{"title":"人权过度合法化:国际关系理论和英联邦加勒比地区对人权制度的反弹","authors":"L. Helfer","doi":"10.2307/1123662","DOIUrl":null,"url":null,"abstract":"This article raises the intriguing claim that international law can be overlegalized. Overlegalization occurs where a treaty's substantive rules or its review procedures are too constraining of sovereignty, causing governments to engage in acts of non-compliance or even to denounce the treaty. The concept of legalization and its potential excesses, although unfamiliar to many legal scholars, has begun to be explored by international relations theorists analyzing the effects of legal rules in changing state behavior. This article bridges the gap between international legal scholarship and international relations theory by exploring a recent case study of overlegalization. It seeks to understand why, in the late 1990s, three Commonwealth Caribbean governments denounced human rights treaties and withdrew from the jurisdiction of international tribunals. I refer to these events as the Caribbean backlash against human rights regimes. My study of this backlash has two objectives. The first is to show how overlegalizing human rights can lead even liberal democracies to reconsider their commitment to international institutions that protect those rights. The second objective is to assess three competing international relations theories that seek to explain the conditions under which states comply with their treaty commitments. To provide a more persuasive analysis of these issues, the article includes empirical data analyzing changes in the filing and review of international human rights petitions against Caribbean governments during the 1990s.","PeriodicalId":51408,"journal":{"name":"Columbia Law Review","volume":null,"pages":null},"PeriodicalIF":3.4000,"publicationDate":"2002-05-20","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"https://sci-hub-pdf.com/10.2307/1123662","citationCount":"123","resultStr":"{\"title\":\"OVERLEGALIZING HUMAN RIGHTS: INTERNATIONAL RELATIONS THEORY AND THE COMMONWEALTH CARIBBEAN BACKLASH AGAINST HUMAN RIGHTS REGIMES\",\"authors\":\"L. Helfer\",\"doi\":\"10.2307/1123662\",\"DOIUrl\":null,\"url\":null,\"abstract\":\"This article raises the intriguing claim that international law can be overlegalized. Overlegalization occurs where a treaty's substantive rules or its review procedures are too constraining of sovereignty, causing governments to engage in acts of non-compliance or even to denounce the treaty. The concept of legalization and its potential excesses, although unfamiliar to many legal scholars, has begun to be explored by international relations theorists analyzing the effects of legal rules in changing state behavior. This article bridges the gap between international legal scholarship and international relations theory by exploring a recent case study of overlegalization. It seeks to understand why, in the late 1990s, three Commonwealth Caribbean governments denounced human rights treaties and withdrew from the jurisdiction of international tribunals. I refer to these events as the Caribbean backlash against human rights regimes. My study of this backlash has two objectives. The first is to show how overlegalizing human rights can lead even liberal democracies to reconsider their commitment to international institutions that protect those rights. The second objective is to assess three competing international relations theories that seek to explain the conditions under which states comply with their treaty commitments. To provide a more persuasive analysis of these issues, the article includes empirical data analyzing changes in the filing and review of international human rights petitions against Caribbean governments during the 1990s.\",\"PeriodicalId\":51408,\"journal\":{\"name\":\"Columbia Law Review\",\"volume\":null,\"pages\":null},\"PeriodicalIF\":3.4000,\"publicationDate\":\"2002-05-20\",\"publicationTypes\":\"Journal Article\",\"fieldsOfStudy\":null,\"isOpenAccess\":false,\"openAccessPdf\":\"https://sci-hub-pdf.com/10.2307/1123662\",\"citationCount\":\"123\",\"resultStr\":null,\"platform\":\"Semanticscholar\",\"paperid\":null,\"PeriodicalName\":\"Columbia Law Review\",\"FirstCategoryId\":\"90\",\"ListUrlMain\":\"https://doi.org/10.2307/1123662\",\"RegionNum\":2,\"RegionCategory\":\"社会学\",\"ArticlePicture\":[],\"TitleCN\":null,\"AbstractTextCN\":null,\"PMCID\":null,\"EPubDate\":\"\",\"PubModel\":\"\",\"JCR\":\"Q1\",\"JCRName\":\"LAW\",\"Score\":null,\"Total\":0}","platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":null,"PeriodicalName":"Columbia Law Review","FirstCategoryId":"90","ListUrlMain":"https://doi.org/10.2307/1123662","RegionNum":2,"RegionCategory":"社会学","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":null,"EPubDate":"","PubModel":"","JCR":"Q1","JCRName":"LAW","Score":null,"Total":0}
OVERLEGALIZING HUMAN RIGHTS: INTERNATIONAL RELATIONS THEORY AND THE COMMONWEALTH CARIBBEAN BACKLASH AGAINST HUMAN RIGHTS REGIMES
This article raises the intriguing claim that international law can be overlegalized. Overlegalization occurs where a treaty's substantive rules or its review procedures are too constraining of sovereignty, causing governments to engage in acts of non-compliance or even to denounce the treaty. The concept of legalization and its potential excesses, although unfamiliar to many legal scholars, has begun to be explored by international relations theorists analyzing the effects of legal rules in changing state behavior. This article bridges the gap between international legal scholarship and international relations theory by exploring a recent case study of overlegalization. It seeks to understand why, in the late 1990s, three Commonwealth Caribbean governments denounced human rights treaties and withdrew from the jurisdiction of international tribunals. I refer to these events as the Caribbean backlash against human rights regimes. My study of this backlash has two objectives. The first is to show how overlegalizing human rights can lead even liberal democracies to reconsider their commitment to international institutions that protect those rights. The second objective is to assess three competing international relations theories that seek to explain the conditions under which states comply with their treaty commitments. To provide a more persuasive analysis of these issues, the article includes empirical data analyzing changes in the filing and review of international human rights petitions against Caribbean governments during the 1990s.
期刊介绍:
The Columbia Law Review is one of the world"s leading publications of legal scholarship. Founded in 1901, the Review is an independent nonprofit corporation that produces a law journal edited and published entirely by students at Columbia Law School. It is one of a handful of student-edited law journals in the nation that publish eight issues a year. The Review is the third most widely distributed and cited law review in the country. It receives about 2,000 submissions per year and selects approximately 20-25 manuscripts for publication annually, in addition to student Notes. In 2008, the Review expanded its audience with the launch of Sidebar, an online supplement to the Review.