The Routledge Handbook of Self-Determination and Secession explores the various debates surrounding the issues of self-determination and secession, and the legal, political, and normative implications they give rise to.Offering a broad survey of the state of the sub-discipline today, the chapters are divided into seven key parts: an Introduction, Self-Determination, Explaining and Justifying Secession, Secession Strategies, Counter-Secession Strategies, International Law a...

First published in 1997, this volume aims to present a new perspective on the history of the Serbs in the twentieth century, viewing this period through the lives of its most significant Serb participants. Its contributors represent a diverse variety of backgrounds, coming from different countries, academic disciplines, intellectual traditions and generations.The aim of this book is to present a new perspective on the history of the Serbs in the twentieth century through the lives ...

Secession is the creation of a new independent state out of an existing state. This key volume examines the political, social and legal processes of the practice of secession. Following an analysis of secessionist movements and their role in attempts at secession, eight case studies are explored to illustrate peaceful, violent, sequential and recursive secessions. This is followed by a look at the theoretical approaches and a discussion that focuses on the economic causes. Normative theori...

The present international order is characterized by the rapid globalization of economic activity, by systematic attempts to coordinate state responses to the outbreaks of violence and by unilateral military interventions against sovereign states either by the USA or by one of its regional allies. This collection explores the changes that the current international order has brought to the theory and practice of recognition of secessionist claims and to the conditions for secessionist mobili...

About half of today’s nation-states originated as some kind of breakaway state. The end of the Cold War witnessed a resurgence of separatist activity affecting nearly every part of the globe and stimulated a new generation of scholars to consider separatism and secession.As the 150th anniversary of the American Civil War approaches, this collection of essays allows us to view within a broader international context one of modern history's bloodiest conflicts over secession. The cont...

The intersection of law and religion is a growing area of study for academics working in both subject areas. This book draws together research on several collisions between the two arenas, including a study of religious clauses in the US constitution and the interplay between religion and law in Canada, Australia and South Africa. With an emphasis on common law traditions, this book will be essential reading for researchers and advanced students of law and religion.

Secession is a detachment of a territory from an existing state with the aim of creating a new state on the detached territory. Secession is usually an outcome of the political mobilization of a population on the territory to be detached and, as a political phenomenon, is a subject of study in the social sciences. Its impact on inter-state relations is a subject of study in international relations. But secession is also subject to regulation both in the constitutional law of sovereign stat...

The demise of the former Yugoslavia was brought about by various secessionist movements seeking international recognition of statehood. This book provides a critical analysis from an international law perspective of the break-up of Yugoslavia.Although international recognition was granted to the former Yugoslav republics of Slovenia, Croatia, Bosnia-Hercegovina and Macedonia, the claims of secessionist movements that sought a revision of existing internal federal borders were reject...

In Texas v. White (1869), the Supreme Court ruled that the unilateral secession of a state from the Union was unconstitutional because the Constitution created “an indestructible Union, composed of indestructible States.” The Court ruled “there was no place for reconsideration, or revocation, except through revolution, or through consent of the States.” In his iconoclastic work, Peter Radan demonstrates why the Court’s ruling was wrong and why, on the basis of American constitutio...

This book on China's constitution and its tradition of constitutionalism is one of the first in the English language, and as such provides a much needed overview of China's constitutional history and present arrangements. The nine chapters are divided into three parts. The first part (Chapters 1 & 2) deals with China's constitutional history, its indigenous and Confucian antecedents, as well as the turbulent century which led up to the 1982 Constitution and the new order which this ushered...

At the end of the Cold War, there was much talk of a new world order in which the sovereign state would be held to democratic account, fundamental rights would be respected, and conflict would be replaced by cooperation based on the rule of law. At the start of the new millenium most of this optimism has evaporated.This book examines why it is so difficult to improve standards of international behaviour and explores the pre-conditions for any realistic attempt to do so. It discusse...

Consociations are power-sharing arrangements, increasingly used to manage ethno-nationalist, ethno-linguistic, and ethno-religious conflicts. Current examples include Belgium, Bosnia, Northern Ireland, Burundi, and Iraq. Despite their growing popularity, they have begun to be challenged before human rights courts as being incompatible with human rights norms, particularly equality and non-discrimination. Courts and Consociations examines the use of power-sharing agreements, their ...