Public Interest Litigation in International Law

Justine Bendel is a Marie Skłodowska-Curie Fellow at the University of Copenhagen, Denmark. Her work focuses broadly on enforcement issues in international environmental and climate change law, with a particular emphasis on the impacts of international law on forests. Her monograph is entitled Litigating the Environment: Process and Procedure before International Courts and Tribunals (2023). Yusra Suedi is a Lecturer in International Law at the University of Manchester, UK. Prior to this, she was Fellow in Law at London School of Economics (LSE) Law School, UK. She holds a doctorate in Public International Law from the University of Geneva, Switzerland for her manuscript entitled The Individual in the Law and Practice of the International Court of Justice. She has worked for the United Nations Office in Geneva, the International Law Commission, the Institut Du Droit International, the International Labour Organization Administrative Tribunal and the International Court of Justice.

Table of Contents



1. Introduction

PART 1: The meaning and purpose of public interest litigation



2. Marion Esnault, On the pertinence of ‘public interest’ for international litigation



3. Yusra Suedi & Justine Bendel, Public interest litigation: a pipe dream or the future of international litigation?

PART 2: Public interest litigation before the International Court of Justice



4. Craig Eggett & Sarah Thin, Third party intervention before the International Court of Justice: A tool for litigation in the public interest?



5. Paula Wojcikiewicz Almeida & Miriam Cohen, Mapping the ‘public’ in public interest litigation: an empirical analysis of ‘participants’ before the International Court of Justice

PART 3: Procedural developments in public interest litigation



6. Brian McGarry & Nasim Zargarinejad, All That Glitters is Not Monetary Gold: Indispensable Parties and Public Interest Litigation before International Tribunals



7. Carlos Antonio Cruz Carrillo, The role of advisory opinions in addressing public interest issues

PART 4: Public interest litigation and non-state actors



8. Kristina Hellwig, Third-party investigation in international criminal law: public interest litigation in a broader sense?



9. Wasiq Abass Dar & Gautam Mohanty, NGOs as amicus in investor-state arbitration: Addressing public interest and human rights issues

PART 5: Public interest litigation and human rights



10. Maria-Louiza Deftou, Balancing public interest with health-related rights: current dilemmas and future prospects



11. Dinah Shelton, Reparations for Human Rights Violations: A Major Objective of Public Interest Litigation

PART 6: Public interest litigation and climate change



12. Vonintsoa Rafaly, Ocean-climate Litigation: Enforcing Public Interest Against all Odds



13. Corina Heri, Climate Cases as Public Interest Litigation before the European Court of Human Rights