Archive for ‘Professors’ Scholarship’

Exploring Evil with Dr. James Waller

Exploring Evil with Dr. James Waller

In October 2022, The Comparative Jurist sat down with Dr. James Waller, Cohen Professor of Holocaust and Genocide Studies at Keene State College in New Hampshire and Director of Academic Programs at the Auschwitz Institute for Peace and Reconciliation (AIPR), an international non-governmental organization dedicated to genocide and mass atrocity prevention.  Dr. Waller, a trained social psychologist, visited William & Mary Law School to present the research behind his book Becoming Evil: How Ordinary People Commit Genocide and Mass Killing. [. . .]

Populism and Constitutionalism in East-Central Europe

Populism and Constitutionalism in East-Central Europe

By Gábor Halmai.

The recent deviations from the shared values of constitutionalism towards a kind of “populist, illiberal constitutionalism” in East-Central Europe raise the theoretical questions: are populism and illiberalism what the leaders of these backsliding states proud of, reconcilable with constitutionalism? I shall concentrate on a particular version of populism, which is nationalist and illiberal, and mainly present in Hungary and Poland, and in other countries of the region. Most are also members of the European Union, a valued community based on liberal democratic constitutionalism.  The arguments set forth below about East-Central European populist constitutionalism in this paper do not necessarily apply to other parts of Europe (Greece and Spain), Latin-America (Bolivia), or the US, where populism has a different character, and its relationship to constitutionalism is distinct from the Hungarian or the Polish variant. […]

Language Challenges in the South China Sea Dispute

Language Challenges in the South China Sea Dispute

By Huanxin Luo.

Due to the number of claimants and the complexity of claims, the South China Sea dispute is deemed as the “mother of all territorial disputes”. In 2013, the Philippines unilaterally filed an arbitration case, requesting the tribunal to adjudge her disputes with China concerning the interpretation and application of the United Nations Convention on the Law of the Sea (UNCLOS). The Philippines’ submissions were detailed about the legitimacy of China’s historic rights claim based on the “nine-dash line”; the status and maritime entitlements of relevant features in the Nanshan Islands. On July 12, 2016, the tribunal rendered its final award, which mostly backed the Philippines’ position. Immediately, the Chinese government reaffirmed her objection, insisting the award is null and void for the tribunal does not have jurisdiction over any of the claims made by the Philippines. […]