The United States And Inter

Drawing on the case law of the Court, this volume analyses crucial developments over the years on both procedural and substantive issues before the Inter-American Court.

This book, which can be used as a text for teaching purposes, gives a fascinating, and authoritative treatment both the rights protected by the Inter-American system and of the way in which its institutions work. An important part of the book is a thorough, article by article account of the guarantee in the American Declaration of the Rights and Duties of Man and in the American Convention on Human Rights of civil, political, economic, social and cultural rights in the light of the jurisprudence of the Inter-American Commission on Human Rights and the Inter-American Court of Human Rights, and of the Commission's many country reports on the human rights situation in particular states. There are also chapters on the rights of indigenous peoples, amnesty laws and states of emergencies. The evolution and current methods of work of the Commission and the Court are set out at length and their achievements are critically assessed. The role of non-governmental organisations is also examined in this context. The book will be invaluable to all those interested in the protection of human rights in the Americas and international human rights law generally.

Doctrine, Practice and Advocacy in the Inter-American Human Rights System is the first casebook to focus on the Inter-American human rights system, the primary system for advancing and protecting rights in the Western hemisphere. Created by the Organization of American States, the Inter-American Commission on Human Rights and the Inter-American Court of Human Rights are autonomous and independent bodies that make up the Inter-American system. Together, they play a vital role, working closely with victims, civil society, and states to protect fundamental human rights in the Western hemisphere, particularly in Latin America. While the system is relatively unknown in legal academia in the United States and Canada, its study is mandatory in most law schools in the Americas. Government appointees, civil servants, high level actors, private attorneys, judges and legal scholars, and media regularly engage with the system in Latin America, implementing its determinations and applying its rulings and interpretations concerning the human rights of their citizens. Thus critical matters affecting vital rights, such as the peace process in Colombia, disappearances in Mexico, gang violence in the Northern Triangle (El Salvador, Honduras, and Guatemala) or trials for perpetrators of crimes against humanity in Argentina, all directly involve the rulings and actors of the Inter-American system. Increasingly, the Inter-American system has advanced rights protection in the United States and Canada. The statements and determinations of the Inter-American Commission on the detention center at Guantanamo, for example, led to a global consensus opposing the prolonged use of pretrial detention at that site, while the Commission's ruling on the juvenile death penalty was cited by the United States Supreme Court in its holding finding that practice unconstitutional. A report by the Commission on murdered and missing indigenous women in British Columbia led to the creation of a National Commission of Inquiry on the subject by Canada. This book provides analysis on a wide range of practical issues that advocates face when interacting with the Commission or Court and explores current debates on possible reforms of the system. At the same time, it provides materials that consider the political dynamics that empower and constrain the system. Doctrine, Practice and Advocacy in the Inter-American Human Rights System takes as its point of departure a critical look at the real-world successes and failures of the system and human rights advocates in the Americas, including the tensions and trade-offs commonly confronted by activists as they seek to advance human rights.

Fidel Castro described Salvador Allende's democratic election as president of Chile in 1970 as the most important revolutionary triumph in Latin America after the Cuban revolution. Yet celebrations were short lived. In Washington, the Nixon administration vowed to destroy Allende's left-wing government while Chilean opposition forces mobilized against him. The result was a battle for Chile that ended in 1973 with a right-wing military coup and a brutal dictatorship lasting nearly twenty years. Tanya Harmer argues that this battle was part of a dynamic inter-American Cold War struggle to determine Latin America's future, shaped more by the contest between Cuba, Chile, the United States, and Brazil than by a conflict between Moscow and Washington. Drawing on firsthand interviews and recently declassified documents from archives in North America, Europe, and South America--including Chile's Foreign Ministry Archive--Harmer provides the most comprehensive account to date of Cuban involvement in Latin America in the early 1970s, Chilean foreign relations during Allende's presidency, Brazil's support for counterrevolution in the Southern Cone, and the Nixon administration's Latin American policies. The Cold War in the Americas, Harmer reveals, is best understood as a multidimensional struggle, involving peoples and ideas from across the hemisphere.

This book provides a reference guide to the case law of the Inter-American Court of Human Rights. Structured in two parts, it covers the case law on jurisdiction and procedure before the Court and the case law on the scope of particular rights, drawing comparisons with the case law of the European Court of Human Rights.

Of the several regional arrangements that function within the United Nations, the most elaborate in organization and function is the Organization of American States. Although the United Nations holds the primary responsibility for preserving international peace, its charter concedes virtual autonomy to regional arrangements in dealing with matters considered appropriate for regional action. This latitude stimulated a trend toward regionalism which eventually posed the important question of how to preserve legitimate regionalism like Pan-Americanism without impairing the essential overall authority of the United Nations. Following an introductory description of all existing regional arrangements, this comprehensive case study examines every aspect of security cooperation in the Western Hemisphere in the mid-twentieth century: the historical origins and development of the inter-American system; the perfecting of the security structure; and, most important, the functioning of the system under test by controversies among the member nations, and by two world wars, the Korean emergency, and the aggressive threats of international Communism. Particular attention is given to the Cuban situation. This volume was the first to recognize, boldly and imaginatively, the overwhelming influence wielded in the OAS by the powerful and wealthy United States. This elastic association of one Great Power and twenty small states, based on a mutuality of interests and a common devotion to the principles of civilized international behavior, can be said to have reached full maturity in 1948 with the adoption of the OAS charter, which articulated the goals toward which it had been striving for fifty-eight years: sovereign equality, nonintervention, and consultation for the peaceful solution of disputes and for hemisphere defense. Ironically, just when the Good Neighbor Policy and the rise of Hitler seemed to have cemented inter-American relations, breaks in the solidarity began to appear. World War II produced new forces destined to profoundly alter the bases and objectives of inter-American cooperation. The “be good” policy began to change to a “do good” policy, and in diplomatic discussions, economic measures began to eclipse those concerned with peril to the peace and security of the hemisphere.