Duration
30h Th
Number of credits
| Master in law (120 ECTS) | 6 crédits | |||
| Extra courses intended for exchange students (Erasmus, ...) | 6 crédits |
Lecturer
Language(s) of instruction
French language
Organisation and examination
Teaching in the second semester
Units courses prerequisite and corequisite
Prerequisite or corequisite units are presented within each program
Learning unit contents
The world is becoming increasingly international: abolition of borders, freedom of movement, tourism, relocation, dematerialization, electronic transfers, telecommunications, internet,... These are all concepts that reflect this reality. Criminality follows the same movement and exploits these new possibilities.
This course is devoted to the means used both by the international community and by the individual States to give adequate answers to these developments.
The answers are threefold:
1. Organize and improve the cooperation between States in the fight against crime. This will involve police and judicial cooperation. It will take the form of exchange of information, operational cooperation (for police cooperation), mutual legal assistance, extradition, transfer of proceedings or cooperation in enforcement of sentences (for judicial cooperation).
2. Approximate the definitions and criminalization of specific acts for which the international community considers it necessary to cooperate, including terrorism, organized crime, corruption, money laundering, trafficking in human beings.
3. Set up international actors to assist national authorities in their action or to act directly at international level.
The course will highlight the answers given at the different levels: global (UN, OECD, FATF), regional (Council of Europe, European Union) and national levels. It will give special attention to the specific solutions that are provided by the European Criminal Law, since the EU is characterized by the development of its own concept of criminal justice within an area of freedom, security and justice.
Learning outcomes of the learning unit
The aim is to give students an understanding of what is at stake in this domain, what are the founding concepts, and what is the balance of power at work (cooperation / harmonisation ; national justice / international justice, UN / Council of Europe / EU; ...)
Prerequisite knowledge and skills
Planned learning activities and teaching methods
Mode of delivery (face-to-face ; distance-learning)
A mix of lectures and interactive parts in the form of questions and answers (in particular to identify the criminal phenomena or for the study of cases).
A few readings will also be required to prepare some of the courses.
The course is accompanied by a PowerPoint presentation.
Recommended or required readings
Powerpoint presentations will be distributed, in advance to the sessions to which they relate.
The book "Droit pénal européen. Les enjeux d'une justice pénale européenne", Larcier (which I published in 2009) will consitute a useful tool to go back and further into the details of a number of concepts that will come on board during the lectures.
Assessment methods and criteria
The assessment is carried out through an oral examination, which consists of a general question (with a time for preparation) to assess the students' understanding of the issues and principles governing the matter, supplemented by more limited questions, depending on the answer to the first question.
The student may dispose during the examination of all the relevant legal texts. A list of the most useful texts is distributed at the end of the course.