The Human Rights Act 1998 is criticised for providing a weak protection of human rights. The principle of parliamentary legislative supremacy prevents entrenchment, meaning that courts cannot overturn legislation passed after the Act that contradicts Convention rights. This book investigates this assumption, arguing that the principle of parliamentary legislative supremacy is sufficiently flexible to enable a stronger protection of human rights, which can replicate the effect of entrenchment. Nevertheless, it is argued that the current protection should not be strengthened. If correctly interpreted, the Human Rights Act can facilitate democratic dialogue that enables courts to perform their proper correcting function to protect rights from abuse, whilst enabling the legislature to authoritatively determine contestable issues surrounding the extent to which human rights should be protected alongside other rights, interests and goals of a particular society. This understanding of the Human Rights Act also provides a different justification for the preservation of Dicey's conception of parliamentary sovereignty in the UK Constitution.

The International Court of Justice is the principal judicial organ of the United Nations and plays a central role in both the peaceful settlement of international disputes and the development of international law. This comprehensive Commentary on the Statute of the International Court of Justice, now in its second edition, analyses in detail not only the Statute of the Court itself but also the related provisions of the United Nations Charter as well as the relevant provisions of the Court's Rules of Procedure. Five years after the first edition was published, the second edition of the Commentary embraces current events before the International Court of Justice as well as before other courts and tribunals relevant for the interpretation and application of its Statute. The Commentary provides a comprehensive overview and analysis of all legal questions and issues the Court has had to address in the past and will have to address in the future. It illuminates the central issues of procedure and substance that the Court and counsel appearing before it face in their day-to-day work. In addition to commentary covering all of the articles of the Statute of the ICJ, plus the relevant articles of the Charter of the United Nations, the book includes three scene-setting chapters: Historical Introduction, General Principles of Procedural Law, and Discontinuation and Withdrawal. The second edition of the Commentary adds two important and instructive chapters on Counter-Claims and Evidentiary Issues. The combination of expert editors and commentators, and their assessment of new developments in the important work of the ICJ, make this a landmark publication in the field of international law.

New and Updated Edition Who owns Scotland? How did they get it? What happened to all the common land in Scotland? Has the Scottish Parliament made any difference? Can we get our common good land back? In this book, Andy Wightman updates the statistics of landownership in Scotland and explores how and why landowners got their hands on the millions of acres of land that were once held in common. He tells the untold story of how Scotland's legal establishment and politicians managed to appropriate land through legal fixes. Have attempts to redistribute this power more equitably made any difference, and what are the full implications of the recent debt-fuelled housing bubble, the Smith Commission and the new Scottish Government's proposals on land reform? For all those with an interest in urban and rural land in Scotland, this updated edition of The Poor Had No Lawyers provides a fascinating analysis of one the most important political questions in Scotland.

Introduces students to legalistic, theoretical, empirical, comparative and cross-disciplinary research methods, grounded in working examplesNew for this editionNew chapter on inter- and cross-disciplinary research essential reading for international students and students with a non-law first degree undertaking research in the areas of law, criminology, psychology and sociologyResearch ethics has been expanded to a full chapter that includes current plagiarism and imperfect disclosureBrings existing chapters up to date with the newest thinking in legal researchDrawing on actual research projects, Research Methods for Law discusses how legal research as process impacts on research as product. The author team has a broad range of teaching and research experience in law, criminal justice and socio-legal studies, and give examples from real-life research products to illustrate the theory.

In this important book, Elspeth Reid presents an integrated treatment of the law of Delict in Scotland. Alongside its focus upon the Scots sources, where appropriate it also gives full consideration to case law and commentary from other jurisdictions, especially England and Wales.