Harvard ILJ

A footnoted version of a speech delivered by Harold Hongju Koh, Legal Adviser, U.S. Department of State, on September 18, 2012, at the USCYBERCOM Inter-Agency Legal Conference on the Roles of Cyber in National Defense, at Fort Meade, Maryland.

One of the most memorable images of the Egyptian Revolution is that of hundreds of people lined up for Islamic prayer in Tahrir Square in Cairo, in Alexandria, and in all of the other cities around the country. Hundreds organized into neat rows, standing, bowing, and prostrating in tandem to perform Islamic ritual prayer as they endured assaults of hot gushing water and tear gas by riot police. For a number of political analysts and commentators, such images of public religiosity and religious performance throughout the course of the Egyptian Revolution proved to be challenging, if not confusing. For some, it appeared paradoxical, if not incongruous, that despite the decidedly prominent role of expressions of Islamicity, whether through forms of expression of Islamic identity, such as collective prayer, or the invocation of Islamic symbolism, or the usage of Islamic phrases, the Egyptian Revolution was not a call for a theocratic government or an Islamic government.

We begin by providing a brief overview of the Egyptian Constitution. We then discuss some of the main amendments that the Egyptian Constitutional Amendment Committee proposed and that were recently adopted by public referendum. Finally, we recommend a few other amendments that Egypt should consider after parliamentary elections take place.

The Egyptian people discovered, however, that in the absence of internal democracy, it was impossible to preserve the gains of the previous revolutions. The January 25 Revolution therefore affirmed the centrality of democracy to the Egyptian national movement, not just as a utopian goal—one whose practical implementation would be indefinitely deferred—but rather as the foundation for a modern, independent, and prosperous Egypt.

The transition under way in Egypt is constitutional. A constitutional transition is the most important task for sealing in law the future of post-Mubarak Egypt and for ensuring peaceful political change.This modest Article seeks to identify key revisions to Egypt’s Constitution and discusses the possibility of comprehensive constitutional redrafting. The Article also argues that the judiciary is uniquely positioned to lead the project of constitutional amendment.

Taking the recent Kiobel decision as a starting point, this article examines the ramifications of the majority opinion with respect to corporate accountability in conflict zones, both in the ATS context and more generally. The article contends that Kiobel is out of step with the historical tradition of the international legal system to fill governance gaps, including by holding actors operating in conflict zones accountable for egregious violations of human rights when domestic systems fail to do so.

Creative lawyering goes beyond knowledge of the applicable law to include understanding local culture and customs, understanding the company’s strategy and risk tolerances, being mindful of corporate reputation, gathering relevant prior experience, and being willing to act as the conscience of the company. To address known and unknown risk conditions, companies and their lawyers can look to a number of guiding principles to shape decisions and responses.

This article explores the role of new governance structures that have been utilized to address supply chain–related labor and human rights abuses. More specifically, it examines the utility of multi-stakeholder fora to address such problems. It argues that such multi-stakeholder fora, including multi-stakeholder initiatives, provide a number of advantages when addressing global supply chain–related issues, when compared to traditional command-and-control approaches.

Introduction* Elections are a defining characteristic of democracy, and thus form an integral part of the democratization process.  Over the past decade, electoral systems and processes have become a centerpiece of UN peacekeeping missions and post-conflict democratization projects undertaken by intergovernmental organizations and donor agencies such as World Bank and USAID. The emphasis on elections as an element of UN [...]

Introduction* Over the past few years, I have observed numerous commentators, pundits, and self-appointed experts of nearly every political stripe describe their views on whether or not the U.S. was wise to have “allowed” early elections in Iraq.  Generally the answer to the question tends to lie in the affirmative among defenders of the Bush administration, and in the [...]

Elections are often considered a panacea for conflict-ridden countries. International donors, eager to spread the wings of democracy, frequently assist post-conflict countries only if the recipient countries agree to hold elections immediately following war.

Citizenship is yet again central to contestations about the relations between state and religion. Arguments over the public recognition of cultural difference and especially the degree and type of recognition that ought to be afforded to faiths have risen to the forefront of public debate. Increasingly, these renewed state and religion debates revolve around the regulation of women and the family, placing them at the center of larger debates about citizenship and identity.