura.

In the 1970's penal abolitionism seemed on its way to become one of the most important currents of critical criminology. At least, this was the situation in Germany. Thomas Mathiesen and Nils Christie, but also LoukHulsman and (to a lesser degree) Herman Bianchi established very loyal communities in Germany. Young German scholars, some of whom are today leading German criminologists (like Karl Schumann or Sebastian Scheerer) took up their ideas. And this promised a potent theoretical tool with important and radical practical implications. However, by the end of the 1980's, critical criminologists took up other issues and abolitionism is hardly mentioned any more in the criminological discourse in Germany. A double question then arises, what became of abolitionism as a movement?, and, is abolitionism still valid as a theoretical and/or strategic approach? This paper explores the results of an email survey including nine abolitionist scholars, which led to a lively exchange of views and a lively discussion. This exchange started by the end of August 2007 and petered out by the end of September of the same year. We decided to group some excerpts in the guise of seven fictitious Frequently Asked Questions: 1) What is abolitionism? 2) Does abolitionism require the abolition of all prisons? 3) Are there any practical successes abolitionism can claim? 4) What about positive alternatives? 5) What became of the abolitionist movement/movements? 6) What about academic abolitionism? 7) Is there a future for abolitionism?

In this article I discuss preliminary outcomes of an ongoing research that focuses on the process of institutionalization of the BolsaFamília program (BFP), a Brazilian conditional cash transfer policy launched in 2003. Since then this policy has achieved considerable results in regard to the decrease of poverty and fight against hunger. Nevertheless its potential to change social structures of inequality in the country is still under discussion. Considering the program in the Latin American context, the aim of this paper is to bring together a set of studies conducted in the field of Law and Development that analyses the role of legal regulation within BFP and critical inputs from the Latin American social thought in order to offer an alternative research agenda about the role of law in social reforms.

This paper outlines my approach to analysing conceptions of individual rights in the Middle Ages, particularly the so-called ‘twelfth-century renaissance’. This period witnessed an efflorescence in learning and culture, particularly as the schools of higher learning led development in the disciplines of law and theology. Examining Justinianic Roman law (i.e. Roman law received via the Emperor Justinian I’s codification in the early sixth century), canon law (i.e. church and ecclesiastical law), as well as theological sources, I am looking for the use of rights language and conceptions of individual rights. My point of departure is Brian Tierney's notion of individual rights in twelfth-century canon lawyers, but to extend this inquiry more broadly (beyond canonists) to include medieval Justinianic Roman law glossators and scholastic theologians. Within this line of inquiry, I am interested in the ‘lawyer-theologians’ of the twelfth century, particularly those in the Anglo-Norman context, whose writings evince an overriding practicality in their treatment of these issues.

The European Convention on Human Rights (ECHR) is a traditional human rights document. As a result, the focus of its supervisory mechanism in Strasbourg has been on the civil and political rights violations carried out by states. Notwithstanding, the Strasbourg Court has, in some cases, applied a wider interpretation of the Convention to include some social and economic rights. In addition, the Court has established in its case law that Convention rights apply in the private sphere, albeit indirectly. There is empirical evidence that transnational corporations are violating human rights, however their liability remains slight. The developments in Strasbourg may indicate a potential for the ECHR to have an impact on human rights violations committed by legal persons, namely corporations. Questions arise regarding the best way to deal with these violations: should human rights law consider the direct liability of corporations, implying their elevation to the status of states in international public law; or is it best to develop the current mechanism of the indirect method (Drittwirkung) and maintain the state-centred approach? This paper scrutinises the potentiality of the application of the Convention to corporate violations of human rights, as well as the suitability of the European Court of Human Rights (ECtHR) as a venue to implement the accountability of corporations. European Convention on Human Rights, corporate accountability, indirect approach (Drittwirkung)

Four legislative Acts have been passed by the French Parliament since 1990 dealing with the memory of the Holocaust, of the Negro Trade and Slavery, of Colonization and the Armenian Genocide, and retrospectively named as lois mémorielles (memorial laws). Since 2005, a large number of history teachers and historians – increasingly anxious about the way law engages with history – made appeals to the French Parliament to stop legislating the past (described in this paper as ‘the memorial laws’ debate’). Taking into consideration the reflections this debate has led to and the repeated warnings against the incursion of law’s reason in the field of historical science, it is argued here that this controversy creates an opportunity to reflect further on the different methodological approaches to knowledge that historians and jurists develop, and their respective relations to history, memory and authority.

During the last decade, the governments of different countries in Western Europe and America have adopted emergency criminal policies to combat criminal phenomena which they regard as particularly dangerous (such as terrorism and narcotrafficking), for they a threat to the existence of the state and society. With the argument that they are defending the rule of law and democracy, governments' actions and policies have consolidated an emergency penal culture whereupon order and security are invoked not only to limit huma rights, but also to push economic and social justice into the background of the political agenda. This, order and security are regarded as pre-condition for economic development and social welfare. This outlook, which has captured the penal imagination of several western democracies, entails a conservative and neoliberal political economy that promotes the expansion of the repressive functions of the state, as well as the rolling back of its active intervention in the economic and social spheres. This paper discusses the Colombian case where different political, economic, and social phenomena have contributed to the expansion and consolidations of emergency penal culture. During the last decade, the rise to power of conservative governments which defend the neoliberal model, together with a protracted armed conflict and the phenomenon of narcotrafficking, have made crime control a key battlefield for the defense and expansion of such model.

Este artículo brinda un mapa para comprender las democracias latinomericanas contemporáneas signadas por el temor y la inseguridad. Su fin es construir un marco conceptual para analizar las sociedades de seguridad y las formas que en ellas adopta el espectáculo mediático. En paralelo, se descomponen las características de las subjetividades emergentes en los escenarios del miedo (las víctimas) y los aspectos desde los cuales estas identidades redefinen lo abyecto. El paper perfila los límites contemporáneos que acechan la política y analiza el advenimiento de los medios de comunicación como un mecanismo privilegiado para explorar la tensión entre previsibilidad e incerteza. A la vez, avanza en la teorización del paradigma de la victimización y configura una matriz para situar las características propias de las subjetividades de las sociedades de seguridad.

This article intends to expose the policies of reparation and truth and memory promoted by the Brazilian Amnesty Commission and one of it projects. Regarding this, it will reflect on Brazilian military dictatorship through a transitional justice perspective. However, the paper’s aim does not have as principal focus evaluated those policies; instead plans to expose the debate, looking for the policy justifications and principal critiques. Therefore, it does not aspire to promote one point of view, pro or against the policies, but prefers to discuss the mechanisms of public politics that are associated with them. This investigation will be done by – first – by contextualization, in order to understand the context and actors related to the Brazilian Military Dictatorship, then, by the transitional justice theory and the policies of Amnesty Commission. Lastly, it will sum the points of conclusion.

This paper is based on a socio-legal research which evaluates the impact of the Treaty of Lisbon on the area of fundamental rights within the EU. The project’s central core is on the relationship between the Court of Justice of the EU (CJEU, as it might be termed the Luxembourg Court) and the European Court of Human Rights (ECtHR, as it might be termed the Strasbourg Court) in the pre and post EU’s accession to the European Convention of Human Rights (ECHR). The work, as informed by empirical findings, questions whether the two Courts’ dialogue in the fundamental rights sphere could be analysed using the language of constitutional pluralism, doctrine elaborated by scholars to describe the multiple claims of authority between the CJEU and the national courts. The after accession era offers interesting features to revisit the constitutional pluralism doctrine, challenging its appropriateness when granting final authority to the Strasbourg Court in the European human rights field.

This paper reflects on the role of the intellectuals from the sociology of law as one of the possible discourses in the research and the connection that joins this activity with the university today, from a critical perspective of the three mentioned concepts (University-Law-Research). The theoretical basis which the analysis arises from has its main bases in the proposals of the role of intellectuals developed by Pierre Bourdieu and Edward Said, which articulate the observation of critical thinking in legal knowledge. The integration of these observations is aimed to raise a proposal to work in socio-legal studies, taken from the critical nature of the intellectual, making visible the diversity of legality and enable to rethink its uses and implications in our societies, in turn. Se propone una reflexión sobre el papel que desempeñan los intelectuales desde la sociología del derecho como uno de los discursos posibles dentro de la investigación y la conexión que, a su vez, une esta actividad con la universidad en nuestros días, a partir de una perspectiva crítica sobre los tres conceptos mencionados (Universidad-Derecho-Investigación). El eje teórico a partir del cual se plantea este análisis tiene sus bases principales en las propuestas sobre el papel del intelectual desarrolladas por Pierre Bourdieu y Edward Said, las cuales se articulan con la observación del pensamiento crítico en el saber jurídico. La integración de estas observaciones se orienta a plantear una propuesta de trabajo en sociología jurídica que, asumida desde el carácter crítico del intelectual, haga visible la diversidad de lo jurídico y que permita, a su vez, repensar sus usos e implicaciones en las sociedades actuales.

This paper aims at elucidating the role played by the Italian penal system in the government of that specific segment of social marginality presented by illegal immigrants. Drawing on an ethnographic research on the procedimento per direttissima (summary penal procedure), it tries to show that some features of the Italian penal system, typically associated with the police activity, do increase the selectivity of the system to the detriment of those who are socially constructed as dangerous, converting it into an administrative agency devoted to the management of social boundaries. What emerges from the empirical research is indeed the core position assumed by the Italian penal system in the framework of an increasingly restrictive migratory policy: called to govern a population strictly confined at the margin, its main task becomes to reduce the social costs caused by the subordinate inclusion that Italy grants to migrants.

This paper presents a discursive analysis of the arrival, operation, and effects of Corporate Social Responsibility (CSR) on international development from a socio-legal perspective. CSR has become a priority on the international development agenda as frameworks for development promote the contraction of the state's role and seek to encourage corporate participation in addressing social issues. It is argued here, however, that CSR discourse represents an expansion of development as an antipolitics machine. As a discourse, CSR possesses a powerful capacity for selfperpetuation, allowing it to appropriate and rephrase social dissent in its own terms, and cancelling genuine political contestation. Through institutionalization, regularization and managerial capture, CSR exemplifies how discursive practices and structures embody a constellation of power relations that constrain action and obscure the intrinsically political nature of development.