Justitia





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INTERNATIONAL CONFERENCE

[Dansk version]

(This conference was held at Copenhagen University, September 21-22, 2007)

 

Punishing War Crimes, Genocides, and Crimes Against Humanity

– New Ethical Challenges?

 

[programme]

 

Purpose

The establishment of a permanent international criminal court (the ICC) has in recent years attracted increasing attention in the discussions among law scholars and philosophers. However, an important question which in this connection has received very little attention is how and how severely war criminals should be punished for their misdeeds.

 

The fact that international criminal courts may face situations where the legal background for punishing and, not least, the types of crimes one has to deal with differ somewhat from what one is used to in traditional national courtrooms might lead one to wonder whether the punishment of war criminals raises new challenges for traditional theories of punishment.

 

For instance, from a retributivist point of view, what would constitute the proportionate punishment of a person who is responsible for the killings of hundreds or even thousands of people? Or, if one favours a consequentialist position, does it make any sense to seek to justify punishment of war criminals by reference to the traditional utilitarian goals, such as reform, incapacitation and prevention? Or, should punishment in these cases perhaps be totally abandoned in favour of restorative justice procedures?

 

In order to illuminate and elaborate on such questions the Danish Research Group for the Ethics of Punishment is arranging a conference with the title "Punishing War Criminals - New Ethical Challenges?" The idea is to bring together and discuss the outlooks on this topic held by theorists representing different approaches to the ethics of punishment.

 

Contributions

The invited speakers are:

 

Professor Nils Christie (Oslo University)
Professor Peter Cave (Open University London)
Professor Michael Clark (University of Nottingham)
Professor Angelo Corlett (San Diego State University)
Professor Michael Davis (Illinois Institute of Technology)
Professor Anthony Ellis (Virginia Commonwealth University)
Judge Frederik Harhoff (International Criminal Tribunal for the former Yugoslavia)
Judge Hans Henrik Brydensholt (International Criminal Tribunal for the former Yugoslavia)
Professor Jesper Ryberg (University of Roskilde)
Professor Claudio Tamburrini (Stockholm University)
Professor Andrew von Hirsch (University of Cambridge)

 

Location

The conference took place the 21.  and 22. of September (2007), at the University of Copenhagen Amager, (aud. 22.0.11.).

 

Questions can be directed to Jesper Ryberg (ryberg@ruc.dk).