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Introduction
I am an Associate Professor at the University of Lausanne, Switzerland. I hold a PhD in law from the University of Fribourg, Switzerland, and a Master of Laws (LL.M.) from Harvard Law School. My habilitation thesis analyzes the constitutional framework governing legislative lobbying in Europe and in the USA. My PhD thesis, which was supervised by Prof. Samantha Besson, examined the interpretative methods that domestic courts use in international law cases.
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Publications
Publications (100)
The question of how best to tackle anthropogenic climate change is a thorny one: besides scientific uncertainty regarding the consequences of climate change, another difficulty is that the recommendations of climate experts may clash with the priorities of citizens, interest groups and political institutions. With the European Green Deal, the Europ...
Compared to global lobbying hubs like the USA and the European Union and to its neighboring countries, Switzerland hardly regulates legislative lobbying, i.e., lobbying that targets the legislative branch. Only three types of legal provisions apply to lobbying in the Swiss legislature: First, legislators must disclose their ties to interest groups....
Wie auch in anderen kontinentalen Rechtsordnungen sind Studierende der Rechtswissenschaften in der Schweiz an die traditionelle Vorlesung gewöhnt, weshalb sie tendenziell eine passive Rolle im Unterricht einnehmen. Dies gilt insbesondere für die ersten Jahre des Studiums, in denen mittelgroße bis große Gruppen von Studierenden (an der Universität Z...
Das öffentliche Recht ist auch eine Verantwortungsordnung. Es ordnet die Verantwortung der Einzelnen gegenüber der Gesellschaft, die Verantwortung des Staates gegenüber der Bevölkerung, anderen Staaten und der Umwelt, und jene der heutigen Generation gegenüber den folgenden – oder unterlässt dies bisweilen gerade. Die Beiträge des Tagungsbandes ana...
Das öffentliche Recht ist auch eine Verantwortungsordnung. Es ordnet die Verantwortung der Einzelnen gegenüber der Gesellschaft, die Verantwortung des Staates gegenüber der Bevölkerung, anderen Staaten und der Umwelt, und jene der heutigen Generation gegenüber den folgenden – oder unterlässt dies bisweilen gerade. Die Beiträge des Tagungsbandes ana...
Die Verkündung wird jedes Jahr mit Spannung erwartet: Am Ende der JTÖR teilt das Orga-Team im Rahmen der Aussprache den nächsten Tagungsort mit. Diese Verkündung ist das Ergebnis eines Suchprozesses, der mit einem "Call for Teams" seinen Anfang nimmt. Dieses Jahr war die Spannung besonders groß. Denn die Zürcher Tagung endete mit einem Cliffhanger....
In der Diskussion um die Abstimmung zur Justizinitiative wird von den Gegnern immer wieder darauf hingewiesen, wie wichtig es sei, dass alle wichtigen Parteien am Bundesgericht vertreten seien. Diese Forderung legt offen, dass die Bedeutung der Gewaltentrennung und der Unabhängigkeit von Gerichten für das Funktionieren eines Rechtsstaats unterschät...
In the Global North, there is often a notable discrepancy between the amount of taxpayers’ money transferred to the agricultural sector and the sector’s contribution to the economy as measured by GDP. How come the agricultural sector garners such high levels of government support? Part of the answer to this question lies in the distinctive features...
Abstract (D): Die institutionelle Ausgestaltung des Richteramts steht in der Schweiz in einem Spannungsverhältnis zur richterlichen Unabhängigkeit. Dies trifft auch auf das Bundesrichteramt zu: Bundesrichterinnen und Bundesrichter werden vom Schweizer Parlament nach Massgabe des Parteiproporzes gewählt und müssen sich nach Ablauf ihrer 6-jährigen A...
Im Frühjahr 2021 verabschiedete die Universität Bern sog. «Leitlinien zu Informationen und Meinungsäusserungen». Deren Ausführungen zum Umgang von Universitätsangehörigen mit Social Media sorgten für mediale Aufmerksamkeit und wurden insbesondere unter dem Blickwinkel der Wissenschaftsfreiheit teilweise heftig kritisiert. Der vorliegende Aufsatz be...
Citizens’ perception that lawmaking is dominated by special interests undermines their trust in democratic institutions and lawmaking processes. This also applies to the EU, where lobby regulation remains weak despite past lobbying scandals. While the European Commission and the European Parliament established a Joint Transparency Register in 2011,...
In 2017, 78.7% of the Swiss people voted to enshrine the concept of ‘food security’ in the Federal Constitution. Originally prompted by agricultural interest groups for reasons of protectionism and then revamped by the Swiss Parliament, the new article 104a includes a wide array of demands for food policy, including protection of agricultural land,...
Abstract (D): Vor bald hundert Jahren bezeichnete der Politikwissenschaftler Fritz Morstein Marx das freie Mandat als «verfassungsrechtliches Fossil». Grund dafür war die Macht, welche die Parteien auf die Abgeordneten ausübten. Der Aufsatz geht der Frage nach, wie diese Einschätzung heute zu bewerten ist. Er argumentiert, dass das heutzutage vorhe...
Abstract (F) : Comme nous ne le savons que trop bien, la pandémie de coronavirus a révolutionné notre rapport collectif à l’espace public, devenu un vivier d’infections. Afin d’infléchir la courbe des contagions, les autorités ont fortement limité les rassemblements de personnes, y compris en Suisse. Même si ces restrictions ont – après quelques hé...
Volume 10 of the Yearbook for Direct Democracy comprises four essays. They deal with direct democracy from a cultural-philosophical perspective, with participation in environmentally relevant projects in Germany, with developments in the European Citizens' Initiative, and with transparency in political financing in Switzerland. Two further contribu...
Recipient of the Walther Hug Prize 2021 (prize awarded to the authors of the best PhDs in law in Switzerland in the corresponding year).
Reviews:
- C. Collin, in (2019) 65 Annuaire français de droit international 790, available at <www.persee.fr/issue/afdi_0066-3085_2019_num_65_1>
- R. Cueni, in (2020) sui generis, available at <sui-generis.ch/art...
In recent years, citizenship by investment ( CBI ) and residency by investment ( RBI ) programmes have been burgeoning throughout the world, including in a range of European States. At first sight, such programmes are blatantly anti-meritocratic: they hinge on a person’s wealth, and not on her skills, potential, and intrinsic qualities. Yet upon a...
Abstract (F): En dépit du fait qu’il s’immisce dans le processus de formation de l’opinion démocratique et, par ce biais, dans la création du droit, le lobbying fait partie des angles morts du droit suisse. Le droit public en vigueur aborde principalement deux aspects du lobbying, à savoir l’accès au Palais fédéral et les liens d’intérêt des parlem...
Abstract (D): Neuere Beispiele zeigen, wie Rechtswissenschaftler – und nicht nur Naturwissenschaftler, wie z.B. in jüngster Zeit Epidemiologen und Virologen – aufgrund ihrer Expertise Einfluss auf die Politik nehmen können oder dies zumindest anstreben. Überraschend ist dies nicht: Sachverstand stellt eine von vielen möglichen Einflussquellen dar....
2021 Early Career Prize (Silver) of the Swiss Academy of Humanities and Social Sciences. // Abstract: In recent years, citizenship by investment (CBI) and residency by investment (RBI) programs have been burgeoning throughout the world, including in a range of European States. At first sight, such programs are blatantly anti-meritocratic: they hing...
The host of negative effects of animal agriculture on the immediate environment, workers, and local communities are well- documented, yet little is known about the global repercussions of animal agriculture, especially on human rights guarantees. This contribution attempts to begin filling this soaring gap. It examines the nexus between industrial...
Democratic process and federalism concerns raise questions about the Swiss government’s COVID-19 policies
As populism is on the rise (and, so it seems, here to stay), judges are especially vulnerable to public criticism and political pressure. Their constitutional mandate is harder than ever to fulfill, as they must carry out their interpretative task regardless of these potentially overwhelming external influences. In other words, judges must keep exe...
Jurisprudential theories have rarely taken international law into account, yet can provide insights into how domestic courts can and should conceptualise their interpretative activity. This paper relies on the works of HLA Hart and Duncan Kennedy to show that the domestic judicial interpretation of international law should be conceptualised as anal...
Jurisprudential theories have rarely taken international law into account, yet can provide insights into how domestic courts can and should conceptualise their interpretative activity. This paper relies on the works of H.L.A. Hart and Duncan Kennedy to show that the domestic judicial interpretation of international law should be conceptualised as a...
On 6 December 2017, in its much debated "Coty" judgment, the Court of Justice of the European Union considered third platform bans on luxury goods in selective distribution to be admissible, provided that the "Metro" criteria laid down in the Court's earlier case law are met. In response to the Coty ruling, the Swiss Competition Commission adapted...
In the legal history of a State (or, for that matter, of any political entity), the drafting of a new constitution is an exceptional occurrence. Given the important consequences of their work, as well as their significance for political, legal, and especially constitutional theory, constituent assemblies should not escape academic scrutiny. It is p...
This article consists in an empirical study of the Swiss Federal Tribunal’s practice of international law. It provides statistical data on the practical significance of international law across time, on the relevance of various sources of international law, and on the context in which international law is cited. It also complements a number of intu...
In den letzten Jahren ist die schweizerische Juristin, Journalistin und Schriftstellerin Iris von Roten (1917-1990) erneut ins Zentrum der Aufmerksamkeit gerückt. Wilfried Meichtry hat das Leben des nun mythischen Paares, das Iris (geborene Meyer) und Peter von Roten bildeten, akribisch aufgearbeitet und in die Doppelbiographie “Verliebte Feinde” (...
The relationship between Swiss politics and the European Court of Human Rights cannot be understood without emphasizing the pivotal role played by domestic judicial interpretation. Swiss semi-direct democracy has been challenging the authority of the European Court of Human Rights and of the European Convention on Human Rights for four decades. Yet...
Abstract: Gemäss der Volksinitiative «Schweizer Recht statt fremde Richter (Selbstbestimmungsinitiative)» soll die Schweizer Verfassung allen Bestimmungen des für die Schweiz geltenden internationalen Rechts vorgehen, mit Ausnahme des «zwingenden Völkerrechts». Diese Forderung erinnert an die Praxis der USA, wo der Vorrang der Verfassung vor dem in...
Abstract: In his Opinio Juris blogpost of November 3, Julian Ku contends that “dualism may save the United Kingdom from Brexit.” To make this claim, he starts by emphasizing an alleged correlation between dualism and a State’s propensity to “violat[e] international law obligations by failing to enforce those obligations (usually treaties) domestica...
Abstract: A la différence des nombreuses études sur l’interprétation des accords bilatéraux Suisse-UE parues à ce jour et qui se concentrent sur les aspects de droit suisse ou européen de l’interprétation juridique, la présente contribution propose une lecture de droit international de l’interprétation des accords bilatéraux Suisse-UE. Elle prend l...
One way for judges to be responsive to the concerns of ordinary people is to take public opinion into account in their decisions. In this paper, I examine cases in which the US Supreme Court and the Swiss Federal Tribunal have explicitly done so. To identify relevant decisions, I use a keyword-based citation-analysis, complemented by a qualitative...
Numerous documents and decisions of the Swiss authorities in the field of customary international law (CIL) provide an overview of their practice of determination of CIL. This practice displays specific features that are peculiar to Switzerland. The present study sets out and analyzes the Swiss practice of determination of CIL. After presenting the...
The purpose of this book is to examine how Swiss courts, and domestic courts in general, must interpret norms stemming from the sources of international law. On the one hand, I analyze whether Swiss courts’ interpretative method complies with what international law requires from States when they interpret their international obligations. On the oth...
There is frequent disagreement between Switzerland and the European Union (EU) about the prohibition of discrimination on grounds of nationality, enshrined, among other places, in article 2 of the Swiss-EU Bilateral Agreement on the Free Movement of Persons (AFMP). Difficulties stem from the multiple legal sources of the principle of non-discrimina...
Some scholars argue that the Court of Justice of the European Union, when it interprets international legal norms, is comparable to a domestic court. Analogies, however, must be handled with care and cautiously justified. This contribution investigates if, and to what extent, the Court of Justice can be likened to a domestic court that interprets i...
Read the original article in full here: https://refugeehosts.org/2017/09/15/the-multiple-faces-of-representation/
The Multiple Faces of Representation
By Yousif M. Qasmiyeh, University of Oxford and Odile Ammann, University of Fribourg
The face of the Other – under all the particular forms of expression where the Other, already in a character’s...
