Category: Publications

Reaction to Obama’s Speech on NSA Reform

Following a much-anticipated speech by President Obama outlining the broad parameters of reform of the NSA, I published two columns. The first, in The Conversation UK, emphasised the need to react cautiously to the speech. While, in its tone, the Obama speech suggested a firm embrace of the idea that security and liberty are complementary–rather than oppositional–concepts, the detail in the speech was light. It is that detail that will, of course, allow us ultimately to assess the meaningfulness of the proposed reform.

In a second column, on Human Rights in Ireland, I reflected on the prevention paradigm that continues to frame Obama’s approach to counter-terrorism. Of course, the US is not alone in this; preventing rather than reacting to is a core element of counter-terrorism in the UK and EU as well as in the United States. However, in all cases it is important that we are cautious and aware of the implications of a preventative mentality for decision making, policy making, and operations in the CT field. No real assessment of policy reforms or even legislative measures can be done unless we take the implications of preventativeness into account.

AJCL article extracted in ‘Constitutions, Security and the Rule of Law’

An article that I co-authored with Suzanne Kingston and published in the American Journal of Comparative Law ((2010) 58(2) AJCL 359-413) has been extracted in a collected edited by Sudha Setty, entitled Constitutions, Security and the Rule of Law (2014, iDebate). The full version of the article, entitled “Rights, Security and Conflicting International Obligations: Exploring Inter-Jurisdictional Judicial Dialogues in Europe”, can be downloaded for free here or read on Durham’s online repository here. The book, which features a range of international perspectives, can be ordered here.

Column reflecting on the NSA Report

I have published a short column reflecting on two of the more interesting proposals in the NSA report released last week: the data retention proposal (which is intended to prevent the NSA itself from collecting metadata) and the proposals for a Public Interest Advocate to be appointed to the FISC. The latter is a particularly fascinating proposal, in my view. The column, published on The Conversation, can be read here.

Latest Publication: On privatisation and counter-terrorist surveillance

Last December I attended and spoke at the IACL Working Group on Constitutional Respones to Terrorism conference on surveillance at UNSW Law School. The edited book arising from that conference has now been published by Routledge and is edited by Fergal Davis, Nicola McGarrity and George Williams and is entitled Surveillance, Counter-Terrorism and Comparative Constitutionalism. In it I publish a chapter entitled “Privatized Counter-Terrorist Surveillance: Constitutionalism Undermined”. I describe the chapter thus in the introduction:

This chapter is concerned with the constitutionalist challenges posed by privatized counter-terrorist surveillance (PCTS). PCTS is defined here as surveillance done for the purposes or in the course of a broader counter-terrorist regime and in which private (by which is meant non-state) actors are involved. This chapter characterizes PCTS as one illustration of a broader trend of privatization in counter-terrorism and problematizes it as a phenomenon  that severely undermines the core constitutionalist commitment to limited, transparent and accountable power.

The entire collection–which is very comparative in its approach–is an insightful and intersting one. It can be ordered here.