Skip Navigation

Oxford Journal of Legal Studies 2002 22(1):17-52; doi:10.1093/ojls/22.1.17
© 2002 by Oxford University Press
This Article
Right arrow Full Text (PDF)
Right arrow Alert me when this article is cited
Right arrow Alert me if a correction is posted
Services
Right arrow Email this article to a friend
Right arrow Similar articles in this journal
Right arrow Alert me to new issues of the journal
Right arrow Add to My Personal Archive
Right arrow Download to citation manager
Right arrowRequest Permissions
Google Scholar
Right arrow Articles by Simpson, B.
Right arrow Search for Related Content
Social Bookmarking
Add to CiteULike   Add to Connotea   Add to Del.icio.us  
What's this?

The Devlin Commission (1959): Colonialism, Emergencies, and the Rule of Law

Brian Simpson1

1 University of Michigan

The Devlin Commission Report of 1959 on the handling of the emergency in Nyasaland (Malawi) was unique in British colonial history. On no other occasion was a commission, chaired by a British judge, established to consider generally the response of a colonial government to a problem of law and order. Though now remembered mainly as an incident in decolonization, the report has a special legal significance in that it addresses the perennial problem of the relationship between respect for the rule of law and the supposed need to suppress an insurrectionary movement. Documents now available make it possible to give a full account of the work of the commission, and of the processes whereby the text was modified so as to downplay Devlin's desire to publish a report which squarely faced this problem. The suppressed passages in the draft report are here published for the first time.


Add to CiteULike CiteULike   Add to Connotea Connotea   Add to Del.icio.us Del.icio.us    What's this?




Disclaimer: Please note that abstracts for content published before 1996 were created through digital scanning and may therefore not exactly replicate the text of the original print issues. All efforts have been made to ensure accuracy, but the Publisher will not be held responsible for any remaining inaccuracies. If you require any further clarification, please contact our Customer Services Department.