State Immunity and Breaches of Human Rights

• Main Author: CHONG, Adeline
• Format: text
• Language: English
• Published: Institutional Knowledge at Singapore Management University 2013
• Subjects: Human Rights Law
• Online Access: https://ink.library.smu.edu.sg/sol_research/1172; https://search.library.smu.edu.sg/discovery/fulldisplay?docid=cdi_openaire_primary_doi_036f34fbdacd503c64577a0ad97b3899&context=PC&vid=65SMU_INST:SMU_NUI&lang=en&search_scope=Everything&adaptor=Primo%20Central&tab=Everything&query=any,contains,Regulatory%20Hybridization%20in%20the%20Transnational%20Sphere
• Institution: Singapore Management University

Phillip Jessup included both public international law and private international law in his definition of transnational law. Jessup thought that transnational law includes “all law which regulates actions or events that transcend national frontiers.”1 Within this umbrella definition of transnational law, one can discern an intertwining of public and private law norms and the blurring of the distinctions between public international law and private international law. This chapter considers an area which brings into sharp relief the interplay between these two areas of law. The focus is on the situation where victims of breaches of fundamental human rights pursue civil claims against the foreign perpetrator states before national courts. The claim would be a private international law claim, usually one sounding in tort. However, in adjudging such a claim, the national court will have to consider public international law principles, most notably, the doctrine of state immunity.