This book offers a critical and original examination of how the doctrine of superior responsibility has been interpreted and applied in international criminal law. It challenges prevailing scholarly approaches by shifting the focus from legal characterization to the doctrine's conceptual components -- an often overlooked but more pressing arena. At the same time, by tracing the doctrine's evolution from ancient military theory through religious and medieval legal traditions to its current position in international criminal law, the book interrogates the underlying tension between its nature as a form of vicarious liability and the principle of personal culpability central to criminal law theory -- an approach the book critically examines, and perhaps ultimately rejects. Rather than merely summarizing case law, the book explores how and why international tribunals -- particularly the International Criminal Court in the landmark
Bemba case -- have applied the doctrine inconsistently. It engages with jurisprudence from
ad hoc and hybrid tribunals to expose doctrinal ambiguities and recurring misapplications that undermine legal coherence and accountability. An additional contribution of this work is the development of a syllogistic test for assessing superior responsibility in contexts involving human rights violations and treaty-based offenses. Balancing doctrinal critique with a normative analysis, the book offers a deeper theoretical and practical lens on one of international criminal law's most debated areas. Intended for legal scholars, practitioners and graduate students, this book is a valuable resource for anyone seeking a more principled and analytically rigorous understanding of superior responsibility in both historical and contemporary contexts.
Humoud Y. Al-Fadhli is an Assistant Professor in the Department of International Law of the College of Law of Kuwait University in Sabah Al-Salem University City, Kuwait.
本書對於優越責任的教義在國際刑法中的詮釋和應用進行了批判性和原創性的檢視。它挑戰了當前學術界的主流觀點，將焦點從法律特徵轉移到該教義的概念組成部分——這是一個經常被忽視但更為迫切的領域。
同時，通過追溯該教義從古代軍事理論、宗教和中世法律傳統到其在國際刑法中當前地位的演變，本書探討了其作為一種替代責任形式的本質與刑法理論中個人有罪原則之間的潛在緊張關係——這是一種本書進行批判性檢視，並最終可能拒絕的方式。
本書不僅僅是對案例法的總結，而是探討了國際法庭——特別是在具有里程碑意義的 Bemba case 中的國際刑事法院——如何以及為何不一致地應用該教義。它參與了 ad hoc 和混合法庭的法理學，以揭示教義上的模糊性和反覆出現的錯誤應用，這些都削弱了法律的一致性和問責性。
本書的另一個貢獻是發展了一種三段論測試，用於評估涉及人權侵犯和基於條約的罪行的優越責任。在對教義的批判與規範分析之間取得平衡，本書提供了對國際刑法中最具爭議領域之一的更深層次的理論和實踐視角。
本書旨在為法律學者、實務工作者和研究生提供資源，對於任何希望在歷史和當代背景下更有原則性和分析性地理解優越責任的人來說，都是一個寶貴的資源。
Humoud Y. Al-Fadhli 是科威特大學法學院國際法系的助理教授，位於科威特的薩巴赫·阿爾·薩勒姆大學城。
