Much attention has been given to a series of decisions by the U.S. Supreme Court regarding the effects of the decisions of the International Court of Justice interpreting the Vienna Convention on Consular Relations. On 19 September, 2006, the German Bundesverfassungsgericht (BVerfG - German Federal Constitutional Court), has made its first judgment on the issue. The decision is significant for international law and even more specifically for U.S. jurists: Its outcome differs significantly from the U.S. Supreme Court decisions.

On 3 May 2007, the European Court of Human Rights in Strasbourg (hereinafter “the Court”) rendered a judgment in the case Bączkowski and Others v. Poland The Court stated that Poland violated Article 11 (freedom of association and assembly), Article 13 (right to an effective remedy) in conjunction with Article 11 and Article 14 (prohibition of discrimination) in conjunction with Article 11 of the Convention for the Protection of Human Rights and Fundamental Freedoms.

Why should public law be concerned with networks? What is the point of taking up a concept that does not originate from a legal context? What is the appeal of this topic? Perhaps the concept describes certain “basic structures of post-nation society”, thus questioning traditional central categories of public law; certainly, it has a certain modernistic charm. Public law, however, has thus far not succumbed to that charm. This is understandable. Dealing with networks is frequently based on an affect against hierarchical structures that favours spontaneous coordination solutions and their legitimacy through output. In jurisprudence, this effect is met more often than not with suspicion. This suspicion stems from a number of objections.

Shakespeare's famed citation “What's in a name? That which we call a rose by any other name would smell as sweet” may be one of the most used quotations in contemporary literature. It serves to provide guidance in reviewing ones assessment of new perspectives on a given topic. The implications of the quotation induce the reader to feel concordant with the assumption that whatever name a given phenomenon is accorded, it is of little importance because the objects are similar and hence there is no reason to emphasise a peripheral and meaningless concept such as a name and the idea which it embraces. By contrast, intellectual property rights, and therein trademark law, is conceptually based on the assumption that a verbal mark, figure or colour of a given good or service need to be protected since these immaterial notions give rise to patrimonial rights conferred to the owner of the registered trademark. A well known slogan or figurative mark is capable of having significant commercial value as demonstrated in the recent dispute between Apple and Cisco concerning the right of the former to use the trademark iPhone. However, it is important to note that the essential raison d'ětre of trademark law is not only to confer patrimonial rights to a legal or natural person and thus prevent an abusive use by a third party, but essentially to guarantee the origin of goods or services to the consumer and hence enable him, without any danger of confusion, to distinguish the goods or services from others which have another origin. Having said that it should also be noted that traditional trademark theory is perceived on the assumption that trademarks serve to minimize the likelihood of consumer confusion and prohibits the use of a trademark with regard to competing or similar goods only. However the “dilution theory” challenges this approach to trademark law as it also disseminates the postulate to prohibit the use of certain famous and/or characteristic trademarks on non-competing goods on the ground that such use dilutes and possibly erodes a given trademark's commercial value and its hold on the consumer.

The fall of the Berlin Wall and the end of the Cold War were greeted by many as an important step in the unstoppable development of human civilization. Francis Fukuyama even announced, in his celebrated essay of the same name, the “end of history” and the triumph of the liberal democratic model, which, according to him, was soon to become the most dominant, if not the only, form of organized human community.

This article introduces Turkey's Law on Utilization of Renewable Energy Sources for the Purpose of Generating Electrical Energy (hereinafter “Law”) which, almost unnoticed abroad, was adopted on 18 May 2005. It provides an overview of the general provisions of the Law, as well as other supporting legislation regarding renewable energy sources (“RES”). However, the legislation on bio-fuel will not be taken into account.

Constitutionalism beyond the state concerns itself with the relation among various legal levels and the position of the individual in a multilevel legal system. The question how human rights are protected against international organizations who increasingly take on executive powers cannot be thoroughly answered without confronting a fundamental debate in international law theory: the constitutionalism-fragmentation debate. The European Court of First Instance as well as the European Court of Justice (ECJ) had to deal recently and are still dealing with this complex in a number of cases.

On 15 February 2007, the European Court of Justice delivered its judgment in the case Lechouritou and others v. the State of the Federal Republic of Germany. The case concerned the question whether compensation for acts perpetrated by armed forces in the course of warfare can be asserted on the basis of the jurisdictional rules provided for by the Brussels Convention. The Court held that such an action did not fall within the scope of the Convention since it could, due to its origin in sovereign acts, not be regarded as a civil matter in terms of Art. 1 Brussels Convention. Thus, jurisdiction for claims directed at the compensation for damages resulting from the exercise of public power cannot be based on the Brussels Convention. The analysis of the Court's ruling will proceed as follows: First, the history of the case as well as the essence of the judgment will be presented (infra B) before giving a review on the Court's previous case law on the concept of “civil matters” (infra C). This outline will be followed by an analysis and a classification of the ruling in the Court's jurisprudence (infra D), before eventually the results will be summarized (infra E).

Corruption poses an increasingly serious threat against Turkey as well as the rest of the world in many respects. The fight against corruption is crucial, in particular, to achieve an economic and political stability, to attract foreign investors and to establish the rule of law. In addition to those interests, which are common for almost all countries, anti-corruption has a particular importance for Turkey in the achievement of its goal of becoming a European Union member, since anti-corruption is expected to feature prominently in Turkey's talks on European Union accession.