Parliamentary Sovereignty: Brexit and Schrödinger’s cat

By Marc Johnson, Lecturer in Law (Truman Boddon Law School)

Photo: Flickr

Brexit has been a source of emotionally-charged debate. One point which has received plenty of attention is the sovereignty of Parliament and its relationship with EU membership. It is often explained that the EU’s ability to make laws (which can apply in the UK) is some form of forfeiture of sovereignty. However, this statement has a number of shortcomings, not least that it ignores the election of Members of the European Parliament by the UK, providing (at least to some degree) a democratic mandate to the European Parliament. I will use Schrödinger’s cat to suggest that sovereignty can be present in multiple places and remain intact, allowing the normal operation of both the UK Parliament and European Parliament, without offending a nuanced view of sovereignty. In order to do this, one must cast aside the orthodox views of sovereignty and start with a pragmatic and philosophical approach to Parliamentary Sovereignty as it today. Brexit is akin to lifting the lid of Schrödinger’s box to observe the actual state of sovereignty at a specific point in time, but in doing so it reduces the observers to that of a quantitative measurer, and asks ‘is it dead or alive’ – when, in fact, reality is far more complex than this. (more…)

Legal Authority Beyond the State – Towards New Insights into International Law

By Prof Patrick Capps, Professor of International Law (University of Bristol Law School) and Prof Henrik Palmer Olsen (University of Copenhagen Faculty of Law)

Two new edited volumes, which add new perspectives on international law, have recently been published by OUP and CUP. The first is International Court Authority (published by OUP during the summer of 2018 and edited by Karen Alter, Laurence Helfer and Mikael Rask Madsen), and the second is Legal Authority Beyond the State (published by CUP early in the spring of 2018 and is edited by Patrick Capps and Henrik Palmer Olsen (the writers of this blog)). The books are similar insofar as they present interdisciplinary scholarship on the authority of international law. Both are, at root, an exploration of how legal authority is established and evolves in international organizations, such as international courts. An important difference between the two books is how each sees the plausible limits of theoretical inquiry into the nature of authority. International Court Authority is more empirical, while Legal Authority Beyond the State is situated in the rationalist philosophical tradition. We argue that the empirical inquiry found in International Court Authority is limited to measure factual, observable behavior which appears to be engaging with international organizations and their laws, but it cannot account for authority per se, which is commonly accepted (in both books) to be the self-conscious orientation of actor’s behavior towards international law, so that it is consistent with the practical reasons offered by international organizations. (more…)

Nanny states and grown-up debates on alcohol policy

By Prof John Coggon, Professor of Law (University of Bristol Law School)

Photo: Flickr

Debates on alcohol policy are necessarily complex and controversial, and a complete consensus on how we should regulate this area will not be achieved. Like other lawful but regulated products, alcohol presents benefits and harms that may be understood from ranging perspectives. These include views based in cultural, economic, ethical, historical, legal, medical, population-based, religious, and social understandings. Of necessity, outlooks on alcohol policy and the role of regulation therefore vary both within and across such differing sources of critique. The values—positive and negative—of alcohol at individual, familial, community, commercial, and population levels thus call for careful, reasoned, and respectful public debates.

Even within the context of public health analysis, we cannot just look to scientific studies to inform and determine policy: we are required to consider forms of ‘evidence’ from different disciplines and sectors. This is well explained in a recent publication by the Health Foundation, with papers applied to child obesity but with lessons that are generalisable across health policy. However, for many working in public health, or members of wider communities who have interests in what makes good health policy, challenges emerge in relation to the conduct of public debates: often care, reason, and respect are replaced by simplistic slurs and assertions. And in this context, accusations of nanny statism are a key and persistent example. (more…)