Document Type

Article

Disciplines

International Law

Abstract

Little more than a decade has passed since the Second Circuit decided Filartiga v. Pena-!rala1 and revived the once obscure Alien Tort Statute. Yet, the passage of time has not ensured the future of the statute in America's human rights policy-a policy said "to promote democratic processes respect[ful of] human rights and ...to oppose specific human rights violations wherever they occur" 3 nor has it seen the clarification of the role of federal courts in deciding international human rights claims called for by Circuit Court Judge Edwards in TelOren v. Libyan Arab Republic.4 It is with these thoughts in mind that we must welcome the recent publication of a book by Kenneth Randall, Professor of Law at the University of Alabama, entitled Federal Courts and the International Human Rights Paradigm-a book that does much to answer the far-ranging domestic and international law questions raised in cases like Filartiga and Tel-Oren.

Professor Randall calls for an expanded federal court role in protecting international human rights and, in a somewhat original step, advocates federal court adjudication of extraterritorial terrorist acts. He relies on various notions of jurisdiction-in particular adjudicatory and universal-to show that federal courts are empowered to forcefully promote the recognition of international human rights norms both within the American political and in the international legal systems. To this end, he divides his book into two parts. In the first part of the book, he presents an historic view of the sharing of foreign relations powers among the three branches of government; discusses federal jurisdiction over state and nonstate international law offenders; explores separation of powers issues in human rights and terrorism cases; and advances a legislative prescription. In the second part, he looks beyond American constitutional and statutory structures toward a universal principle of adjudication in human rights and terrorism matters. In doing so, Professor Randall concludes that it is now appropriate (if not necessary) to think in terms of a "human rights paradigm:" a decentralized world legal order that moves beyond the medieval Westphalian system and permits the extraterritorial judicial review of fundamental human rights.

Research for Professor Randall's book, however, was completed too soon to incorporate the latest developments under the act of state doctrine and what might be characterized as the emerging "deposed dictator jurisprudence"-a gap that will be partly filled by this Book Review. 5 Nonetheless, the book provides an excellent discussion of the current debate surrounding the use of American courts in the enforcement of fundamental human rights, a debate that will be heating up as international human rights actions against the estate of former Philippine President Ferdinand Marcos and against former Haitian President Prosper Avril are argued in federal district courts in Hawaii and Florida.

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