In a Time of Trouble: Law and Liberty in South Africa's State of Emergency

Can the law really protect human rights when they are most under siege? During much of South Africa's state of emergency, the country's highest court grimly rejected efforts to use the law to restrain emergency power. The tide of those decisions has now turned. As this important book shows, these changing judicial trends reveal both the weakness and strength of the law. Although no guarantee of liberty, law and legal traditions can help to slow the march of oppression.

Part 1 South Africa internal security law - constitutional framework and statutory designs: Parliamentary supremacy and the constricted field of judicial review of legislation; South African internal security statutes. Part 2 Hurley's case and the doctrinal bases for human rights jurisprudence in South Africa: Hurley and the character of legislative intention in South Africa; the interpretation of intention. Part 3 The Rabie Court and the Judicial Protection of the State of Emergency: the Rabie era; the rights denied. Part 4 The Rabie Court's protection of human rights: the rights not lost; the rights protected; the demands of the emegency against the claims of human rights. Part 5 The Corbett Court and the emergency: the change in the Court's decisions; the common doctrinal ground of the Rabie and Corbett Courts; the immediate causes of the change in the Court's approach. Part 6 Explaining the Court's performance - visions of law in South Africa: the Rabie Court - adherence to law in South African culture; the Corbett Court - the Bar and the Judiciary as carriers of a human rights tradition. Part 7 Lawyers against the emergency: lawyers' moral responsibility for their work; the value of emergency law work.