Backlash against international courts: explaining the forms and patterns of resistance to international courts

Madsen, Mikael Rask; Cebulak, Pola; Wiebusch, Micha

doi:10.1017/s1744552318000034

Cited by 105 publications

(96 citation statements)

References 61 publications

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“…While there is a growing literature on backlashes against international courts, this literature has not yet developed a general theory of why backlashes occur. Some of the literature focuses on explaining the success or failure of backlash attempts (Alter, Gathii, and Helfer 2016b;Alter and Helfer 2017b), the implications for international courts (Helfer 2018) and legal academia (Posner 2017), and on mapping backlashes (Madsen, Cebulak, and Wiebusch 2018). Other scholars develop explanations for backlashes in specific contexts (Sandholtz, Bei, and Caldwell 2017;Alter, Gathii, and Helfer 2016b).…”

Section: Explanations For Backlashmentioning

confidence: 99%

“…B oth the numbers of international courts 1 and their judgments increased markedly throughout the 1990s and the early 2000s (Alter 2014). More recently, however, these institutions have faced a growing backlash (Alter, Gathii, and Helfer 2016a;Sandholtz, Bei, and Caldwell 2017;Madsen, Cebulak, and Wiebusch 2018). Several states have rescinded the jurisdiction of international human rights courts.…”

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confidence: 99%

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Populism and Backlashes against International Courts

Voeten¹

2019

Perspect. polit.

107

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International courts, like domestic courts, protect liberal limits on majoritarianism. This sometimes puts these courts in a position to protect the property rights of the "corrupt elites" that are targeted by populists or the civil liberties of those who are targeted in domestic populist identity politics. Moreover, populism offers an ideology to attack the authority of a court rather than just its individual rulings. An empirical examination illustrates the plausibility of this argument. A large number of backlashes against international courts arise from judgments that reinforce local populist mobilization narratives. Populist backlashes against international courts are not just about sovereignty but often follow efforts to curb domestic courts, usually for similar reasons. Yet populist backlashes do not always succeed, either because populist leaders do not follow up on their exit threats or because populism is too thin an ideology for creating successful multilateral reform coalitions.

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Section: Explanations For Backlashmentioning

confidence: 99%

mentioning

confidence: 99%

Populism and Backlashes against International Courts

Voeten¹

2019

Perspect. polit.

107

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“…The introduction to this special issue on resistance against international courts (ICs) sets out a useful framework for analysing the forms and patterns of resistance to such courts, which has become an increasingly common global phenomenon (Madsen, Cebulak and Wiebusch, 2018).…”

Section: Introductionmentioning

confidence: 99%

“…The article contains four sections. Section II briefly addresses the analytical framework for resistance set out by Madsen, Cebulak and Wiebusch (2018). Section III sets out fundamental contextual factors that affect the overall operation of the African Court.…”

Section: Introductionmentioning

confidence: 99%

The African Court on Human and Peoples' Rights: mapping resistance against a young court

Daly¹,

Wiebusch

2018

International Journal of Law in Context

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At first glance, it appears that the African Court on Human and Peoples’ Rights – the first pan-continental court of the African Union (AU) for human rights protection – epitomises the advances made by international courts in Africa in the past decade. Since its first judgment in 2009, the Court has taken a robust approach to its mandate and its docket is growing apace. However, a closer look at the overall context in which the Court operates reveals that it is susceptible to many of the patterns of resistance that have hampered other international courts in the region, which cut across the development of its authority and impact. This paper analyses the forms and patterns of resistance against the African Court and the actors involved, emphasising the additional difficulties entailed in mapping resistance to a young court compared to long-established courts, such as the European and Inter-American human rights courts.

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“…The opening article by Madsen, Cebulak and Wiebusch sets out a framework for studying resistance to ICs that is deployed and discussed by all the other articles in this special issue. Appellate Body (Madsen, Cebulak and Wiebusch 2018), our emphasis is generally on regional international courts in the areas of trade and human rights. This emphasis allows us to make general conclusion that are valid at least with regard to such regional institutions.…”

Section: Introduction and Conclusionmentioning

confidence: 99%