Francesca Capone – författare

This book offers various perspectives, with an international legal focus, on an important and underexplored topic, which has recently gained momentum: the issue of foreign fighters. It provides an overview of challenges, pays considerable attention to the status of foreign fighters, and addresses numerous approaches, both at the supranational and national level, on how to tackle this problem. Outstanding experts in the field – lawyers, historians and political scientists – contributed to the present volume, providing the reader with a multitude of views concerning this multifaceted phenomenon. Particular attention is paid to its implications in light of the armed conflicts currently taking place in Syria and Iraq. 

Andrea de Guttry is a Full Professor of International Law at the Scuola Superiore Sant’Anna, Pisa, Italy. Francesca Capone is a Research Fellow in Public International Law at the Scuola Superiore Sant’Anna. Christophe Paulussen is a Senior Researcher at the T.M.C. Asser Instituut in The Hague, the Netherlands, and a Research Fellow at the International Centre for Counter-Terrorism – The Hague.

This book, a follow-up publication to the 2016 volume Foreign Fighters under International Law and Beyond, zooms in on the responses that the international community and individual States are implementing in response to (prospective and actual) returning foreign fighters (FFs) and their families, focusing on returnees from Syria and Iraq to European countries. 

As States and international organisations are still ‘learning by doing’, the role of the academic community is to help steer the process by bridging the divide between international standards and their implementation at the national level and between security concerns and human rights law. Furthermore, the academic community can and should assist in identifying ways forward that are both effective, sustainable and international law-compliant. Those are, ultimately, the goals that the present volume seeks to pursue. 

The observations, recommendations and warnings included in this book will be useful in future debates on (returning) FFs, both in the academic world and in the world of policy makers and practitioners, as well as to the public at large.

Francesca Capone is Associate Professor of International Law at the Istituto DIRPOLIS of the Scuola Superiore Sant’Anna in Pisa, Italy.

Christophe Paulussen is Senior Researcher International Law at the T.M.C. Asser Instituut in The Hague, The Netherlands.

Rebecca Mignot-Mahdavi is Lecturer in International Law at the Manchester International Law Centre, University of Manchester, School of Law in Manchester, United Kingdom.

This book deals with a crucial and yet under-explored topic that has increasingly gained momentum during modern armed conflicts, i.e. dual-use objects under international humanitarian law (IHL). Dual-use objects, such as energy infrastructures, water installations and civilian means of transportation and communication, which could be used also for military purposes, is a term that has entered the IHL jargon but has not attained the status of a legal concept.

Dual-use objects are easily identifiable and yet remain difficult to pin down, in particular when it comes to separating them from military objectives and determining the applicable rules to enhance their protection. Although attacks against critical infrastructures are traditionally justified as being part of a legitimate military strategy, experts and, in some instances, governments are uncomfortable with the idea of depriving the civilian population of services and goods essential to its survival. Yet, the sense of discomfort has not led to any significant improvement and ‘dual-use objects’ remain on the target lists of most belligerents. A number of factors, which this book analyses to explain the rise and rationale behind the current ''mainstream approach'' to dual-use objects, contributed to cementing the status quo.

The present book, building on these premises, pursues a twofold aim. First, this book seeks to fill a significant gap in the IHL scholarship in light of the limited attention that the topic has received so far. Second, this book aims to challenge the mainstream approach through a rigorous inquiry and the development of a new paradigm. The paradigm shift, which is at the heart of this study, places under the spotlight the civilian function of dual-use objects and reclaim the central role of the individual actors that plan, order and execute attacks against these targets. This book aspires to become an essential tool for academics and practitioners working in the IHL field, but at the same time its readership is expected to include students at all levels that have an interest in the topic and seeks to approach it in an innovative way.

Francesca Capone is Associate Professor of International Law at the Institute DIRPOLIS of the Scuola Superiore Sant’Anna in Pisa, Italy.