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Ph.D Candidate, Irish Centre for Human Rights

Government of Ireland Scholar 2009-2012

National University of Ireland Travelling Scholar 2009-2010

LL.M International Human Rights Law (National University of Ireland Galway, 2006)

Bachelor of Business and Law (University College Dublin, 2004)

john.j.reynoldsgmail.com

 

PhD Thesis:

Empire and Emergency: Colonialism, States of Emergency and International Law

 

Supervisor: Dr. Kathleen Cavanaugh

 

The fundamental thrust of the thesis is a critical appraisal of the concept of the state of emergency/exception from the perspective of the Third World Approaches to International Law (TWAIL) school of thought. It takes as its point of departure one of the core tenets of TWAIL: the centrality of colonialism—and colonial legal concepts—to an understanding of both the historical composition and continuing development of international law.

Much has been written in the fields of legal theory and political science about the state of emergency/exception since the initiation of the global ’war against terrorism’. The overwhelming majority of this scholarship has adopted a binary approach to the question of emergency powers, pitting sovereign executive power on one hand against legality/rule of law on the other. A review of the literature quickly reveals a renaissance of interest in the work of Carl Schmitt, invoked typically as a foil to liberal conceptualisations of the rule of law. His framing of sovereignty through the notion of the decision on the exception—namely, the sovereign capacity to suspend law during times of emergency—is quoted ad nauseam. On the basis of sometimes simplistic interpretations of Schmitt’s model, spatial boundaries are drawn whereby sovereign emergency measures must be classed as either inside or outside of the legal order.  An overly narrow focus on the theses of Schmitt and Giorgio Agamben in the emergency/exception discourse results in often circular debates as to whether a given practice or policy is understood as a measure that is judged against and constrained by the principle of legality, or as an act of exceptional executive power that cannot be regulated by a rule of law.

This thesis attempts to move beyond the legality/extra-legal dichotomy in the context of emergencies, and to examine the state of exception as a racialised and imperial component of state sovereignty. This stems from an understanding of sovereignty itself as an historically racially subordinating concept, and a detection of the widespread use of emergency powers in a racially contingent manner, whereby the sovereign classifies its enemy ’other’ and enacts essentially (if no longer explicitly) discriminatory measures on the basis of race. Such powers were integral to the machinery of the European colonial project and its suppression of the native other. They were also often codified and legislated for by colonial authorities with a genuine concern over the ’lawfulness’ of their actions. If it is accepted that colonial legal concepts have underpinned the formation of contemporary norms—domestically and internationally—relating to emergencies and national security, this implies questions that speak not just to the application or relevance of a rule of law, but to the nature of law itself. In a setting framed as one of emergency, to what degree is law inherently constitutive of racialised hegemonic control? How likely is the sovereign decision on the exception to be employed and implemented in a racially subjugating manner? On a more panoramic level, is the paradigm of a racially contingent emergency implicated in the broader (imperial) project of neoliberal globalisation? It is these questions that the thesis wishes to address, using a methodology of theoretical inquiry and critique, with reference to relevant cases in practice.

Publications

[Selected publications available here]

Books

Beyond Occupation: Colonialism, Apartheid & International Law in the Occupied Palestinian Territories (V. Tilley ed., forthcoming: Pluto, 2012) (co-author)

Journal Articles

’The Political Economy of States of Emergency’ (2012) 14(1) Oregon Review of International Law

’Apartheid, International Law, and the occupied Palestinian territory’ (with John Dugard; forthcoming, 2012)

’The Use of Force in a Colonial Present, and the Goldstone Report’s Blind Spot’ (2010) XVI  Palestine Yearbook of International Law 55-77

’The Long Shadow of Colonialism: The Origins of the Doctrine of Emergency in International Human Rights Law’ (2010) 6(5)  Osgoode Comparative Research in Law and Political Economy 1-51

’An Enduring Occupation: The Status of the Gaza Strip from the Perspective of International Humanitarian Law’ (2010) 15(2) Journal of Conflict and Security Law 211-243 (with Shane Darcy)

Book Chapters

’Third World Approaches to International Law and the Ghosts of Apartheid’ in David Keane & Yvonne McDermott (eds.), The Challenge of Human Rights: Past, Present and Future (Cheltenham: Edward Elgar, 2012)

’Palestine, and the Politics of International Criminal Justice’, in William Schabas et al. (eds.), The Ashgate Research Companion to International Criminal Law: Critical Perspectives (Aldershot: Ashgate, 2012) (with Michael Kearney)

Book Reviews

’International Law from Below: Development, Social Movement and Third World Resistance’ (2009) XV Palestine Yearbook of International Law 433-438    

Edited Collections

Symposium Proceedings: Occupation, Colonialism, Apartheid? (Ramallah: Al-Haq, 2009)

Selected Conference Papers

Governmentality and Emergency in the Arab World

Birzeit University / University of Windsor – Beyond Apology and Utopia in the Middle East University of Windsor, 26 November 2011

 

Emergency, Capitalism and the Common Good

Third World Approaches to International Law – Capitalism and the Common Good

University of Oregon, 22 October 2011

 

The State of Exception: The Vanishing Point of Human Rights?

International Studies Association – Global Governance: Political Authority in Transition

Montréal, 16 March 2011

 

Forgotten, but not Forsaken?: The Ghosts of Apartheid in International Law

Irish Centre for Human Rights – Forgotten Rights, Forgotten Concepts

National University of Ireland Galway, 20 November 2010

 

The Colonial Origins of the Doctrine of Emergency in International Law

Toronto Group for the Study of International Law – Disturbing the Minds of States

University of Toronto, 29 January 2010

 

Sovereignty, Colonialism and the 'State' of Palestine under International Law

Human Sciences Research Council – Re-envisioning Israel/Palestine

Cape Town, 13 June 2009

 

Litigating International Human Rights Law in Domestic Courts

Harvard Law School – International Human Rights Series

Harvard University, 27 October 2008

 

The Fog of Occupation: The Local Relevance of International Humanitarian Law

University of Antwerp – The Local Relevance of Human Rights

Antwerp, 18 October 2008

 

Peace and Human Rights: Palestine as a Case Study

University of Antwerp – The Local Relevance of Human Rights

Antwerp, 17 October 2008

           

The Use of Force by the Occupying Power as a “Counter-terrorism” Measure

International Commission of Jurists – Eminent Jurists Panel, Counter-terrorism & Human Rights

Ramallah, 24 August 2007

Online Publications

’ Bertrand Russell’s Legacy’, Jadaliyya, 2 November 2011

’ The Spectre of South Africa’, Jadaliyya, 29 October 2011

’ Palestinian Statehood: To Recognise, or Not To Recognise?’, Politico, 15 September 2011

’ Emergency, Governmentality, and the Arab Spring’, Jadaliyya, 10 August 2011

’ The Trials and Travel Bans of Shawan J.’, Human Rights in Ireland,  24 November 2010

’ Five Years after the ICJ Advisory Opinion on the Wall: Barriers to Enforcement’, Adalah Virtual Roundtable, 9 July 2009

’ Seeking to Uphold Third State Responsibility: The Case of Al-Haq v. UK’ (2009) 41 al-Majdal 12

Photography Books

Human Rights Through the Lens (Galway: Irish Centre for Human Rights, 2010)  

 

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