The New Human Rights-Based Huricompatisation Model of Ascertainment of Indigenous Customary Law: Strategies for Adequate Local and Global Public Access (Volume 2) eBook and Book (Paperback)

The New Human Rights-Based Huricompatisation Model of Ascertainment of Indigenous Customary Law: Strategies for Adequate Local and Global Public Access

By Dr. Leesi Ebenezer Mitee, PhD in international human rights law, legal information technology (legal informatics), indigenous customary law and indigenous rights

ISBN 9789083108568 (eBook)

ISBN 9789083108544 (Paperback)

Publisher: Koinonia Legal Research and Book Publishing, Tilburg, The Netherlands

In response to the growing global prominence of indigenous rights and the right of every person to know the laws that regulate the person’s conduct and activities, this pioneering book, The New Human Rights-Based Huricompatisation Model of Ascertainment of Indigenous Customary Law: Strategies for Adequate Local and Global Public Access (Volume 2 of the Human Right of Free Access to Public Legal Information Book Series), examines how adequate public access to the unwritten rules of indigenous customary law can be achieved in such a way that the method of providing that access also complies with the general human rights and the specific rights of indigenous communities (indigenous peoples).

The theory of legal certainty provided the theoretical framework for this book, an aspect of which is the concept of ascertainment of indigenous customary law. The other specific relevant concepts are the rule of law and the doctrine of ignorance of the law is no excuse. The United Nations-endorsed human rights-based approach (HRBA) provided the conceptual framework for analysing the human-rights requirements of the model ascertainment method, while the specific requirements for adequate public access to indigenous customary law were formulated from existing literature.

The findings of the study include the following: There are four existing methods of ascertainment of unwritten indigenous customary law, namely judicialization, codification, restatement, and self-statement; and those methods neither provide adequate public access to indigenous customary law nor protect the human rights and indigenous rights of the communities affected by the ascertainment of their law.

To provide an alternative to the existing deficient methods of ascertainment, this book develops the human rights-compliant and public access-adequate new model of ascertainment of indigenous customary law (acronymed as huricompatisation). Huricompatisation incorporates a mix of twelve relevant general human rights and specific indigenous rights into ten essential requirements for adequate public access to indigenous customary law.

This book argues that huricompatisation satisfies the need of the members of indigenous communities to know the applicable rules of their indigenous customary law and that it also preserves the evolving and adaptive nature of that law. Further, huricompatisation protects their general human rights (e.g. the right to a fair trial) and their specific indigenous rights which include their omnibus right to self-determination that encompasses their rights to self-governance in their internal affairs, culture, and indigenous identity. Additionally, huricompatisation provides the opportunity for unprecedented free public access to indigenous customary law from indigenous communities worldwide, some of which exist in modern urban cities like London.

The United Nations, regional bodies, governments at all levels, intergovernmental and nongovernmental organisations, other policymakers who work on indigenous matters, and indigenous communities will benefit from the law-reform utility and policy relevance of this book that extends the frontiers of the right of free access to public legal information to indigenous customary law globally.

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Keywords: Huricompatisation ascertainment of indigenous customary law, Human right of free access to public legal information (access to law), Right of public access to indigenous customary law, Customary law judicialization (judicial ascertainment), Customary law codification ascertainment, Customary law restatement ascertainment, Customary law self-statement ascertainment, Oral or unwritten law, Indigenous peoples, Indigenous communities, Indigenous nations

The Academic Article-Style Independent but Interconnected Chapters of the Book

Chapter 9: The Meaning and Forms of Indigenous Customary Law eBook

Chapter 10: The Right of Public Access to Indigenous Customary Law and the Concept of Ascertainment eBook

Chapter 11: The Human Rights-Based Approach as a Conceptual Framework and a Universal Mechanism for the Management of Social Projects eBook

Chapter 12: Huricompatisation as the New Human Rights-Based and Public Access-Adequate Model of Ascertainment of Indigenous Customary Law eBook

Chapter 13: The Legal Framework for the Implementation of the New Huricompatisation Model of Ascertainment of Indigenous Customary Law Projects eBook