Insanity: Comparison of Czech and American legal concept Abstract The aim of this thesis is to capture the essence of the institute of insanity from the substantive point of view according to the Czech and American legislation and to deduce any differences from them. First, the continental legal system on which the Czech legal order is based is compared with the Anglo-American legal system from which the American legislation is derived. Subsequently, the basic pillars of the Czech legal order including the position of criminal law are defined. Attention is also paid to the political system of the United States, because, as a result of federalism, there are two levels of law that have a significant impact on national legislations. Hereupon, the structure of criminal liability according to Czech law is analyzed. Since the prerequisite of criminal liability is the commission of a criminal offense, this is also defined. For the purposes of comparison, circumstances excluding punishability as well as circumstances excluding liability are outlined. Due to the fact that US law is based on common law, criminal liability is defined both from the perspective of common law and the Model Penal Code, which are of the basic sources of US criminal law. Next part of the thesis is focused on the institute of insanity in the...

Only a handful of studies focuses on the relationship between the legal origin and the content of CSR reports, based on the institutional differences. The previous studies have contradicting results. The paper aims to add to the body of research by analyzing the relationship between the legal origin and its effect on the content of CSR disclosure. To analyse the content a scoring index is developed following Clarkson, Li, Richardson, & Vasvari, 2008 and Ong 2016. 45 CSR reports from 8 different countries are analysed and the research period is 2018 or FY 2019.  The findings suggest that companies from code law countries do publish more in-depth CSR reports. The key findings are that code law countries disclose more employment related information and that institutional regulations lead to better disclosure. Overall, this study extends the discussion on the effects of the legal origin.

The substitution of the dominant Western jurisprudence for South Africa’s indigenous normative values during colonial and apartheid times has resulted in a perverted conception of law that presents Western jurisprudence as synonymous with law. In the era of the constitutional recognition of African law where the application of the democratic principle demands that the newly re-enfranchised African communities deserve to be regulated by their own indigenous values, the resilience of this legal culture has become problematic. To reverse this situation legal and constitutional interpreters must rethink and reshape their contributions to the achievement of the post-apartheid version of African law envisioned by the South African Constitution. The application of African law in a free and liberated environment must reflect its own social, political and legal cosmology in which its institutions operate within their own indigenous frame of reference. A study of the anatomy of African jurisprudence as a means of gaining insight into the indigenous worldview which was characterised by the culture of communal living and the ethos of inclusiveness to counter the prevailing hegemony of autonomous individualism, has become urgent. To achieve this such pillars of African jurisprudence as the philosophy of ubuntu must be exhumed in order for African law’s rehabilitation under the Constitution to be undertaken on the basis of its authentic articulation uncontaminated by colonial and apartheid distortions. The task of developing the African law of the 21st century to the extent required by the Constitution is a challenge of enormous proportions which demands an appreciation of the historical and political environment in which African law lost its primacy as the original legal system of South Africa after Roman-Dutch law was imposed on the South Africa population. The revival of African law becomes more urgent when one considers that when Africans lost control of their legal system they had not abdicated sovereignty voluntarily to the newcomers. The validity of the imposition of Western jurisprudence is vitiated by the colonial use of such imperial acts as colonisation, conquest, and annexation as the basis on which the regime of Roman-Dutch law was imposed on South Africa. Ever since, African law has been subordinated and denigrated through colonial and apartheid policies which relegated it, via the repugnancy clause, to a sub-system of Roman-Dutch law with whose standards it was forced to comply. The repugnancy clause left African law a distorted system no longer recognisable to its own constituency. The advent of the new dispensation introduced a constitutional framework for re-capacitating South Africa’s post-apartheid state institutions to recentre African law as envisioned by the Constitution. This framework has become the basis on which legislative and judicial efforts could rehabilitate the indigenous value system in the application of African law. The courts of the new South Africa have striven to find the synergy between indigenous values and the Bill of Rights in order to forge areas of compatibility between African culture and human rights. An analysis of this phase in the development of African law, as evidenced by the present study, reveals successes and failures on the part of the courts in their efforts to rehabilitate African law in line with both its value system and the Bill of Rights. These findings lead to the conclusion that whilst South Africa’s legislative and judicial institutions have not yet achieved the envisioned version of African law, there is an adequate constitutional framework through which they could still do so. This study, therefore, recommends that the above institutions, especially the courts, should adopt a theory of re-indigenisation that would guide them as they proceed from the indigenous version of African law which is the basis on which to apply the Bill of Rights. The application of such a theory would ensure that the distorted ‘official’ version of African law which was imposed by colonial and apartheid state institutions is progressively discredited and isolated from the body of South African law and gives way to the version inspired by the Constitution. / Constitutional, International and Indigenous Law / LL. D.

Thèse numérisée par la Direction des bibliothèques de l'Université de Montréal.

<p>Cohabiting with a partner, rather than living in a legal marriage, has been documented as a significant risk factor for intimate partner homicide. This study used national U.S. homicide data from 1990-2005 to examine changes in risk patterns. The results showed that both male and female cohabiting victims experienced a steep decline in intimate partner homicide rates. Such was the strength of this decline that by 2005 cohabiting couples were no longer at higher risk than married couples. A similar, though weaker, trend was found in Canada between 1991 and 2006. It was hypothesised that this convergence of cohabiting and married homicide rates was due to cohabiting and married populations becoming more similar in terms of socio-demographic variables. Contrary to expectation, over time, the U.S. and Canadian cohabiting populations remained younger, poorer, less educated, and less conventional, than their married counterparts. This suggests that demographic changes were not responsible for the decline in cohabiting homicide rates. Further research is required to determine whether changes in union characteristics may have driven the decline in cohabiting homicide risk.</p> / Master of Science (MSc)

L'auteur analyse la mise en œuvre du droit constitutionnel de l'inculpé d'être jugé dans un délai raisonnable. Partant du constat de l'allongement des délais judiciaires en matière pénale au sens large (les procès criminels y compris) malgré la baisse continue du taux de criminalité et du volume des poursuites des infractions pénales graves, l'auteur démontre l'impuissance des tribunaux à faire respecter cette garantie. Il démontre ensuite que cette impuissance est due au fait que deux des principales causes de ces délais relèvent du législateur. L'auteur en conclut donc qu'une intervention législative, à travers une réforme en profondeur de certains aspects de la législation pénale, est nécessaire si l'on souhaite parvenir à une mise en œuvre à la fois efficace et équitable de cette garantie constitutionnelle. Une telle initiative législative pourrait d'ailleurs renforcer la collaboration entre les tribunaux et le législateur et elle constituerait un complément nécessaire à la jurisprudence constitutionnelle. Pour y arriver, l'auteur analyse les raisons historiques et constitutionnelles qui assurent l'historicité d'une intervention législative dans ce domaine et celles qui expliqueraient les difficultés persistantes des tribunaux à régler cette problématique. L'analyse se fait principalement dans le cadre du système juridique anglo-canadien et, accessoirement, dans celui de la France, l'objectif étant de mieux illustrer le propos dans deux contextes juridiques différents, soit les traditions juridiques de la common law et du droit romano-civiliste. L'auteur présente finalement des pistes de solutions à explorer au Canada pour effectuer la nécessaire réforme du droit criminel et du droit pénal réglementaire pour assurer durablement la mise en œuvre équilibrée du droit constitutionnel concerné. La thèse se divise en deux parties. La première porte sur l'historique de la protection du principe de célérité du procès pénal (d'où est tiré le droit constitutionnel en cause) à partir du droit romain et par la suite en droit anglo-canadien et en droit français jusqu'à nos jours. Cette partie démontre l'historicité de l'intervention du législateur pour résoudre la problématique des délais judiciaires et fait ressortir les limites consubstantielles à une tentative de règlement par la voie jurisprudentielle. La seconde partie analyse les raisons profondes de l'allongement des délais judiciaires en matière pénale et elle démontre que, pour des raisons constitutionnelles, c'est le législateur qui a compétence pour intervenir sur deux de ces causes. Cette partie explore finalement, par l'exemple canadien, les réformes du droit criminel et du droit pénal réglementaire qui pourraient assurer la protection efficace et équitable du droit constitutionnel.

El presente trabajo de investigación analiza y desarrolla el funcionamiento de las adquisiciones de artículos o ítems virtuales en mundos o plataformas virtuales, desde un punto de vista jurídico. Este sofisticado mercado virtual, en el que interactúan millones de usuarios, plantea diversos desafíos relacionados con la protección de los artículos adquiridos, al igual que en el mundo real. Es así que, para identificar los tipos de protección jurídica de estos artículos, se analiza la naturaleza jurídica de los mismos desde el Common Law hasta el derecho peruano, lo cual nos lleva a poner en la balanza los derechos de propiedad tradicionales y los de propiedad intelectual y los derechos de autor, los cuales encuentran seguridad jurídica en los EULA o acuerdos de licencia que suscriben los usuarios. Es a partir de allí que destacamos cuáles son los mecanismos de solución de conflictos entre usuarios y cómo deben llevarse a cabo, para luego plantear propuestas ante los nuevos retos virtuales. / This paper analyzes and develops the functioning of the acquisition of virtual items in virtual worlds or platforms, from a legal point of view. This sophisticated virtual marketplace, in which millions of users interact, poses various challenges related to the protection of acquired items, just as in the real world. In order to identify the types of legal protection for these articles, the legal nature of these articles is analyzed from the Common Law to the Peruvian law, which leads us to put in the balance the traditional property rights and the intellectual property and copyright rights, which find legal security in the EULA or license agreements signed by the users. There, we highlight the mechanisms to solve conflicts among users and how they should be carried out, and then we make proposals to face the new virtual challenges.

L'auteur analyse la mise en œuvre du droit constitutionnel de l'inculpé d'être jugé dans un délai raisonnable. Partant du constat de l'allongement des délais judiciaires en matière pénale au sens large (les procès criminels y compris) malgré la baisse continue du taux de criminalité et du volume des poursuites des infractions pénales graves, l'auteur démontre l'impuissance des tribunaux à faire respecter cette garantie. Il démontre ensuite que cette impuissance est due au fait que deux des principales causes de ces délais relèvent du législateur. L'auteur en conclut donc qu'une intervention législative, à travers une réforme en profondeur de certains aspects de la législation pénale, est nécessaire si l'on souhaite parvenir à une mise en œuvre à la fois efficace et équitable de cette garantie constitutionnelle. Une telle initiative législative pourrait d'ailleurs renforcer la collaboration entre les tribunaux et le législateur et elle constituerait un complément nécessaire à la jurisprudence constitutionnelle. Pour y arriver, l'auteur analyse les raisons historiques et constitutionnelles qui assurent l'historicité d'une intervention législative dans ce domaine et celles qui expliqueraient les difficultés persistantes des tribunaux à régler cette problématique. L'analyse se fait principalement dans le cadre du système juridique anglo-canadien et, accessoirement, dans celui de la France, l'objectif étant de mieux illustrer le propos dans deux contextes juridiques différents, soit les traditions juridiques de la common law et du droit romano-civiliste. L'auteur présente finalement des pistes de solutions à explorer au Canada pour effectuer la nécessaire réforme du droit criminel et du droit pénal réglementaire pour assurer durablement la mise en œuvre équilibrée du droit constitutionnel concerné. La thèse se divise en deux parties. La première porte sur l'historique de la protection du principe de célérité du procès pénal (d'où est tiré le droit constitutionnel en cause) à partir du droit romain et par la suite en droit anglo-canadien et en droit français jusqu'à nos jours. Cette partie démontre l'historicité de l'intervention du législateur pour résoudre la problématique des délais judiciaires et fait ressortir les limites consubstantielles à une tentative de règlement par la voie jurisprudentielle. La seconde partie analyse les raisons profondes de l'allongement des délais judiciaires en matière pénale et elle démontre que, pour des raisons constitutionnelles, c'est le législateur qui a compétence pour intervenir sur deux de ces causes. Cette partie explore finalement, par l'exemple canadien, les réformes du droit criminel et du droit pénal réglementaire qui pourraient assurer la protection efficace et équitable du droit constitutionnel.

La réforme et l’harmonisation du droit des sûretés mobilières sont à l’ordre du jour de plusieurs organisations internationales, car il est admis qu’un régime de sûretés efficient favorise l’accès au crédit à de faibles coûts. L’harmonisation de ce droit comporte deux volets. D’une part, dans l’Occident industrialisé, les efforts d’harmonisation vont de la réforme des droits internes à l’établissement de régimes spéciaux relativement à des biens spécifiques (principalement les biens mobiles de grande valeur, tels les aéronefs, le matériel ferroviaire roulant et les satellites, et les biens incorporels, comprenant les créances, valeurs mobilières, actifs financiers et titres intermédiés). Ces efforts d’harmonisation démontrent que d’un point de vue systémique, malgré quelques différences notables, les régimes nord-américains et européens sont fondés sur des principes similaires et atteignent des résultats comparables. En résulte l’émergence d’un ordre juridique transnational en droit des sûretés mobilières, fondé sur les principes de la primauté de l’individu et la reconnaissance du droit de propriété de l’individu dans ses biens, mis en œuvre grâce à l’État de droit. D’autre part, les institutions financières internationales encouragent l’établissement de régimes de sûretés dans les pays en voie de développement qui obéissent aux mêmes critères que ceux de l’Occident, en insistant sur les réformes institutionnelles et juridiques visant l’établissement d’une bonne gouvernance et l’État de droit. Cependant, une transposition des régimes occidentaux ne peut se faire sans heurts dans les pays en voie de développement, notamment pour des raisons socio-culturelles et politiques. Lorsque les principes de la primauté de l’individu, de la propriété individuelle et de l’État de droit ne sont pas reconnus dans un pays donné, la réforme et l’harmonisation du droit des sûretés s’en trouvent compromis. La démonstration de l’état d’avancement de la réforme et de l’harmonisation du droit des sûretés dans les pays occidentaux industrialisés est faite grâce à une comparaison du Uniform Commercial Code, du Code civil du Québec, des Personal Property Security Acts des provinces canadiennes de common law, des principes des droits français et anglais, de l’influence du droit communautaire sur les pays membres de l’Union Européenne. Sont analysés, aussi, dans cette optique, les principaux instruments de l’harmonisation du droit émanant des organisations internationales. Par ailleurs, deux études de cas relatifs à la réforme du crédit foncier en Égypte et à la réforme de l’urbanisme et de l’habitat en République démocratique du Congo, viennent étayer les difficultés que rencontrent les institutions internationales, telles la Banque mondiale et l’ACDI, dans le cadre de projets de réformes visant la bonne gouvernance et l’instauration d’un véritable État de droit, en partie à cause d’un pluralisme des ordres juridiques de ces pays. / The reform and harmonization of secured transactions on movable (or personal) property is fostered by international organizations, on the assumption that an efficient regime of secured transactions will give access to affordable credit to a large number of persons and corporations. Such reform and harmonization process can be explained according to its two main features. Firstly, in Western and developped countries, the focus is on endeavours to harmonize the various regimes internally and to establish special regimes with respect to specific assets (for instance, high value mobile equipment, such as aircrafts, rolling stock or satellites, on the one hand, or incorporeal property, including securities, financial assets or security entitlements, on the other hand). Even though some differences remains from a systemic point of view, north american and european regimes are based on similar principles and achieve comparable results. It is therefore possible to see the emergence of a transnational legal order in the law of secured transactions, based on individuals and the enforcement of their rights of ownership, ascertained by the Rule of Law principle. Secondly, international financial institutions are encouraging the implementation of secured transactions regimes in developing countries along the same criteria as those used in Western developed countries, in the context of institutional and legal reforms under governance and rule of law projects. However, Western regimes must be adapted and customized before they are transplanted into a developing country. Indeed, for socio-cultural and political reasons, it is not possible to establish the same kind of regime therein. When individual rights and freedoms, including the right of ownership and the Rule of Law, are not recognized, the reform and harmonization of secured transactions is not likely to happen. The status of advancement of the reform and harmonization of secured transactions in the developed world is illustrated by a comparison between the Uniform Commercial Code, the Civil Code of Québec, the Personal Property Security Acts of canadian common law provinces, the applicable principles under both French and English Law, and the influence of European Law on its member states. An analysis of the main harmonization instruments proposed by international organizations is also conducted. Finally, the pitfalls of governance and rule of law reform projects are well described by two case studies. The first one deals with real estate and mortgage law reforms in Egypt, with a goal to encourage affordable access to housing; the second one is about urban planing and housing reforms in the Democratic Republic of Congo. The existence of a multiplicity of legal orders in these countries explains the difficulties encountered in such reform processes.

Constante alvo de preocupação dos processualistas, os efeitos das decisões judiciais ganham contornos inovadores e polêmicos no domínio da jurisdição constitucional brasileira. O presente estudo, além de fazer breve incursão sobre as premissas conceituais e classificatórias do controle de constitucionalidade, busca subsídios doutrinários sobre a classificação da sentença à luz dos efeitos que produzem, para, após, sistematizar idéias capazes de eliminar a falta de nitidez que paira sobre muitos dos efeitos produzidos na fiscalização judicial de constitucionalidade. A investigação se debruça sobre quais são esses efeitos, como e quando se operam no processo, o campo pelos quais se estendem e a quem alcançam; tal exame é feito de acordo com as características do controle difuso, incidental e concreto, de um lado, e da fiscalização concentrada, principal e abstrata, de outro. Nessa parte da pesquisa, para além de temas como o da retroatividade da decisão e o da modulação de efeitos, despontam, ainda: (i) a assimilação da súmula vinculante e da repercussão geral como institutos que potencializam a eficácia das decisões; (ii) projeção de efeitos erga omnes por meio de recurso extraordinário; (iii) o efeito vinculante visto como fator de aproximação entre os sistemas da common law e da civil law; (iv) as características do denominado processo objetivo; (v) a força obrigatória dos motivos determinantes do decisório; (vi) natureza dúplice e causa petendi aberta das ações de controle abstrato, entre outros. Ao final, considerando-se os possíveis conflitos entre as decisões editadas no controle difuso e no concentrado, analisa-se o impacto de um processo sobre o outro. Nesse contexto, destaca-se a abordagem da ação rescisória e dos instrumentos previstos nos artigos 475-L, §1º, I e 741, parágrafo único do Código de Processo Civil como possíveis caminhos de revisão da sentença que contraria decisão do Supremo Tribunal Federal em matéria constitucional. Considerações conclusivas de cunho crítico encerram o trabalho. / Object of constant concern for Procedural Law authors, the effects of judicial decisions gain new and controversial configurations in the scope of the Brazilian constitutional jurisdiction. This paper, besides presenting a brief overview on the conceptual and classificatory premises of the control of constitutionality, seeks support in legal writings on the classification of the sentences regarding the effects they produce, and then systematizes ideas capable of eliminating the lack of clarity in many of the effects produced in the judicial control of constitutionality. This study looks into such effects, how and when they manifest in the proceeding, the scope to which they extend and who they affect. Such examination is based, on the one hand, on the characteristics of diffuse, incidental and concrete control, and on the other hand, on the main and abstract concentrated control. In this part of the research, besides issues like retroactivity of decision and flexibilization of decision effects, other questions emerge, such as: (i) assimilation of binding precedent and of the general repercussion as potentializing agents of the efficacy of the decisions; (ii) projection of erga omnes effects, by means of extraordinary appeal; (iii) binding effect seen as a factor of approximation between common law and civil law systems; (iv) the characteristics of the so-called objective proceeding; (v) the binding force of the motives that determine the decision; (vi) Double nature and open causa petendi of the actions of abstract control, among others. Finally, considering the possible conflicts between the decisions passed in the diffuse control and in the concentrated control, the impact of one proceeding on the other is analyzed. Accordingly, rescissory action and instruments provided for in articles 475-L, paragraph 1, I and 741, sole paragraph, of the Code of Civil Procedure, are highlighted as possible paths towards revision of sentence, which contradicts decision by the STF (Federal Supreme Court) in constitutional matter. The paper is concluded with critical considerations.