HL Strydom Professor in Public International Law, Faculty of Law, University of the Free State

JL Pretorius Professor in and Head of the Department of Constitutional Law, Director of the Centre for Human Rights Studies, Faculty of Law, University of the Free State

ME Klinck Lecturer in Constitutional Law, Faculty of Law, University of the Free State

The establishment of a constitutional dispensation in South Africa where a bill of rights occupies an important position, has ushered in profound changes for government, legal practitioners and the legal academy. Since all disciplines of law are influenced by fundamental rights, they are forced to acquaint themselves with developments in the field of fundamental rights, and in so doing, familiarise themselves with international source material previously unknown to them. This familiarisation is often hampered by the inaccessibility of relevant source material

Key benefits

• Compliments and further develops efforts made in facilitating access to human rights sources

• Focuses on an important body of international human rights standards which falls outside the scope of conventional sources of human rights law - "soft law"

• Supplements often vague human rights principles, as well as providing comprehensive and detailed guidelines on the implications of human rights principles for specific areas, such as law enforcement, criminal proceedings, correctional institutions, etc

Who should purchase?

• Legal Practitioners

• Government officials

• Academics

• Students

Topics covered

Section A: The courts, judicial officers and criminal proceedings

Section B: The treatment of prisoners and detainees

• General standards

• Juvenile detainees and prisoners

• Persons detained on grounds of mental ill-health or suffering from mental illness

• Foreign prisoners

• Non-custodial measures

• Regional standards

Appendices

Section C: Law enforcement

• General

• Code of conduct

• Basic principles on the use of force and firearms

• Principles on the effective prevention and investigation of extra-legal, arbitrary and summary executions

• Declaration on the protection of all persons from enforced disappearance

Practical Features

• Each section is introduced by means of background material and a brief comment thus placing the instruments pended to each section in a proper context

• Extensive cross-reference to conventional instruments and case law