Defeating Impunity
Attempts at International Justice in Europe since 1914

Edited by Pieter Lagrou,Ornella Rovetta

ISBN13: 9781836950684

Imprint: Berghahn Books

Publisher: Berghahn Books

Format: Paperback / softback

Published: 01/10/2025

Availability: Not yet available

Description
Over the course of the long and violent twentieth century, only a minority of international crime perpetrators ever stood trial, and a central challenge of this era was the effort to ensure that not all these crimes remained unpunished. This required not only establishing a legal record but also courage, determination, and inventiveness in realizing justice. Defeating Impunity moves from the little-known trials of the 1920s to the Yugoslavia tribunal in the 2000s, from Belgium in 1914 to Ukraine in 1943, and to Stuttgart and Düsseldorf in 1975. It illustrates the extent to which the language of law drew an international horizon of justice.
List of Figures and Tables Acknowledgements List of Abbreviations Chronology Introduction: Defeating Impunity in Twentieth-Century Europe Ornella Rovetta and Pieter Lagrou Chapter 1. The Law of Military Occupation and the Belgian Trials after 1918 Thomas Graditzky Chapter 2. The Claims of Belgian Deported Workers at the Paris Mixed Arbitral Tribunal in 1924 Arnaud Charon Chapter 3. Coining Postwar Justice from the Margins: Exile Lawyers in London, 1941–1945 Kerstin von Lingen Chapter 4. The Treasure Trove of the United Nations War Crimes Commission Archives, 1943—1949 Wolfgang Form Chapter 5. Legal Imagination and Legal Realism: ‘Crimes against Humanity’ and the US Racial Question in 1945 Guillaume Mouralis Chapter 6. Filling the Legal Void: Jewish Victims, German Offenders and Belgian Judges, 1942–1951 Marie-Anne Weisers Chapter 7. Soviet Footage of War Crimes, 1941–1946: Between Propaganda and Judicial Evidence Vanessa Voisin Appendix 7.1: Circular Sent to the Chiefs of Cinema Front Groups by Fedor Vasilchenko, the Director of Newsreel Production, 8 September 1943 (Excepts) Appendix 7.2: Circular Sent to the Chiefs of Cinema Front Groups by the Director of Newsreel Production Fedor Vasilchenko, 3 December 1943 (Excerpts) Chapter 8. From Majdanek to Demjanjuk: Failures of Justice in Postwar Germany, 1958–2009 Rebecca Wittmann Chapter 9. Force of Fact: Municipal Authorities, Victim Associations and Forensic Science at the International Criminal Tribunal for the former Yugoslavia Isabelle Delpla Chapter 10. International Law in Action: The Role of the Legal Advisor in Operations in the Twenty-First Century Chris De Cock Conclusion Ornella Rovetta and Pieter Lagrou Index
  • General & world history
  • Legal history
  • Genocide & ethnic cleansing
  • War crimes
  • Professional & Vocational
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