What’s New in Public Law

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—Eman Muhammad Rashwan, Ph.D. Candidate in the European Doctorate in Law & Economics (EDLE), Hamburg University, Germany; Assistant Lecturer of Public Law, Cairo University, Egypt.

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In this weekly feature, I-CONnect publishes a curated reading list of developments in public law. “Developments” may include a selection of links to news, high court decisions, new or recent scholarly books, and articles, and blog posts from around the public law blogosphere.

To submit relevant developments for our weekly feature on “What’s New in Public Law,” please email iconnecteditors@gmail.com.

Developments in Constitutional Courts

1. The U.S. Supreme Court denied review to Boardman v. Inslee, a challenge to a Washington state law that shields the personal information of in-home care providers from public disclosure but allows the state to provide that data to the union that represents the providers.
2. The U.S. Supreme Court declined review in Ortiz-Diaz v. United States, a challenge to Congress’ authority to criminalize cockfighting in Puerto Rico.
3. The President of the European Court of Human Rights (ECtHR) appointed Ledi Bianku, an Albanian judge who has served at the ECtHR, to the Constitutional Court of Bosnia and Herzegovina due to disagreement between the appointing actors in the jurisdiction
4. U.S. Supreme Court Justice Sonia Sotomayor stated that changes to the structure of the supreme court’s oral arguments have been made, in part, due research finding that female justices were more prone to being interrupted by male justices and attorneys.

In the News

1. Main political parties in Spain agree on renewing Constitutional Court judges.
2. A controversial ruling by Poland’s Constitutional Court on the relationship between Polish and EU law was published in the Official Gazette on Tuesday, meaning it is now legally binding. The court had ruled that elements of EU law violate the Polish Constitution, thereby giving national law precedence over EU law.
3. The UN special envoy for the war-ravaged nation told the Security Council on Tuesday that talks on drafting a constitution for Syria will reconvene on October 18, 2021, in Geneva.
4. The Egyptian Initiative for Personal Rights addressed an official letter to the President to request the Constitutional Court to interpret the legal clauses regulating the periods of pre-trial detention.
5. On Monday, Tunisia’s President Qais Saied unveiled a new government with its Prime Minister Naglaa Bouden, the first female PM in the modern Arab World. Saied gave no hint, though, when he would relinquish his near-total control after seizing most powers in July this year.
6. For the first time in its history, the Egyptian State Council appoints 98 female judges among its members in different judicial levels upon earlier instructions of the President.

New Scholarship

1. Richard Albert, David Landau, Pietro Faraguna, and Šimon Drugda, I·CONnect-Clough Center 2020 Global Review of Constitutional Law (2021) (assembling detailed but relatively brief reports on constitutional developments and cases in 63 jurisdictions during the past calendar year authored by scholars, judges, and constitutional experts)
2. Richard Schragger, The City in the Future of Federalism, in Cities in Federal Constitutional Theory (Forthcoming 2022) (First, considering the mismatch between cities’ increasing economic, political, and sociological importance and their relative lack of status in constitutional theory. Second, discussing the use and definition of the term “city.” And third, considering the various ways institutional designers might go about empowering the city)
3. Eman M. Rashwan, The Price of Transitional Justice: A Cost‐Benefit Analysis of its Mechanisms in Post‐Revolution Phase, University of Bologna Law Review, Vol. 6, No. 1 (2021) (providing a cost-benefit analysis of the United Nations’ five mechanisms for nations to recover from conflict, applying these guidelines to democratic transitions after revolutions over autocratic regimes. The study suggests that TJ policies that take into account proportionality, a combination of different mechanisms, customization of the mechanisms upon the relevant case, and adopting these policies in the formality of basic or organic laws may be expected to have the most effective outcomes achieving the goals of TJ with the least legal complications)
4. David S. Schwarz, The Committee of Style and the Federalist Constitution, Buffalo Law Review Vol. 70 (Forthcoming, 2022) (arguing that the Style doctrine is historically unfounded and obscuring the Constitution’s original meaning. Ultimately, the Style doctrine is an artifact of post-ratification developments tending to disregard elements of the more nationalistic constitutional vision of the Federalist Framers)
5. Tonja Jacobi, Zoe Robinson, and Patrick Leslie, Comparative Exceptionalism? Strategy and Ideology in the High Court of Australia, The American Journal of Comparative Law (forthcoming 2021) (providing a rare comprehensive empirical assessment of oral argument outside the United States. Drawing on a novel dataset over 26 years (1995–2019), comprising nearly 1 million speech episodes at oral argument in Australia’s apex court, the High Court of Australia, the authors compare patterns of judicial behavior found in the U.S. Supreme Court to a comparable Western liberal democracy with a long tradition of judicial independence)
6. Aymen Briki, Saied Grab of Power Between Popular Sovereignty and Constitutional Legitimacy: A Déjà-vu Tunisian Legitimization Dilemma, Journal of Middle Eastern Politics & Policy (2021) (Explaining the power struggle in Tunisia in the light of the latest constitutional crisis of July 25. The author first argues that the alliance between the Tunisian and French constitutionalism traps the Tunisian transition in the black hole of the French constitutional history, which threatens the country’s future. Second, he presents an analysis of the legitimization dilemma in the Tunisian constitutional history, pioneering the concept of Lāhu-Lāhu Legitimacy. He concludes with policy recommendations to overcome the current deadlock)

Calls for Papers and Announcements

1. Centre for Constitutional Studies at the University of Alberta, Faculty of Law is holding an online webinar under the title “Language Rights’ Real Most Valuable Player – section 23 & Minority-Language Education” guesting Stéphanie Chouinard (Associate Professor, Queen’s U and Royal Military College) on October 19, 2021. Registration is open here.
2. Thomas Perroud, Jean-Bernard Auby, and Paul Lignieres launched “Chemins Publics,” a blog that aims to provide elements of “decoding” and legal translation of political, economic, and social events with a significant effect on public action. It focuses on public law, be it national, European, global, or compared. The subjects it covers are organized around nine themes: Climate change/health crisis, Commons, Competition and public good, Governance & Democracy, The private (as a vector of the common good), European construction, Digital, Public ethics, Cities. Instructions for submissions are provided here.
3. The ConstituGent and the Human Rights Centre (Ghent University) are pleased to announce an expert seminar on “intensity of review in public law” to be held on April 29, 2022, in Ghent. The deadline to submit abstracts is November 30, 2021.
4. The Ludwig Boltzmann Institute of Fundamental and Human Rights, Vienna, Austria, announces a full-time researcher/project manager vacancy (m/f/d) in the Programme Line “Human Dignity and Public Security.” The deadline for applications is November 7, 2021. All interested persons are requested to send their CV and a motivation letter to: gmr.office@univie.ac.at.
5. The Faculty of Law of the National University of Singapore (NUS Law) invites applications for Post-Doctoral Fellowship positions commencing in the academic year 2022-2023.
6. The Faculty of Law at the University of Helsinki invites applications for the position of Professor/Associate Professor/Assistant Professor of international law. The closing date for applications is November 7, 2021.
7. The International Studies Association (ISA) Innovative Pedagogy Planning Committee invites submission for its 2022 conference, which will be held in conjunction with the Annual Convention on March 29, 2022, in Nashville, TN, the U.S.

Elsewhere Online

1. Tom Fieldhouse, Reforming elections: assessing the government’s proposals, The Constitution Unit Blog
2. Ignatius Yordan Nugraha, ‘It’s just a prank, bro!’ ZB v. France and a dark humour that turned sour, Strasbourg Observers
3. Eman Muhammad Rashwan, Religious Identity in the Constitution of Egypt: A Deliberate Ambiguity?, IACL-AIDC Blog
4. Brian Bird, Rethinking Peace, Order, and Good Government in the Canadian Constitution, Double Aspect
5. Ashwanee Budoo-Scholtz, Is Covid-19 bringing out the inequalities in the delivery of health services in Mauritius?, AfricLaw
6. Maame A.S. Mensa-Bonsu, Forging Forward Introspectively as Ghana’s Constitution Turns Thirty, IACL-AIDC Blog
7. Shaakirrah Sanders, Justices probe both sides in clash between confrontation clause and evidentiary rules, SCOTUSblog
8. Jochen von Bernstorff, Afghanistan and Great Power Interventionism as Self-Defense, Verfassungsblog
9. Jess Bravin, Supreme Court Quizzes Government Ban on ‘Black Site’ Testimony, The Wall Street Journal