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Begin New Search Topic Religion Political Geography Italy Content Type Journal Article

1. Faith, Ritual and Rebellion in 21st Century (Positivist) International Law

Author:
Mónica García-Salmones Rovira
Publication Date:
04-2015
Content Type:
Journal Article
Abstract:
In this review of three works (Jörg Kammerhofer’s Uncertainty in International Law: A Kelsenian Perspective; Jean d’Aspremont’s Formalism and the Sources of International Law: A Theory of the Ascertainment of Legal Rules ; and International Legal Positivism in a Post-Modern World, a collection of essays edited by Kammerhofer and d'Aspremont), Mónica García-Salmones Rovira argues that: Theological statements about morality and law to the effect that they ought to be autonomous or that they ought to coincide defy reality, history and common sense and suffer from intellectual inconsistency. On the contrary, from our long legal history appear at least two clear facts about the relationship between morality and law. First, they both conflate in the same acting individual. Second, in the legal sphere, the individual always acts in communication with other individuals. Whether one aims at investigating the normative principles of the first fact, of what makes a good lawyer, or of the second, of what makes good law and the related issue of responsibility, we are always thinking in terms of practical action. Probably, it is in that practical province where international law has its greater emancipatory potential in a post-modern world.
Topic:
Human Rights, International Law, Religion, and Legal Theory
Political Geography:
Europe and Italy

2. The International Legal Status of the Vatican/Holy See Complex

Author:
John R. Morss
Publication Date:
10-2015
Content Type:
Journal Article
Abstract:
This article offers a re-examination of the international legal status of what is here termed the Vatican/Holy See complex (VHS), focusing on claims to statehood. The problematic ‘effect’ of Vatican City, of the Holy See, of the papacy and of associated entities is interrogated at the level of international law, entering as little as possible into administrative or theological distinctions. The various grounds cited as supporting status amounting to statehood are argued to be inadequate. The continuing exchange of representatives with states by the VHS is missionary and hierarchical in character and is reflective neither of the reciprocity of peers nor of customary obligation going to law. Agreements entered into by the papacy with the Kingdom of Italy (the Lateran Pacts) in 1929, relating to the status of the geographical territory known as Vatican City, cannot be determinative of international status. Nor can membership of international agreements and organizations confer a status amounting to statehood. Events and practices since 1929 have not substantially altered international status as of 1870. The Roman Catholic Church is but one of many faith-based international movements, and since the eclipse of the papal state nearly one-and-a-half centuries ago, the status in international law of its temporal headquarters in Rome should not be privileged.
Topic:
International Law, Religion, Sovereignty, and History
Political Geography:
Europe, Italy, and Vatican city