States increasingly refer to ‘legal stability’ in connection with maritime zones, amidst concern to preserve their jurisdictional rights in the face of climate-change induced sea-level rise. Yet such a claim for preservation is at odds with the widely-expressed scholarly view that baselines, and their associated maritime zones, ‘ambulate’ with coastal changes. This article interrogates this tension by focussing on the understudied notion of legal stability as it relates to maritime zones, under the international law of the sea. The article examines the development of the term ‘legal stability’ in the discourse of States (what States say) and contends that a claim for the stability of maritime zones should be seen as an expression of the long-standing value placed on legal stability by States in the system of maritime zones. Further, the article presents the results of a global study of States’ implementation of the normal baseline in domestic legislation (what States do). The results show that many States have taken practical measures to secure legal stability for their normal baselines within their domestic frameworks, suggesting that existing international law may accommodate a greater degree of stability than widely appreciated. The article concludes by asserting that these findings matter not only for how we should receive States’ claims for maritime zone preservation on the basis of legal stability, but also prompts reconsideration of our overall understanding of the existing law on baselines and maritime zones.

Four years following the entry into force of the EU data protection framework (the GDPR) serious questions remain regarding its enforcement, particularly in transnational contexts. While this transnational under-enforcement is often attributed to the role of key national authorities in the GDPR's procedures, this article identifies more systemic flaws. It examines whether the GDPR procedures are deficient-by-design and, if not, how these flaws might be addressed. The conclusions reached inform our understanding of how to secure effective protection of the EU Charter right to data protection. They are also of significance to EU law enforcement more generally given the increasing prevalence of composite decision-making as the mechanism of choice to administer EU law.

Despite recent and increasing attention to the wrong of apartheid in international politics, some basic definitional questions remain uncertain. This article seeks to delineate the definition of apartheid in international law. Its focus is on the prohibition of apartheid binding States in custom and the obligation in Article 3 of the International Convention on the Elimination of All Forms of Racial Discrimination. In both cases, the article shows that the Apartheid Convention of 1973 supplies the wrong's definition. Thereafter, the article addresses three key elements that will be central to determining an allegation of apartheid: its wrongful acts, its distinctive purpose requirement, and the issue of what constitutes a ‘racial group’. Finally, the article also draws attention to the wider importance of the prohibition of apartheid in the international legal system. International law marks with particular normative significance a set of practices entailing systematic and structural harms that need not involve violations of life or bodily integrity.

Value-added tax, the most common form of consumption tax in the world, operates on a destination principle to ensure it is levied only in the place of final consumption in cases of cross-border transactions. The international trade in services and intangibles through digital means poses two challenges: finding the place of consumption and collecting the tax when services supplied by businesses in one jurisdiction are instantaneously consumed by customers in another. This article examines these challenges and considers how unilateral action and soft international responses have so far failed to achieve consistent destination basis taxation. An alternative option would be to adopt a hard multilateral response that would overcome the limitations of unilateralism and soft-law approaches and achieve consistent destination basis taxation in the digitalised economy.

Pioneered by the US, recent mega-regional trade agreements such as the CPTPP have incorporated ‘regulatory coherence’ provisions—mirroring the US Administrative Procedural Act's core designs—to balance between domestic regulatory autonomy and international cooperation. Building upon existing literature that traces the trajectories of the diffusion of regulatory coherence across jurisdictions, this article analyses how Australia's constitutional tradition could effectively condition the development of regulatory coherence in a Westminster-based model of governance. It is argued that the global entrenchment of regulatory coherence is contingent upon the inherent boundary defined by the political dynamics and constitutional structures within a jurisdiction.

Taking a law-and-governance approach, this article addresses legal certainty in international human rights law as it applies to artificial intelligence (AI). After introducing key issues concerning legal certainty, a comparative analysis of AI law-and-governance initiatives at the international, regional and national levels is undertaken. The article argues that many initiatives contribute to increased legal certainty and can partially compensate for some of the shortcomings of the international human rights law framework, but that further clarification is badly needed. This is especially true for the responsibilities of private businesses which are developing AI and the corpus of human rights beyond privacy and data protection.

This article analyses what is widely known as the police powers exemption found in modern international investment agreements, with a focus on mega-regional trade and investment agreements. It explores its legal nature and requirements, the burden of proof and issues of compensation. In an attempt to curb (indirect) expropriation claims, the exemption carves out non-discriminatory regulatory measures from the scope of indirect expropriation and in such situations no compensation needs to be paid. It follows that, as a rule, foreign investors are not protected against the adverse economic effects of regulatory measures. The key question addressed is whether host States can increase the level of protection given to public welfare objectives through the use of this exemption without having to compensate investors for the measures taken. The article argues that, under the proportionality test embodied in the exemption, States can provide the level of protection that they desire without incurring a risk of liability as regards expropriation claims.

The UN Human Rights Committee's finding in Teitiota v New Zealand has garnered widespread global attention for its recognition that the effects of climate change may put people's lives at risk or expose them to cruel, inhuman or degrading treatment, thus triggering States’ non-refoulement obligations. However, a secondary—and highly problematic—consequence of the decision has been its confusing and misplaced focus on ‘imminence’ of harm. This reflects a concerning, albeit uneven, trend in human rights cases generally (and cases concerning climate change and human rights, in particular) to recognize violations only where rights are immediately threatened. This short article reflects on the assumptions that Teitiota has triggered about the place of imminence in international protection claims, identifies the source of confusion, and suggests a more appropriate framework to guide a category of case that is likely to become the subject of intense litigation in the future.

The two-step methodology for the identification of general principles of law deriving from domestic legal systems, consisting of a comparative analysis followed by a transposability test, seems accepted as the undisputed methodology in the current work of the International Law Commission on the topic. This article examines whether this two-step approach finds reflection in the practice of and before the PCIJ/ICJ and in international legal scholarship. The analysis finds that judicial practice does not entirely follow these two steps, but the method is widely upheld in doctrinal writing. The article argues that the decision to codify this two-step methodology can be viewed as progressive development by the Commission, and may signify the crystallization of this method of identification of general principles of law.