A quiet twilight: Enforced disappearance as an architecture for governance
30 August 2026: International Day of the Victims of Enforced Disappearances Imagine a knock at the door, and a loved one disappears without a trace. For thousands of families around the world, this is not a nightmare, but a lived reality. A tool of terror that manifests itself as a hidden crime, leaving behind a [...]
Human Rights Watch on Thursday criticized Ecuador’s newly enacted adoption law, which took effect on August 14 after lawmakers approved it 118-0, saying that provisions restricting adoption by lesbian, gay and bisexual persons and permitting the loss of parental authority over certain medical decisions involving transgender children violate equality and child-rights protections. The Organic Reform [...]
The Lawyer Used to Explain the Law. Now the Chatbot Answers First.
Law does not exist only in statutes, regulations, and court decisions. Before law reaches courts, it already exists in society through the decisions people make every day. Legal scholars have long recognized this social dimension of law. Law is not experienced only through courts and legal institutions; it is also shaped by how ordinary people [...]
US trade court rules Trump may eliminate tariff exemption for low-cost imports
The US Court of International Trade issued summary judgment in favor of the Trump administration on Thursday in a case brought by a US auto-parts dealer challenging a presidential order that closed a tariff loophole for imports under $800. Plaintiff Detroit Axle sued the administration in May 2025 following numerous executive orders under a declared [...]
UN warns of rising food prices due to climate change and energy price hikes
The United Nations reported on Friday that the cost of key foods increased in July as a result of searing heatwaves and ongoing geopolitical instability, which have affected crop yields and global energy prices amid persistent hunger risks in multiple countries. According to the UN Food and Agriculture Organization (FAO), the Food Price Index (FPI) [...]
In the aftermath of the recent military escalation involving Iran and the United States, questions concerning the future of international law, humanitarian norms, and the credibility of the post-World War II legal order have once again moved to the center of global debate. At a time when governments, legal scholars, and international organizations continue to [...]
Romania dispatch: government avoids international credit rating downgrade
Mihai Coca-Constantinescu, who holds an International and European Law LLB from the University of Groningen and an International Trade and Investment Law LLM from the University of Amsterdam, is a PhD candidate in Transboundary Legal Studies at the University of Groningen, based in the Netherlands, where he covers legal developments in Romania as a JURIST [...]
When a Federal Rule Falls, So Does the Local Law Built on It
Two years ago, Loper Bright Enterprises v. Raimondo removed the interpretive buffer that once indirectly protected municipalities relying on federal agency interpretations. Last week, I argued that municipalities need a pre-adoption risk assessment tool—a way to evaluate regulatory text before it takes effect. But Loper Bright is not the only structural change municipal attorneys need [...]
Weapons that select and engage targets without a human pulling the trigger are no longer hypothetical, and the legal architecture governing who bears responsibility when they kill the wrong person has not caught up. US Department of Defense doctrine defines autonomous weapon systems (AWS) as systems that, “once activated, can select and engage targets without [...]
“The report of my death was an exaggeration.” —Mark Twain Friday, July 17 was the annual World Day for International Criminal Justice, chosen to commemorate the adoption of the Rome Statute of the International Criminal Court (ICC). This year, that commemoration was, at best, overshadowed by US Secretary of State Marco Rubio’s pledge to “dismantle” [...]
