Wednesday, October 29, 2008

A new Bretton Woods?

As a quick p.s. to my last post, I wanted to flag a post by Julian Ku over at Opinio Juris in which he suggests that we should not expect - as some leaders such as Brown and Sarkozy are suggesting - that the G-2) meeting in Washington on November 15th will lead to a complete restructuring of the world financial system - to a "new Bretton Woods". His view is that the IMF and the WTO have fared rather badly since their inception; that the successes of the WTO cannot be attributed to Bretton Woods; and that, in any event, although "no doubt global cooperation is needed..., new international institutions are a highly doubtful mechanism for such cooperation".

Unfortunately, Ku does not consider the - eminently more likely - possibility of a fairly radical reform of existing institutions, which seems to be more along the lines of what Brown at least is proposing. The Telegraph notes that

It is understood that the Prime Minister wishes to see the IMF reformed to become a "global central bank" closely monitoring the international economy and financial system. There may also be global rules to prevent conflicts of interest and to boost transparency in the financial system.

Just a case of waiting-and-seeing for the time being, then; although it is worth recalling that Brown has received some fairly strong plaudits - notably in the US - for his handling of the financial crisis thus far...


How do we solve the global financial crisis?

With more global administration, according to the leaders of European and Asian States.

The International Monetary Fund (IMF) in particular is at the forefront of these issues, with loan agreements already in place for Iceland and Hungary, and with others requested by States such as Turkey, South Africa and Brazil (according to The Guardian at least; although see here for the suggestion that Brazil has been wrongly included in that group). In a sign of the shifting contours of global economic power, China and Russia have been approached as potential donors to these loan funds.

The central question, however, remains: will we see, in conjunction with this increased scope and reach of global administration, a comparable increase in the - until now sadly lacking - accountability measures? These seem particularly important given the fact that the IMF is sticking to its guns regarding loan conditionality - a fact that some have suggested is dissuading other States in trouble from seeking help there. In Iceland, the consequence of accepting IMF assistance has been a 6% interest rate hike, to 18%; in Hungary, it has been a commitment to introduce austerity measures, and to significantly curtail public spending.

The key thing to realise here is that this is not merely technocratic governance - apolitical decision making based upon the uncontested consensus among experts - but rather highly contested political choices that are being forced upon those States that accept these loans (it has not escaped The Guardian's attention, for example, that the IMF is demanding cuts in public spending while the US and the UK are proposing, at a domestic level, to take precisely the opposite path and attempt to spend their way out of recession). Of course, even ostensibly technocratic governance can fail (I wonder, for example, if the Basel Committee might be tempted to revisit its capital adequacy requirements in the wake of recent events in the world of banking...), raising questions about the accountability for expert error, and, indeed, giving the lie to the suggestion that any governance is ever purely "technocratic". However, when such overtly political questions are in play, the issues of accountability, participation and legitimacy more generally are brought even more dramatically to the fore.

The problem is that the IMF does not seem to have much in the way of administrative law type mechanisms ensuring participation or accountability to anyone other than the dominant (western) States among its membership. The Global Governance Watch website provides one fairly technical example of this, in which the IMF and the World bank have failed to incoporate benchmarks set within the context fo the Extractive Industries Transparency Initiative, which provide global standards for corporations and governments to disclose fully what has been paid and received for the right to extract natural resources. More generally, Aaron Shaw has noted that

The U.S. and Europe still retain a ridiculous share of the voting power within the IMF, World Bank, and the WTO, virtually guaranteeing that they will strong arm through whatever solutions they deem fit. While Ambassadors, Trade Representatives, and their ilk may talk a good game about promoting equality through increased multilateral liberalization, the bottom line is that truly equitable trade will not come about without a substantial sacrifice by the traditional “Great Powers” of the West. The recent trend of the U.S. and E.U. pursuing absurd schemes to evade accountability and transparency by undermining global forums also belies any rhetoric of good will.


It is encouraging to see, then, that with the call for increased global administration, we are also witnessing from many different sources calls for global administrative laws to regulate this. Whether or not these will be sucessful depends in large part on the willingness of major western States to accept some measure of control over their influence and activities within global financial institutions. If they do, it will represent another hugely significant step forward in the emergence of global administrative law; in any event, however, the fact that the debate alone is so prominent is testament to the extent to which the logic of administrative law is being increasingly applied to the institutions of global governance. Further evidence, I suggest, that we are moving towards an measure of GAL as part of a global regulatory "common sense".


Tuesday, October 28, 2008

Viterbo V GAL Seminar: call for papers released

The fifth installment of the extremely successful annual Global Administrative Law Seminars in Viterbo, Italy will held from 12-13 June 2009, and will discuss the issue of Legality Review in the Global Administrative Space. It will be hosted by Professors Stefano Battini, Giulio Vesperini and Edoardo Chiti (IRPA), together with an organizational team led by Martina Conticelli, at the University La Tuscia, Viterbo. A more detailed call for papers and provisional programme have just been released:

In the last fifteen years, the number of mechanisms and proceedings for review of the legality of decisions and norms adopted by global administrative bodies has grown rapidly. Review is exercised by international courts and arbitral tribunals and also by domestic courts. Review may also be exercised by reviewing entities that are a part of the global body making the decision reviewed. Further, other global administrative bodies or domestic administrative authorities may engage in legality review in the course of deciding whether to follow a decision or norm adopted by a global administrative body. Review can extend to both the substantive and procedural elements.

What is the current state of development of such reviewing practices and norms? Do such mechanisms and proceedings result in a coherent and coordinated system of review of global administrations’ action? Or do they generate a fragmented and diverse patchwork, composed of different approaches and standards? To what extent do review procedures depart from the traditional international modes of dispute resolution, basically centred on negotiation? And in what way does their gradual emergence of various forms of review affect the development of global administrative law?

The 5th Viterbo Gal Conference aims at discussing research and studies which, though focussing on specific issues, reviewing bodies or sectors, contribute to academic reflection on the general subject of review of global administrative decisions and the development of global administrative law.

Papers should deal with questions such as, for example, the following. What bodies exercise review? Who has access to such review? How are review mechanisms and proceedings shaped? Which global administrative decisions and measures can be held amenable to review? On which grounds? And what are the effects of the review decision? What remedies and incentives do various reviewing bodies provide? What is the relationship between non judicial and judicial review mechanisms and proceedings? And how do they interact with the review mechanisms and proceedings available at the domestic level?


These events bring together some of the most prominent administrative law scholars in Italy (led by Professor, and Constitutional Court Judge, Sabino Cassese), and a number of others from throughout Europe and the US. I have also always enjoyed the particular format that discussions take, in which papers are presented not by their authors but rather by one discussant per panel, and the authors then have some five minutes to respond. This allows for plenty of time for open discussion, which is, after all, the main benefit of conferences in the first place. Perhaps most important, however, is the focus given to encouraging the contributions of young and upcoming scholars to the emerging field of global administrative law. All of these elements and others combine to make these events, without fail, extremely worthwhile experiences.

Monday, October 20, 2008

IILJ's Global Administrative Law website available in Chinese!

A recent addition to the ongoing attempts to bring new, and in particular developing country, perspectives to the Global Administrative Law project, the project's webpage is now, thanks to the hard work of my colleague here at the IILJ Yunpeng Fan, available in Chinese.

Incidentally, for all those who have been wondering how "global administrative law blog" is translated into Chinese, wonder no more:

全球行政法博客


Spread the word!

Tuesday, October 14, 2008

The NYU Kadi panel discussion in full

What follows is the full and attributed account of the recent panel discussion at NYU on the Kadi judgment, held in the framework of the IILJ’s Hauser Colloquium on Globalization and Legal Theory, 17th September 2008. Involved in the discussions were the following professors and visiting faculty at NYU: Benedict Kingsbury (moderator), Richard Stewart, Thomas Franck, Eric Posner, Mattias Kumm, Robert Keohane, Robert Howse, Sujit Choudhry, David Dyzenhaus and Eyal Benvenisti. There is also an abridged, unattributed version available here, with some additional commentary from myself. For a GAL-related account of the judgment itself, see here; for some comment on the Advocate General's opinion, written prior to the judgment itself, see here and here. For an account of developments in the months after the judgment was handed down, see here.


Thomas Franck opened discussions with the observation that the Kadi judgment represented what he referred to as the “Texasization” of the European Union in its relations to the international law. This was in reference to the judgment of the US Supreme Court in Medellin v. Texas, in which it held that international treaty commitments entered into by the US Government (in this case, the Vienna Convention on Consular Relations) could not override the applicable criminal law standards of the State of Texas unless Congress had specifically legislated to that effect. Franck suggested that, in effectively granting national constitutional law precedence over international obligations, the ECJ had effectively mirrored the decision of the US Supreme Court in this regard.

He noted, however, that the ECJ in Kadi had created for itself a considerable amount of room for maneuver in striking down the Regulation implementing the Security Council’s Resolution. Firstly, in terms of timing: rather than annulling the Regulation with immediate effect, the Court allowed it to continue in effect for a brief period – not exceeding three months from the date of the judgment – in order to allow the Council to remedy the infringements of fundamental rights that the Court had found. Secondly, Franck noted that the Court explicitly mooted the possibility that any mechanisms created by the Security Council in order to increase the rights protection of those listed by its Sanctions Committee could in future result in it adopting a more deferential attitude towards Security Council Resolutions.

Franck stressed the importance of protecting the Security Council’s role in combating international terrorism, and the need for a coherent and universally binding approach to the issue of freezing the funds of those suspected of financing terrorism. He noted also the need for secrecy in such a process: funds can be moved or hidden with relative ease should advanced warning be given of any plans to freeze them; and the standard security concerns over making public evidence and sources also apply in this context. It is necessary, then, that a balance be struck between these considerations and the protection of individual rights; a balance that, in Franck’s view, the Security Council has not managed to achieve satisfactorily to date.

Franck concluded his comments with a proposal for improving the Security Council procedures, noting that it was being seriously considered by US officials. His proposal focuses on the idea of establishing “probable cause” for freezing funds, rather than “proof” that they will be used to finance terrorism, stressing in doing so that, firstly, the measures taken by the Security Council are temporary, not permanent; and secondly, that they involve merely a freezing of funds and not an expropriation, so that title to the property stays with the suspected individual. Franck suggested that the country seeking the listing of an individual or organization should give the name of perhaps 6 individuals, prominent legal scholars who do not work for the government in question and have not done so for a significant period of time, who would be cleared to see all of the evidence against the suspected individual, and could then give an opinion to the Sanctions Committee as to whether probable cause existed.

Although acknowledging that this, even if instituted, may not “pass muster” in a subsequent review by the ECJ, Franck felt that this kind of independent review might encourage the Court to be more deferential to the obligations imposed on Members by Security Council regulations in this field. In this regard, Franck noted that ordinarily, where one legitimate system has established the existence of probable cause, others will normally recognize that judgment without the need for further investigation – as happens as a matter of course in, for example, extradition proceedings. In his view, it would not be appropriate to establish another standing international court at the UN level to deal with this issue: there are too many of these already; this issue would not generate the workload necessary to justify a standing body; and in any event, it would be preferable to have different investigators used in each case, not a single group of judges.

Eric Posner began his comments by drawing attention to para. 285 of the judgment, according to which “the obligations imposed by an international agreement cannot have the effect of prejudicing the constitutional principles of the EC Treaty, which include the principle that all Community acts must respect fundamental rights, that respect constituting a condition of their lawfulness which it is for the Court to review in the framework of the complete system of legal remedies established by the Treaty”.

This, Posner suggested, was an extremely strong statement on behalf of the ECJ, and not one that it was compelled to take. In effect, the Court held that the constitutional principles of the European legal order will take precedence not only over international law, but over the UN Charter itself. As a result, Posner argued that what we have witnessed with the Kadi judgment is further evidence of the maturing of the European State.

Historically, States have been created through war and violence. Even if neither is present in this case, it might be observed that the birth of states nonetheless always violates international law. This, Posner suggested, could perhaps be explained as a matter of political psychology: that the new State feels the need to reassure its own people that they are its first priority, and that their values will be defended in the face of conflicts with any other legal orders, including the international one.

Posner suggested 4 different implications that the Kadi decision may have:

1) There was a real risk that it would weaken international law, undermining its coherence and favouring instead increased fragmentation, particularly as this decision may well encourage other national courts to adopt a similar stance. However, he also acknowledged that it may have the opposite effect: if the EU is indeed emerging and beginning to act as a single, powerful state, then its traditionally strong support for international law could ultimately lead to a strengthening of the system. Lastly, he noted that the ECJ had sent a clear message to France and Britain that they cannot expect their positions as permanent members of the Security Council to lead to any special treatment.
2) The judgment also raised significant questions over the issue of European constitutionalism. Given that recent attempts to bring an actual “European Constitution” into force have been rejected by the publics of a number of different EU Member States, it is perhaps surprising to see the ECJ rely so heavily on the idea of “constitutional principles” of the European legal order in this judgment. Although this is by no means a new tactic by the Court, the question remains of whether recalcitrant European publics will accept this judicial advancement of the European constitution, when the political route has been blocked.
3) There is a risk that the judgment might undermine the putative universality of human rights law, as the ECJ relies only upon the European human rights regime.
4) Lastly, there is a sense in which the European criticism of the US Supreme Court, and its frequent refusals to consider international law as a factor in its judgments, now rings hollow. Echoing Franck, Posner suggests that the ECJ has simply reaffirmed the US Supreme Court’s view that national constitutional standards take precedence over international law.

Mattias Kumm noted that there is always a temptation in analyzing judgments such as Kadi to place them into one of two categories: either as representative of a monist order, in which international law stands superior to any conflicting national laws; or as supporting a more traditional, dualist position, in which domestic courts apply domestic laws even where these conflict with international commitments.

The Kadi decision, Kumm argued, does not fit into either model. It clearly is not monist; neither, however, does it adopt a traditionally dualist attitude in its interaction with international law. Rather, it adopted an approach that has been central to the European integration project more generally – an approach that respects the principles of European law, but also recognizes and interacts with the wider context in which these are situated in a complex and jurisdictionally sensitive manner. The ECJ both referred to and acknowledged the special role of the Security Council in maintaining international peace and security and gave EU institutions some time to fix the problem without in the meantime undermining the effectiveness of the sanctions. It did not simply ignore the Council, but rather sought to engage in dialogue with it. In this way, it represents a third way of interacting with international law that can be reduced neither to monist or dualist categories.

In deciding in this way the ECJ has ensured that Member States cannot use Community institutions to circumvent national constitutional protections: in many Member States, national constitutional courts may well have struck down implementing legislation if it were introduced domestically – but, generally, actions of Community institutions are not subject to judicial review by national constitutional courts. Furthermore the ECJ protected its authority against possible challenges by national constitutional courts: a different decision by the ECJ may have led some of these national courts – such as, for example, the German Constitutional Court – to challenge the authority of the ECJ by refusing to recognize the ECJ's position as a final arbiter on individual rights. Furthermore the decision takes away the option of Member States to enforce the Sanctions through national rather than EU legislation by insisting that that EU standards regarding human rights would also apply to national implementation measures. In this way the ECJ ensured that the EU would remain the relevant institution to address the implementation of UN Sanctions.

Finally, Kumm observed that, as it currently operates, the UN listing procedure effectively enables the executive branches of government to act in a thoroughly authoritarian manner. The impact upon the human rights of those listed is extremely significant, and would never be countenanced in the context of a democratic state. It is, he said, in a real sense Kafkaesque – an individual can wake up one morning to find that he has no way of accessing any of his funds, but with no idea of what he is suspected of doing, of the evidence against him, or of any meaningful action he can take to remedy the situation.

Robert Keohane introduced a political science perspective to the discussion, noting that sometimes one of the most important consequences of a court decision is to open up a political process that had previously become frozen. There had been little opposition to the US in the Security Council and the Sanctions Committee given its position of dominance – there were few that could challenge it politically and force it to accept procedural guarantees for individuals in the listing procedure. However, this judgment – and the possibility that it will act as a catalyst for similar judgments in other national courts throughout the world – may well have the effect of unblocking the process.

Richard Stewart then suggested that the ECJ could have followed an alternative path to its result, using principles of clear statement used by the US Supreme Court in dealing with congressional statutes delegating very broad discretion to the executive, which exercised the discretion, e.g. to deny passports to asserted Communist sympathizers or denying them security clearances without a hearing, in ways that infringed basic liberty interests. Rather than ruling these actions unconstitutional, the Court found that they had not been authorized by the statutes in question. It stated that notwithstanding their apparent breadth, they should be construed narrowly where basic rights are at risk, thus “remanding” the matter to Congress if it chose to enact more specific legislation. In Kadi, the Security Council resolution was broad in terms but did not specifically prohibit states from providing due process hearing rights to those listed. The ECJ might thus have applied clear statement principles to conclude that those rights were not excluded, effectively requiring the Security Council to address the issue explicitly, perhaps generating a modified resolution that explicitly provides for a measure of procedural protections for listed individuals, while reserving the opportunity to address the “constitutional” relation between Security Council resolutions and Community law on a later occasion if required.

Robert Howse, picking up on Stewart’s suggestion, argued that a careful reading of the Kadi judgment suggests that the ECJ is hinting that there may be a hermeneutic solution to the problem. He cites, for example, para. 296 of the judgment, in which the Court states that “…the Community is to take due account of the terms and objectives of the resolution concerned and of the relevant obligations under the Charter of the United Nations” in relation to measures taken to implement Security Council Resolutions. It is thus open for the Community institutions, interpreting human rights protection as forming part of the goals of the UN and thus of any action taken by the Security Council, to assume that any implementing legislation must not violate those rights. Thus, para. 296 opens up the possibility for the EU to interpret the Security Council’s intentions as being to act in accordance with human rights, forcing the Council into explicitly stating the contrary should it so desire. The judgment contains no actual statement from the ECJ that the Security Council has obliged States to act in a manner that violates human or fundamental rights.

Sujit Choudhry noted that, notwithstanding the ECJ’s statement that it would not review the legality of Security Council resolutions under international law, it proceeded to offer an interpretation of Chapter VII in para. 298 of the judgment, as it states that “[i]t must however be noted that the Charter of the United Nations does not impose the choice of a particular model for the implementation of resolutions adopted by the Security Council under Chapter VII of the Charter, since they are to be given effect in accordance with the procedure applicable in that respect in the domestic legal order of each Member of the United Nations”. Although the ECJ did not explicitly say so, the requirements of a “domestic legal order” would include constitutional guarantees of human rights, such as those found in the EU. There are two ways to read para. 298. First, it may establish a clear statement rule, as Howse suggested. This approach to confining the scope of the Security Council’s powers under Chapter VII arguably underlies the recent decision of the UK House of Lords in the Al Jedda Case, in which it had found that a Security Council authorization to UK and US forces in Iraq to detain suspects without trial “where necessary for imperative reasons of security” did not entirely override Article 5(1) of the European Convention on Human Rights (on the right to liberty and protection against arbitrary detention), but rather merely modified or qualified its application (see para. 39 of that judgment: “the UK may lawfully, where it is necessary for imperative reasons of security, exercise the power to detain authorised by UNSCR 1546 and successive resolutions, but must ensure that the detainee's rights under article 5 are not infringed to any greater extent than is inherent in such detention”).

Second, Choudhry also suggested that para. 298 may even be read in such a manner as to imply a doctrine of ultra vires applicable to the Security Council – i.e. that its powers are bounded by the human rights obligations that form part of the object and purposes of the United Nations. Benedict Kingsbury challenged this proposition, however, noting that it the Court seemed to have gone out of its way to avoid saying anything that could be construed in this manner, refusing even to consider the question, as the Court of First Instance had done, of whether the actions of Security Council could themselves be reviewed (as opposed to actions of Community institutions implementing them) for potential violations of jus cogens obligations.

David Dyzenhaus read the following passage from an early English case, Cooper v. The Board of Works for the Wandsworth District (1893), in which the Court referred to “…a long course of decisions, beginning with Dr. Bentley's case, and ending with some very recent cases, [which] establish that, although there are no positive words in a statute requiring that the party shall be heard, yet the justice of the common law will supply the omission of the legislature. The judgment of Mr. Justice Fortescue, in Dr. Bentley's case, is somewhat quaint, but it is very applicable, and has been the law from that time to the present. He says, ‘The objection for want of notice can never be got over. The laws of God and man both give the party an opportunity to make his defence, if he has any. I remember to have heard it observed by a learned man, upon such an occasion, that even God himself did not pass sentence upon Adam before he was called upon to make his defence. ‘Adam’ (says God), ‘where art thou? Hast thou not eaten of the tree whereof I commanded thee that thou shouldest not eat?’”. Again, then, this seemed to provide further support for the idea, already suggested by a number of commentators, that an intention to grant a hearing to the accused should be attributed to any legislator, unless the latter explicitly states to the contrary.

Eyal Benvenisti, referring to the likelihood that the Kadi judgment would lead to the creation of some kind of hearings and review mechanism within the Sanctions Committee, argued that what we are witnessing is not (or not only) the birth of the European State, but also the Europeanization of the UN system. In further support of this, he referred to Advocate General Maduro’s suggestion, in his Opinion in the Kadi case and which displayed, in some respects at least, the same logic as that relied on by the Court, that all Member States are compelled, in all of their activities, to act in accordance with the basic principles of European law. “As Members of the United Nations, the Member States, and particularly – in the context of the present case – those belonging to the Security Council, have to act in such a way as to prevent, as far as possible, the adoption of decisions by organs of the United Nations that are liable to enter into conflict with the core principles of the Community legal order. The Member States themselves, therefore, carry a responsibility to minimise the risk of conflicts between the Community legal order and international law” (see para. 32 of the Opinion). This could, if it is an accurate reflection of EU law, have huge implications for the future direction of the UN. Benedict Kingsbury, however, noted that the ECJ itself had remained completely silent on this question.

Thursday, October 9, 2008

Calls for increased accountability in development aid

The Accra High-Level Forum on Aid Effectiveness concluded, on September 4th of this year, with the adoption of the Accra Agenda for Action. This document seeks to build on the Paris Declaration on Aid Effectiveness of 2005, in which it was agreed, inter alia, that 1) developing countries should have "ownership" over their own developmental processes; and 2) that both donor and developing countries should be more accountable - to each other and to their constituent publics - for the results of development aid. The three key elements of the new Agenda for Action are as follows:

Country ownership is key. Developing country governments will take stronger leadership of their own development policies, and will engage with their parliaments and citizens in shaping those policies. Donors will support them by respecting countries’ priorities, investing in their human resources and institutions, making greater use of their systems to deliver aid, and increasing the predictability of aid flows.

Building more effective and inclusive partnerships. In recent years, more development actors—middle-income countries, global funds, the private sector, civil society organisations—have been increasing their contributions and bringing valuable experience to the table. This also creates management and co-ordination challenges. Together, all development actors will work in more inclusive partnerships so that all our efforts have greater impact on reducing poverty.

Achieving development results—and openly accounting for them—must be at the heart of all we do. More than ever, citizens and taxpayers of all countries expect to see the tangible results of development efforts. We will demonstrate that our actions translate into positive impacts on people’s lives. We will be accountable to each other and to our respective parliaments and governing bodies for these outcomes.


The Agenda for Action is interesting, form a GAL-perspective, for a number of reasons. Firstly, it stresses that developing countries must take control of their own development, and that donors must respect the developmental priorities of those to whom aid is given. This seems to operate against certain trends that some authors have noted, in which donor states and multilateral institutions - and notably the World Bank - seek, for fear of mismanagement of funds or corruption, to bypass the national level almost entirely, and focus on funding local initiatives with local accountability structures (see my recent post on UNESCO's international coalition of "Cities Against Racism" for another example of this trend).

Secondly, the issue of participation is addressed, with all developmental actors - including NGOs and other civil society actors involved in the field - invited into the fold. As the Global Governance Watch website suggests, however, this is not only an attempt to improve development aid by drawing on the expertise of civil society actors, but also to ensure that these actors - and in particular major aid-delivering or funding NGOs - are included within the group to whom mutual accountability is owed.

Lastly, the issue of accountability is addressed directly, and in a fairly naunced manner. As a number of commentators have noted, the problem in development aid, and in global governance more generally, is not simply a lack of accountability; often, there are plenty of strong accountability mechanisms, but these guarantee only that the interests of particular, powerful actors are represented. Tha Agenda for Action confronts this issue, recognising that "greater transparency and accountability for the use of development resources - domestic as well as external - are powerful drivers of progress", and that such accountability must be to both donor countries and domestic publics:

We will make aid more transparent. Developing countries will facilitate parliamentary oversight by implementing greater transparency in public financial management, including public disclosure of revenues, budgets, expenditures, procurement and audits. Donors will publicly disclose regular, detailed and timely information on volume, allocation and, when available, results of development expenditure to enable more accurate budget, accounting and audit by developing countries.

We will step up our efforts to ensure that—as agreed in the Paris Declaration—mutual assessment reviews are in place by 2010 in all countries that have endorsed the Declaration. These reviews will be based on country results reporting and information systems complemented with available donor data and credible independent evidence. They will draw on emerging good practice with stronger parliamentary scrutiny and citizen engagement. With them we will hold each other accountable for mutually agreed results in keeping with country development and aid policies.

To complement mutual assessment reviews at country level and drive better performance, developing countries and donors will jointly review and strengthen existing international accountability mechanisms, including peer review with participation of developing countries. We will review proposals for strengthening the mechanisms by end 2009.

Effective and efficient use of development financing requires both donors and partner countries to do their utmost to fight corruption. Donors and developing countries will respect the principles to which they have agreed, including those under the UN Convention against Corruption. Developing countries will address corruption by improving systems of investigation, legal redress, accountability and transparency in the use of public funds. Donors will take steps in their own countries to combat corruption by individuals or corporations and to track, freeze, and recover illegally acquired assets.


Of course, there is nothing massively new here, and certainly nothing legally binding. However, the points outlined above do present an interesting account of the way global administrative law concerns (participation, transparency, accountability) are being calibrated in the field of development aid governance; and, perhaps more importantly, that something we might call an "administrative law sensibility" - in which the importance of these mechanisms within global governance is beginning to form part of a global common sense on this issue - is genuinely starting to emerge.

Papers from the Viterbo IV GAL Seminar now available online

Just a quick post to note that almost all of the papers from the Viterbo IV GAL Seminar are now available online, on the websites of both the IILJ and IRPA. The seminar focused on the topic of "Global Administrative Law: from fragmentation to unity?", and had 14 different papers, of which the following 12 are now available:

Supra-national Governance And The WTO: A Model For The Anti-Corruption Movement?
Padideh Ala’i

Global Judicial Review: A Remedy Against Fragmentation?
Mariangela Benedetti

Between Fragmentation and Unity, GAL Should Focus On Efficiency- The Arguments For An Effective Environmental Protection
Rafaël Chetrit

A Common GAL: The Legitimating Role Of The Global Rule Of Law
Georgios Dimitropoulos

Transparency As A Global Goal: Towards An Unity Of Principles In Global Administrative Law
Carlos Iván Fuentes

‘Info-courts’ and the Accountability of International Organizations: Evidence from the World Bank Inspection Panel
Thomas N. Hale

Global Administrative Law in Domestic Courts. Why and How to hold Global Administrative Bodies accountable
Andrej Lang

The "Emergence" Of Global Administrative Law?
Euan MacDonald

The WTO Dispute Settlement System: Administration, Court or Tertium Genus?
Barbara Marchetti

Investment Treaties: Instruments Of Bilateralism Or Elements Of An Evolving Multilateral System?
Stephan Schill

The Arctic gold rush is juridical - The Procedure Of The Extension Of The Russian Federation’s Continental Shelf Analysed Through Global Administrative Law
Rui Tavares Lanceiro

The Judicial System of Mercosur: Is there Administrative Justice?
Mario Viola de Azevedo Cunha

The next of the annual Viterbo seminars will take place on the 12-13th of June, 2009, and will focus on issues relating to the review of global administrative action (by global courts, compliance committees, inspection panels, etc.).