Bloomsbury The Amicus Curiae in International Criminal Justice (Studies in International and Comparative Criminal Law)

The amicus curiae – or friend of the court – is the main mechanism for actors other than the parties, including civil society actors and states, to participate directly in proceedings in international criminal tribunals. Yet reliance on this mechanism raises a number of significant questions concerning: the functions performed by amici, which actors seek to intervene and why, and the influence of amicus interventions on judicial outcomes. Ultimately, the amicus curiae may have a significant impact on the fairness, representativeness and legitimacy of the tribunals’ proceedings and decisions. This book provides a comprehensive examination of the amicus curiae practice of the International Criminal Court and other major international criminal tribunals and offers suggestions for the role of the amicus curiae. In doing so, the authors develop a framework to augment the potential contributions of amicus participation in respect of the legitimacy of international criminal tribunals and their decisions, while minimising interference with the core judicial competence of the tribunal and the right of the accused to a fair and expeditious trial. Review The exploration of legitimacy throughout the text is highly effective … the authors’ decision to adopt both an analytical and normative approach to the role of the amicus means that the text functions at multiple levels of usefulness to academia and practitioners alike. --Human Rights Law Review Molly Thomas, International Criminal Court, The Hague, the Netherlands About the Author Dr Emma Palmer is a Lecturer at Griffith University.; Dr Hannah Woolaver is an Associate Professor Lecturer at the Faculty of Law, University of Cape Town.; Sarah Williams is a Senior Lecturer at the University of New South Wales, Australia. She was previously the Dorset Fellow in Public International Law at the British Institute of International and Comparative Law, a Legal Researcher at the Foreign and Commonwealth Office of the United Kingdom and a Lecturer in Law at Durham University. Sarah Williams is a Professor at the Faculty of Law, UNSW Sydney.