*** LISA ANTEBY-YEMENI, VIRGINIE BABY-COLLIN, SYLVIE MAZZELLA, STEPHANE MOURLANE, CEDRIC PARIZOT, CELINE REGNARD, PIERRE SINTES (Eds.): Borders, Mobilities and Migrations. Perspectives from the Mediterranean, 19-21st Century. Presses Interuniversitaires Européennes / Peter Lang (1 av. Maurice, B-1050 Brussels. Tel: (41-32) 3761717 - Fax: 3761727 - Email: info@peterlang.com - http://www.peterlang.com ). Regional Integration and Social Cohesion series, No. 13. 2014, 310 pp, €46. ISBN 978-2-87574-123-3.
We are living through a time when state borders have never been so permeable and people have never before been so happy to sing the praises of mobility. This reality is essentially for Westerners, however, and particularly European Union citizens, who are urged to take advantage of the benefits of free circulation - some would correct this by saying that this only applies if they have the means to meet their needs. But paradoxically, other people, or more precisely 'the Other,' has never found it so difficult to cross the border into the countries of Europe, and people born on the 'wrong side' of the Mediterranean - or much further afield - now have to submit to ever tighter controls. Controls that, for the illegal immigrant who manages to wriggle past controls at the physical border or in a transit country, pursue him like a sword of Damocles at the centre of big European cities, forcing him to adopt a range of strategies in his role of “'illegal', 'without papers', asylum seeker', clandestine worker', visa holdes, 'legal' or legitimate” - in order to be able to remain in “El Dorado.” The fifteen essays in this book are by historians, geographers, sociologists and anthropologists from a research programme at the Maison Méditerranéenne des Sciences de l'Homme in Aix-en-Provence in France. They explain both the profound transformation of borders and border controls that has been seen since the end of the nineteenth century against the backdrop of the Mediterranean, and also “the nature of reactions, transgressions, re-appropriations and innovations used by migrants, societies and the economic opportunities that they generate.”
In the first part of the book, the writers cast a scientific eye over how we went from the development of nation states from 1880 to 1930, to a free circulation system and then on to a system of permanent controls at national borders, before the establishment of the Area of Freedom, Security and Justice in the mid-1990s saw the rise of new forms of political controls negotiated and externalised in the EuroMediterranean region, with the borders between Greece and Turkey and with North Africa being studied in particular to observe the growing mistrust of immigrants and asylum-seekers, who are increasingly hounded and criminalised. This closing of the borders leads to changes in the behaviour of mobile communities at those borders, which is examined in the second part of the book. “Systems of constraints imposed on a border and mobile population always create new opportunities for smugglers of people and goods, producers of false papers, recruitment agencies specializing in foreign workers, etc,” usefully explains anthropologist Cédric Parizot, pointing out that “these actors contribute to the emergence of a complex social economy,” that the authorities have to work around if they wish to not totally lose control of it, as revealed in four contributions on Lampedusa, the Lebanon and the border between Israel and Palestine.
In the third section of the book, other authors examine the places where illegals eek out a living, in order to shed light on “the tactics and strategies used to overcome the many legal, symbolic and moral frontiers they face in everyday life and the ways in which they contribute to the reconstruction of identity and society and the production of 'illegality'.” What we are dealing with here is the 'production of 'illegality'” by the public authorities (with the complicity of the press) and this is a factor that leads 'illegals' to develop systems and a geography of invisibility to avoid arrest and deportation. On the other hand, only looking at their problems from the humanitarian viewpoint is no solution either, because some even consider how they can get infected with AIDS in order to be allowed to remain in Europe… These portrayals confirm the huge complexity of a migratory issue that calls for reflection rather than populist anathemas, and this is confirmed again in the final part of the book that looks at the role of memory among immigrants.
Michel Theys
*** PAUL LEES, STEPHANIE COUDERC-MORANDEAU, PILAR MARTÍNEZ-VASSEUR, SYLVIE NAIL, ANNIE THIEC (Eds.): Migrations et mobilités en Europe. Politiques publiques et perspectives d'intégration. Peter Lang (1 Moosstrasse, Postfach 350, CH-2542 Pieterlen, Switzerland. Tel: (41-32) 3761717 - Fax: 3761727 - Email: info@peterlang.com - Internet: http://www.peterlang.com ). "Dynamiques citoyennes en Europe" series, No. 5. 2014, 310 pp, €81.10. ISBN 978-3-0343-1523-4.
This book arises from a multidisciplinary research programme on the question of citizenship and identity within the European area and sees experts examine how migration and mobility pan out at supranational, national and regional level. At supranational level, it shows that free circulation is subject to various contingencies depending on a country's political backdrop and it often even gets challenged. There is also a tension between the real rights allowed under European citizenship and the relative indifference from member states and citizens, a combination that tends to lead to immigrants being excluded from the rights of citizenship and even to a fossilisation of the categories of citizenship and sovereignty. The third part of the book looks at how policies relating to immigrants are implemented, casting a critical eye over the situation in Spain (where immigrants remain an object, rather than a subject, of law and illegal immigrants' rights to healthcare have been reduced to such an extent that its runs counter to fundamental rights), France (where civil assimilation prevails that reveals itself to be assimilationist) and the United Kingdom (where nationalist talk of common values is being resuscitated in a context of multiculturalism no longer being in political favoùr, mistrust of the Other even being felt in the domain of botany…). Finally, some good news (as far as the European viewpoint is concerned) comes from the regional section of the book which travels from Scotland to Catalonia, France and England, and which Anne-Sophie Lamblin-Gourdin (of Nantes University in France) says tends to demonstrate that it is perhaps at regional and local levels more than elsewhere that one can observe “ownership of the European dimension,” which makes study of the still rather embryonic legal status of authorities at local and regional level in European law a pressing concern, and even leads to thinking of Europe as a kind of federation of local identities.
(MT)
*** EVA-MARIA POPTCHEVA: Multilevel Citizenship. The Right to Consular Protection of EU Citizens Abroad. Presses Interuniversitaires Européennes / Peter Lang (see above). 2014, 286 pp, €46. ISBN 978-2-87574-168-4.
This book follows on from a doctoral thesis for the autonomous University of Barcelona (after the Bulgarian author gained a German law degree from the Albert-Ludwigs-University in Freiburg), and very usefully explains one of the rights conferred by European citizenship that has been recognised for citizens of the EU member states since the Maastricht Treaty came into force. The book is, in the view of constitutional law professor Teresa Freixes who guided this fine research, “the first monograph offering a dogmatically founded analysis of the configuration elements of the rights to consular protection.” Some countries may not be happy about the way the book provides scientific proof that these rights are in fact fundamental. Some won't be happy with this because Eva-Maria Poptcheva highlights in her work the reluctance to recognise the right to consular protection for EU citizens whose home country is not represented in a foreign country. “Several governments seem to still see Union citizenship mainly as a free-movement concept and deny the integrative power of other civic and political rights” conferred by EU citizenship, explains the author, strongly criticising the way “many political actors” simply view it as a trinket to be waved about from time to time to “capture citizens' votes and support.” The book tends on the contrary to persuade them that “the complex legal framework of the right to consular protection is a prime example of multilevel constitutionalism” within the EU, however uncomfortable this might be for Eurosceptic populists of all types. This European lawyer is determined not to give way to them without a fight using the weapons of scientific rigour.
(MT)
*** MANYA MANDERY: Party autonomy in contractual and non-contractual obligations. A European and Anglo-common perspectives on the freedom of choice of law in the Rome II regulation on the law applicable to non-contractual obligations. Peter Lang (see above). “Studien zum vergleichenden und internationale recht-comparative and international law studies,” series, No. 189. 2014, 310 pp, €64.95. ISBN 978-3-631-65321-0.
This book provides an in-depth study of the autonomy of parties (and thereforre the free will of those due to be tried in court) as laid down in the European regulations known as Rome I and Rome II. Under autonomy of the parties, the parties must have the option of choosing the law that shall apply to any dispute in which the parties may find themselves. It is one of the directing principles of contemporary conflict theories and the foundation of the intersection between international trade and private law because deciding on the law that shall apply in the event of a cross-border dispute is one of the key questions that courts have to consider. A doctor of law currently lecturing at Auckland University in New Zealand, Maya Mandery has opted for an integrated method of analysis in which she firstly compares the principle of party autonomy as laid down in the first two EU regulations with the measures that previously prevailed in Germany and England. She then makes a critical consideration of the common law legal systems of Australia, New Zealand, Canada and Singapore. The author ends by suggesting that recent European developments in this field make an important contribution to reform proposals when it comes to the position of common law on party autonomy in contractual obligations and, more significantly, non-contractual obligations.
(CDe)
*** MILAN REMÁC: Coordinating Ombudsmen and the judiciary. A comparative view on the relations between ombudsmen and the judiciary in the Netherlands, England and the European Union. Intersentia Ltd (Trinitity House, Cambridge Business Park, Cowley road, Cambridge CB4 0WZ, UK. Tel: (32-3) 6801550 - Fax: 6587121 - Email: mail@intersentia.be - Internet: http://www.intersentia.be ). Ius Commune: European and Comparative Law Series, No. 125. 2014, 410 pp, €80, £76, $112. ISBN 978-1-78068-218-1.
The justice system is mostly responsible for protecting the interests of individuals against the civil service, but most legal systems these days also delegate the task to ombudsmen. In this book, Milan Remác of Utrercht University explores existing relations between the two institutions, the influence of the work and powers of the one on the work and powers of the other, and the tension that this co-existence can generate. His very detailed comparative study of coordination between ombudsmen and the judiciary examines three very different legal systems, viz. those of the Netherlands, England and the European Union. The author identifies three potential levels of coordination: institutional, case-by-case and normative. He explores and compares in detail the statutory rules and case law in both domains, based on interviews carried out with ombudsmen and judges, along with their staff members. In this way, the shows that improvements need to be made in the way the two circles currently relate to each other.
(CDe)
*** ALEKSANDER STEPKOWSKI (Ed.): Protection of human life in its early stage. Intellectual foundations and legal means. Presses Interuniversitaires Européennes / Peter Lang (see above). Ad Fontes: Schriften zur philosophie series, No.10. 2014, 263 pp, €56.95. ISBN 978-3-631-64227-6.
Following on from a conference organised at Warsaw University in September 2012, this book comprises thirteen studies examining different aspects of the protection of human life at the earliest stage of development. The essays are divided into three sections. The first concentrates on theoretical problems, with various authors analysing major issues in contemporary jurisprudence, and other essays looking at human rights or the different approaches to sovereignty, the relationship between science and law, the legitimacy of judicial power and the nature of judicial authority. In the second section, questions relating to the national context are addressed for the United States, Germany, Austria and Poland. The third section sees the experts take a broader perspective when they look at the protection of human life in the prenatal stage at various levels: at European Union level, in European Court of Human Rights case law and at the United Nations.
(CDe)