Crimes Against Humanity: The concept of humanity in international law

Raphaëlle Nollez-Goldbach (1)

1 CTAD - Centre de Théorie et Analyse du Droit

With the development of international criminal courts and tribunals, the concept of humanity developed considerably at the end of the twentieth century and the beginning of the twenty-first century to ground crimes against humanity. The 'laws of humanity' were first introduced in international law with the Declaration of Saint Petersburg in 1868, with the purpose of renouncing the use of certain explosive projectiles in times of war. The Nuremberg case-law is the first example of the occurrence of humanity in international criminal case-law. The International Court of Justice defined humanity as all present and future generations, in one of the rare case-law occurrences of the concept of humanity. In France, for instance, the legal definition of humanity was overturned by the bioethics laws of 2004. Since only crimes against humanity were part of the criminal code, a new category of crimes against all human beings was created: crimes against the human species.

Domaines: Droit

Raphaëlle Nollez-Goldbach. Crimes Against Humanity: The concept of humanity in international law. Philipp Kastner. International Criminal Law in Context, Routledge, 2017, 9781315560687. ⟨10.4324/9781315560687⟩. ⟨halshs-03285505⟩