Ciorciari John D. - Hybrid Justice: The Extraordinary Chambers in the Courts of Cambodia

More than thirty years after the fall of the Pol Pot regime, a UN-backed tribunal, fusing Cambodian and international law, procedure, and personnel, was established to try key Khmer Rouge officials for atrocities committed in the late 1970s. In this definitive scholarly treatment of the Extraordinary Chambers in the Courts of Cambodia (ECCC) from legal and political perspectives, John D. Ciorciari and Anne Heindel examine the ECCC's institutional features, compare it to other hybrid and international criminal courts, evaluate its operations, and draw lessons for the future.

Ciorciari and Heindel begin by discussing the political factors and historical contingencies that led the United Nations and Cambodian Government to create a hybrid tribunal with a number of unique features. Next, they examine the tribunal's operations to date, focusing on how its institutional form has affected its various intended functions. They argue that many aspects of the ECCC's judicial proceedings have been broadly consistent with international standards and that the Court's in-country location has provided important benefits in terms of public outreach and victim participation. Nevertheless, the authors demonstrate that the ECCC's complex, divided institutional structure and wrangling between national and international actors have slowed the proceedings, contributed to administrative irregularities, led to due process concerns, and jeopardized the Court's public legitimacy and ability to leave a legacy of credible justice. Ciorciari and Heindel argue that the ECCC's experiences reveal many of the challenges of managing a mass crimes process, especially in the context of a hybrid court. They conclude with recommendations on measures that can be taken to meet some of those challenges going forward.

John D. Ciorciari is an assistant professor at the Gerald R. Ford School of Public Policy at the University of Michigan.

Anne Heindel is legal advisor to the Documentation Center of Cambodia.

The scope of Law, Meaning, and Violence is defined by the wide-ranging scholarly debates signaled by each of the words in the title. Those debates have taken place among and between lawyers, anthropologists, political theorists, sociologists, and historians, as well as literary and cultural critics. This series is intended to recognize the importance of such ongoing conversations about law, meaning, and violence as well as to encourage and further them.

Series Editors:
Martha Minow, Harvard Law School
Austin Sarat, Amherst College

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THE EXTRAORDINARY CHAMBERS IN THE COURTS OF CAMBODIA

John D. Ciorciari and Anne Heindel

The University of Michigan Press
Ann Arbor

Copyright by the University of Michigan 2014
All rights reserved

This book may not be reproduced, in whole or in part, including illustrations, in any form (beyond that copying permitted by Sections 107 and 108 of the U.S. Copyright Law and except by reviewers for the public press), without written permission from the publisher.

Published in the United States of America by
The University of Michigan Press
Manufactured in the United States of America
Printed on acid-free paper

2017 2016 2015 2014 4 3 2 1

A CIP catalog record for this book is available from the British Library.

Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data

Ciorciari, John D. (John David), author.

Hybrid justice : the extraordinary chambers in the courts of Cambodia / John D. Ciorciari and Anne Heindel.

pages cm. (Law, meaning, and violence)

Includes bibliographical references and index

ISBN 978-0-472-11930-1 (cloth : alk. paper) ISBN 978-0-472-12021-5 (e-book)

1. CourtsCambodia. 2. CourtsCambodiaCases. 3. Justice, Administration ofCambodia. I. Heindel, Anne, author. II. Title.

KNM1580.C56 2014

347.861'01dc23

2013040221