The European economic crisis has underlined the challenges that Member States of the European Union face towards ensuring adequate social protection provision for their citizens. The effects of the crisis have and can further impact on the capacity of pension schemes, both state provided and privately managed, that constitute a significant aspect of social protection, to deliver pension promises. This paper highlights the current situation that the common pension challenges pose for Member States and focuses on a particular issue around occupational pension provision, which has been on the European Commission’s agenda for a long time, and on which limited progress had been made. This is the issue of cross-border portability of supplementary pension rights. It is argued that current circumstances facilitate EU action to be taken in this area. In the first section, the paper identifies the main challenges around pension provision stemming from demographic ageing and the effects of the economic crisis. Section two provides a brief overview of the Commission’s holistic approach envisaged in its 2012 White Paper on safe, adequate, and sustainable pensions. Section three provides an overview of the issue of the portability of supplementary pension rights for EU workers. Section four outlines previous attempts and recent developments towards the adoption of legislative measures to promote the portability of such pension entitlements. The paper concludes by arguing that the renewed focus on pensions, in the context of current challenges and the need to enhance workers’ mobility and to provide adequate social protection, have paved the way towards the adoption of measures in this area.

This article addresses three core complaints that are frequently levelled by critics of plain legal language: (1) It will reduce reliance on lawyers; (2) It is uncertain and will lead to greater litigation; and (3) Legal writing is, and should only be, for a legally trained audience. The article develops a definition of plain language that reflects a more contemporary understanding. It demonstrates that the three core criticisms misrepresent this understanding and are unsustainable with regard to lawyers’ duty to clients, the role of legislation as public documents, and modern commercial realities.

The plain language movement (PLM) for the writing of laws calls for improving legislative clarity by drafting the laws in a clear, simple, and precise manner. However, the main purpose of this aspiration is to facilitate the ordinary legislative audience to understand the laws with the least effort. In this respect, turning the pages of recent history reveals that this movement for plain language statutes has mostly been debated and analysed in the context of English as a language of the legislative text. However, in some parts of the multilingual world like India and Pakistan, English is not understood by the ordinary population at a very large scale but is still used as a language of the legislative text. This disparity owes its genesis to different country-specific ethnolingual and political issues. In this context but without going into the details of these ethnolingual and political elements, this article aims to analyse the prospects of plain Urdu legislative language in the Islamic Republic of Pakistan by by analyzing (1) the possibility of producing a plain language version of the legislative text in Urdu and (2) the potential benefit that the ordinary people of Pakistan can get from such plain statutes in terms of the themes of the PLM. In answering these questions, the author concludes that neither (at present) is it possible to produce plain Urdu versions of the statute book in Pakistan nor is the population of Pakistan likely to avail any current advantage from the plain Urdu statutes and further that, for now, it is more appropriate to continue with the colonial heritage of English as the language of the legislative text.

Legislation may be presumed to be intended to transmit a message to those whose conduct it aims to affect. That message achieves its purpose only insofar as it is intelligible to its recipients. Drafters should make every effort to use plain language, but not all meaning can be transferred in plain language. The true criterion is clarity.
‘Mediation’ and ‘conciliation’ are examples of definitions created by legislators which do not correspond with categories in practice. Historical research illuminates cultural differences which affect transmission of meaning. Recent practice also illustrates the possibilities of creative methods for resolving disputes and the dangers of unnecessary prescription.
Imprecise thinking of legislators precludes transmission of precise meaning, as does preference for word-for-word translation. ‘Highest Common Factor’ language is no substitute for natural target language.
No efforts of legislators or translators can prevail against political power. ‘Ignorance of the law is no excuse’ overrides the imperative to transfer meaning.
If research is to be effective, it must be not only comparative but interdisciplinary.

International law guarantees several fundamental principles of procedural justice, such as presumption of innocence, the right against self-incrimination, the right to be tried without undue delay, the right to examine witnesses, and the right to legal assistance. In this article I examine whether Islamic law guarantees similar procedural protections and demonstrate how Islamic law provides for basic human rights as well as general principles that may serve as guidelines in procedural justice. These include the principle of non-retroactivity, the principle of personal accountability, the principle of no crime or punishment without law, the right to be presumed innocent until proven guilty, and the right to defence. The article also identifies rules of evidence provided by Islamic law which are designed to protect the accused.

Jurisdictions around the world continue to grapple with the clash between religious freedoms and other freedoms and values to which a society subscribes. A recent, and current, debate concerns the extent to which a person is free to wear items of clothing often thought to be symbolic of the Muslim faith, though the issues are not confined to any particular religion. Bans on the wearing of this type of clothing have often (surprisingly) survived human rights challenges, on the basis that governments had legitimate objectives in banning or restricting them. A pending case gives the European Court another chance to reconsider the issues. It is hoped that the Court will closely scrutinise claims of legitimate objectives for such laws; perceptions can arise that sometimes, governments are pandering to racism, intolerance and xenophobia with such measures, rather than seeking to meet more high-minded objectives.

Under the Kafala system, which applies in all Arab countries, migrant workers must attain a work entry visa and residential permit, which is possible only if they are working for a domestic institution or corporation or a citizen of the respective country. Each and every employer is required, based on the Kafala system, to adopt all legal and economic responsibilities for all of the employer's workers during their contractual period. By giving wide-ranging powers and responsibilities unilaterally to employers, the Kafala system subjects workers to abysmal and exploitative working conditions, violence, and human rights abuses. Some of these problems have recently made headlines in the United States and in Europe in connection with the campus being built by New York University in Abu Dhabi. While NYU imposed a code of labor standards on its direct contractual partners, it claimed to have no means of controlling subcontractors. Nor did NYU try very hard, it seems, to verify compliance even by its direct contractual partners.
Migrant workers make up at least 30 percent of the population of Saudi Arabia and 49 percent of Saudi Arabia's entire workforce. Employers control Saudi Arabia's Kafala system, in which migrant workers are the weakest link. Studies and international organizations report that foreigners employed in Saudi Arabia have returned home with many complaints. In 2006, Saudi Arabia re-examined all laws including its labor law. This re-examination resulted in abolishing some terms used in labor law, such as the kafala system, but the system remains as is. The new labor law includes many positive changes, but not enough according to the assessment of local and international scholars and observers. In this paper, I will reveal laws, practices and patterns that essentially cause the vulnerability of migrant workers, and I will suggest effective alternative strategies. This paper should contribute to our growing understanding of issues of concern for migrant workers in Saudi Arabia and other Arab countries and help to develop specific and necessary legal and institutional responses.

The purpose of this article is to illuminate one of the contemporary legal dilemmas in Islamic law, namely the appointment of female judges in Muslim countries. The methodology employed is library-based research. The focus of this article is to determine the legal status of appointments of female judges in Shariah courts. It is argued here that female judges can be appointed in Muslim countries and that the main reason for this is that there is no explicit prohibition of it in the fundamental sources of Islamic law. However, the claims that it is contrary to Islamic law to appoint female judges are also discussed here. The outcome of this article is to prove that there is nothing wrong in Islam in appointing female judges as long as they fulfil the necessary conditions.

Much attention has already been paid to the relationship between European (family) law and law from Muslim majority countries in studies of private international law or of comparative law, often discussing family law institutions such as polygamy or repudiation. Among those institutions, there is one that has largely been neglected: kafala, a form of guardianship that is specific to Islamic law.
The reception of this institution in the Member States raises several questions, such as its consequences in terms of legal parentage or its conformity with the best interest of the child or with public order. However, this contribution focuses on the migration angle since some difficulties may appear after this particular guardianship was pronounced abroad when the question of the entrance and the stay of the child with their guardians in a Member State arises.
The research consists of determining whether some EU or international instruments could grant the guardians a right to request that ‘their’ child lives with them in their country and examines whether such a right is always desirable and justifiable. Taking France as an example, the author asks the following question: does not France, as a Member State of the European Union, have to ensure under European law and international obligations that the child and the couple will be able to live together on its territory?

In this article a consecutive comparison will be made between the approaches taken towards wrongful birth and wrongful life cases in the Netherlands and in England and Wales. The systems will be evaluated in the light of the best interests of the child, the balance struck between all moral convictions involved, and legal fairness. It will be argued that the approach taken in the Netherlands is more favourable in most respects, but could improve the balance between all moral convictions involved and could enhance legal fairness by limiting the claim for material damages to costs associated with the disability of the child.

At the heart of the European Union legal order lie values directed collectively to the idea of European integration. As a body with significant governmental and lawmaking powers, the Union also presents itself as an institution based upon the rule of law. The Union ‘constitution’ therefore expresses both regulatory powers direct­ed towards European integration as well as rule of law principles whose scope of application is limited by the terms of the Treaties. In this article I consider how this distinctive amalgam of values operates as a constitution for the European Union, by comparison with domestic constitutional values within the Member States. I also consider how Union constitutional demands condition and inform the legal practices of the Court of Justice. Here I identify the interpretive effects of superior Union laws –‍ the core Treaty objectives as well as rule of law principles found within the General Principles ‍– as of particular significance in developing the legal influences of the entire Union project of integration.

This article proposes the need for ‘dualism’ in the legal system, where civil and criminal offences are considered at the same time, and where both the person complaining and the person responding are on trial at the same time. Considered is how reforming the police and judiciary, such as by replacing the police with legal aid solicitors and giving many of their other powers to the National Crime Agency could improve outcomes for all. The perils of the current system, which treats the accused as criminals until proven not guilty, are critiqued, and suggestions for replacing this process with courts of law that treat complainant and respondent equally are made. The article discusses how such a system based on dualism might have operated during the August 2011 UK riots, where the situation had such a dramatic effect on how the social networking aspects, such as ‘Internet trolling’, affected it.

The standard of living throughout the world has been on the rise thanks in large part to perhaps the greatest advance in the last hundred years: international trade performed by maritime traffic. Despite modern advances in shipping practice, the centuries-old problem of piracy has once again threatened advancement of international trade. Although piracy is not limited to a geographical area, the Horn of Africa has received much attention of late owing to a resurgence of pirate attacks. Using the failed state of Somalia as a base, pirates off the Horn of Africa have found piracy to be an extremely lucrative business in a part of the world ravished by famine, poverty and ongoing wars. This article calls for nations the world over to invoke universal jurisdiction and grant to the International Tribunal for the Law of the Sea in Hamburg, Germany, exclusive jurisdiction over claims of piracy. In doing so, the international community will no longer turn a blind eye to a crime that affects all nations equally.

The Botswana judicial and legal system has undergone a wave of reforms over the past few years. These reforms include judicial case management, which was introduced to reduce unnecessary delays and backlog in the hearing of cases. The introduction of judicial case management necessitates a revision of the rules of court. While the rules of the courts principally relate to civil proceedings, criminal proceedings are principally regulated by the Criminal Procedure and Evidence Act. However, the revised rules of court contain provisions that seek to bring criminal proceedings in line with judicial case management. A number of these provisions are inconsistent with the Criminal Procedure and Evidence Act. This presents problems for the implementation of these rules as the Criminal Procedure and Evidence Act is superior to the rules in the hierarchy of laws. Consequently, the implementation of judicial case management in criminal proceedings may prove to be an arduous task, and urgent harmonisation of the competing provisions is required.

The widespread production and use of illicit drugs is a social phenomenon carrying enormous social, economic, and political significance. The United States stands as a vocal and forceful proponent of prohibitionist drug controls in international policymaking. However, strictly enforced US prohibitionist drug controls largely fail to effectively reduce the consumption of narcotic drugs and ultimately create a significant number of negative consequences for many peoples throughout the world. The increased violence, government corruption and community sequestration that result from the war against drugs are deleterious to economic development among rural communities in drug producing countries. In response to these concerns, this article examines the purpose, effects and consequences of the prohibitive drug controls routinely employed by the United States. Special attention is paid to an oft-overlooked repercussion of prohibitive drug controls: the marginalisation of developmental human rights for peoples in drug producing countries.