The Precarious Position of Denialism Regulations in Domestic and International Law
Location
Littlefoot B Room 124B
Start Date
21-4-2023 10:30 AM
End Date
21-4-2023 11:45 AM
Publication Date
2023
Disciplines
Arts and Humanities | Law | Social and Behavioral Sciences
Description
Denialism regulations have a precarious position in the wider body of domestic and international hate speech laws—politically, normatively, doctrinally, and conceptually. This paper seeks to understand the nature and causes of that precarious position, both current and historic. At the domestic level, denialism regulations have developed in a piecemeal way and exhibit significant variety. The paper argues that these features are best explained by the fact that denialism regulations serve a plurality of different functions and purposes including but not limited to preventing the stirring up of hatred.
Due to the diversity of functions and purposes, it should come as no surprise that domestic denialism regulations are neither ubiquitous nor uniform in nature. At the international level, the spike in the enactment of domestic regulations against Holocaust denial in Europe during the 1990s, for example, stands in marked contrast to the absence of provisions dedicated to combating the problem of Holocaust denial in the early landmark international laws dealing with incitement to genocide and hate speech in general, during the period from the end of World War II through to the late 1990s. The International Convention on the Elimination of all Forms of Racial Discrimination (ICERD), for example, was a keystone international law against hate speech both because it is now widely recognised as such by judges and legal scholars alike and because it was given precisely this status by Mari Matsuda in her seminal article on the legal concept hate speech. And yet the issue of denialism is addressed in neither the ICERD itself nor in the travaux préparatoires, suggesting it was simply not on the radar. The situation has changed considerably since the late 1990s, of course, and denialism provisions are now a fixture of international law. But this still begs the question of whether denialist speech can be aptly classified as hate speech, conceptually, normatively, and legally speaking, when some of the landmark international instruments on hate speech seem to suggest otherwise.
The paper puts forward and critically evaluates several potential reasons for the absence of denialism provisions from the landmark international instruments on hate speech. Finally, it argues that the most plausible reasons for the absence in no way preclude denialist speech from being classified as a sui generis form of hate speech in international law.
Description Format
html
Recommended Citation
Sinclair, Adriana, "The Precarious Position of Denialism Regulations in Domestic and International Law" (2023). International Conference on Hate Studies. 15.
https://repository.gonzaga.edu/icohs/2023/seventh/15
Full Text of Presentation
wf_no
Media Format
flash_audio
Session Title
Genocide Denial in Memes, Online, or in Museums and Denialism in the Law
Type
Panel
The Precarious Position of Denialism Regulations in Domestic and International Law
Littlefoot B Room 124B
Denialism regulations have a precarious position in the wider body of domestic and international hate speech laws—politically, normatively, doctrinally, and conceptually. This paper seeks to understand the nature and causes of that precarious position, both current and historic. At the domestic level, denialism regulations have developed in a piecemeal way and exhibit significant variety. The paper argues that these features are best explained by the fact that denialism regulations serve a plurality of different functions and purposes including but not limited to preventing the stirring up of hatred.
Due to the diversity of functions and purposes, it should come as no surprise that domestic denialism regulations are neither ubiquitous nor uniform in nature. At the international level, the spike in the enactment of domestic regulations against Holocaust denial in Europe during the 1990s, for example, stands in marked contrast to the absence of provisions dedicated to combating the problem of Holocaust denial in the early landmark international laws dealing with incitement to genocide and hate speech in general, during the period from the end of World War II through to the late 1990s. The International Convention on the Elimination of all Forms of Racial Discrimination (ICERD), for example, was a keystone international law against hate speech both because it is now widely recognised as such by judges and legal scholars alike and because it was given precisely this status by Mari Matsuda in her seminal article on the legal concept hate speech. And yet the issue of denialism is addressed in neither the ICERD itself nor in the travaux préparatoires, suggesting it was simply not on the radar. The situation has changed considerably since the late 1990s, of course, and denialism provisions are now a fixture of international law. But this still begs the question of whether denialist speech can be aptly classified as hate speech, conceptually, normatively, and legally speaking, when some of the landmark international instruments on hate speech seem to suggest otherwise.
The paper puts forward and critically evaluates several potential reasons for the absence of denialism provisions from the landmark international instruments on hate speech. Finally, it argues that the most plausible reasons for the absence in no way preclude denialist speech from being classified as a sui generis form of hate speech in international law.