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Item Open Access Artificial intelligence in ancient Rome: classical Roman philosophy on legal subjectivity(De Gruyter, 2023-08-21) Deibel, Talya Uçaryılmaz; Deibel, E.; Hagengruber, Ruth EdithConceiving of technology in its relation to modern society in terms of power imbalances dates back to antiquity. Particularly the understanding that there are 'instruments' of 'instruments' has its roots in the Aristotelian conception of slavery as a morally unacceptable institution both historically and today. In antiquity, slaves were seen as tools in symbioses: The prosthetic extensions of others, simultaneously persons and things. When we conceive of digital technology as a communicative artefact that is an extension of technological reason we face the same dilemma today. This paper seeks to draw historical connections between cybernetics and slavery around the general question: will AI technology result in a new type of slavery? As such this requires us to rethink the intricate concepts of humanness, subjectivity and sovereignty in Roman philosophy in order to apply them to the contempaorary ethical questions on artificial agents and digitization of technology.Item Open Access A transformer-based prior legal case retrieval method(IEEE - Institute of Electrical and Electronics Engineers, 2023-08-28) Öztürk, Ceyhun Emre; Özçelik, Şemsi Barış; Koç, AykutIn this work, BERTurk-Legal, a transformer-based language model, is introduced to retrieve prior legal cases. BERTurk-Legal is pre-trained on a dataset from the Turkish legal domain. This dataset does not contain any labels related to the prior court case retrieval task. Masked language modeling is used to train BERTurk-Legal in a self-supervised manner. With zero-shot classification, BERTurk-Legal provides state-of-the-art results on the dataset consisting of legal cases of the Court of Cassation of Turkey. The results of the experiments show the necessity of developing language models specific to the Turkish law domain.Item Open Access Elephant in the room: CISG, hardship, and uniform application(Kluwer Law International, 2023) Aksoy, Hüseyin CanIt has long been disputed by scholars, courts, and arbitral tribunals whether or not hardship is covered by Article 79 of the CISG. In 2020, the CISG Advisory Council published an opinion and expressed the view that CISG governs cases of hardship but under Article 79, the parties have no duty to renegotiate the contract; and a court or arbitral tribunal may not adapt the contract or bring the contract to an end. Council’s opinion is primarily based on the aim to prevent recourse to domestic law. In fact, if one accepts that CISG contains a gap concerning hardship, domestic law will apply to fill such gap, and this would undermine the unification of the law. However, this can hardly be a reason to accept that cases of hardship are covered by Article 79 CISG. Historical, textual, and teleological interpretation of Article 79 as well as an economic analysis of the concerned remedies show that Article 79 does not cover and/or is not suited to apply to cases of hardship. Therefore, there is an internal gap within the CISG concerning hardship and except for some exceptional cases, where one could find an international trade usage between the parties, the last resort to fill such gap is resorting to the domestic law applicable through private international lawItem Embargo New kid in town: platform workers of the EU and human oversight of automated systems in platform work(Nomos Verlagsgesellschaft, 2023-09-19) Dalkılıç, Elvin EvrimThe era of digitalization created new forms of employment along with complicated employment statuses, where existing labour laws lag in solving legal problems. The most recent development in the European Union is the proposed Platform Work Directive (PWD) against the raising concerns about the operation of digital labour platforms and people working through these platforms. By defining people as platform workers, the PWD offers significant changes. The PWD, with a broad presumption of employment, introduces new restrictions and obligations for digital labour platforms. Among those changes, introduced as a first at the EU level, is the human oversight of automated systems’ decisions. This paper analyses the term ‘platform worker’ in line with the PWD, mainly focusing on human oversight of automated systems in platform work.Item Open Access Extension of the most favoured nation clause to dispute settlement provisions in bilateral investment treaties which Turkey is a party of(İstanbul Üniversitesi Yayınları (Istanbul University Press), 2023-02-01) Tiryakioğlu, BilginBilateral investment treaties (BITs) pave the way for international investment arbitration for investors and play a crucial role in the settlement of investment disputes. In 63 years, 2871 BITs have been signed between States and 2231 of them have entered into force since the first BIT concluded between Germany and Pakistan in 1959. This alone reveals the importance of BITs in terms of the disputes arising from investment and their settlement through arbitration. Almost every BIT contains most favored nation (MFN) clause as a standard of treatment. However, the applicability of MFN clauses to procedural provisions of a BIT has been a controversial issue since 2000 when an ICSID tribunal's award was rendered in the Maffezini case. Following the Maffezini case, conflicting arbitral awards have have become the centre of attention as to the scope of MFN clauses in terms of whether they could be extended to dispute resolution provisions. One of the main reasons leading to this controversy is that the BIT provisions regarding MFN clauses as well as dispute resolution provisions have not been formulated in a clear and unambiguous manner. Accordingly, different arbitral tribunals have interpreted BIT provisions differently regarding the extension of MFN clauses to dispute resolution provisions. This problem has had an impact all over the world and has led a radical shift both for arbitral awards that have been rendered by investment tribunals and BIT practices of almost all countries. MFN clauses no longer cover dispute resolution provisions of BITs that have been signed by Turkey since 2010.Item Open Access The applicability of property law rules for crypto assets: considerations from civil law and common law perspectives(Taylor & Francis, 2023-03-07) Aksoy, Pınar ÇağlayanCrypto assets and their legal qualification hold an important place in the international legal arena. There are many public and private law aspects of crypto assets that require clarification. The first difficulty lies in defining what a crypto asset is. There are many different taxonomies of crypto assets, and these vary globally. Another challenging area which demands attention is whether crypto assets bear the features of objects of ‘property’ in private law. The answer to this question is important because it affects various areas of law, such as tax law, securities law, insolvency law, contract law, even conflict of laws. This paper focuses on whether and how property law rules should be applied to crypto assets and how the legal nature of crypto assets is embarked upon and handled differently in Common Law and Civil Law Countries.Item Open Access Is the syndicated loans market ready for distributed ledger technology?(Taylor & Francis, 2023-09-18) Aksoy, Hüseyin CanThe syndicated loan market has a centralised nature dominated by intermediaries. Such a structure not only requires manual labour and back-office workloads, but it is also prone to human error and fraud. Distributed ledger technology (DLT) and smart contracts are promising tools to overcome the factors which adversely affect the efficiency of the current and classical business model in the primary and secondary market of syndicated loans. DLT eliminates the need for intermediaries; provides transparency, accuracy, and authenticity; lowers transaction costs; makes it easier to comply with Know Your Customer obligations; and provides efficiency in the secondary market for syndicated loans. However, existing legal rules and institutions fail to create a predictable and legally safe environment for the spread of DLT in the syndicated loans market. Therefore, proper regulation is required for the widespread use of DLT technology in the syndicated loan market.Item Open Access Is there a need for a visible hand in digital markets?(Lexxion Verlagsgesellschaft mbH, 2022) Gürkaynak, Gönenç; Uçar, Ali Kağan; Görkem Yıldız, UzayThis article explores whether there is a need for ex ante regulations in digital markets. It explains implications of ex ante regulations in digital markets and focuses on the competition jurisprudence which has generated new terminologies such as ‘tipping’, ‘gatekeepers’ and ‘self-preferencing’ over the last decade, indicating that competition law easily adapts to emerging problems and sweeping ex ante regulation efforts in the digital markets might be uncalled for. In this regard, the article summarizes the on-going debate on whether competition law, as is, can sufficiently address and deliver solutions for competitive concerns in digital markets. Within this scope, the paper examines the alleged competitive concerns in digital markets and argues that it is crucial to first conduct counterfactual analysis with concrete facts, parameters and data, to identify the risks associated with over regulations. The article further contends that the competition law toolkit in place is a sufficient and more appropriate way to deal with anti-competitive conducts and the ongoing ex ante regulation efforts in digital markets are condemned to result in a decline in competition and innovation in the long run.Item Open Access Audiovisual wills: A contemporary approach to testamentary formalities(Boom Uitgevers, 2022-12-01) Aksoy, Hüseyin CanDespite several differences between civil law and common law jurisdictions, today’s modern succession law is based on Roman law, which requires strict formal rules for will-making. However, a historical perspective demonstrates that there is a slow but continuous shift away from strict formalism. In fact, form’s superiority over substance is diminishing, and testamentary formalities are mellowing. Yet legislative intervention is compulsory to ensure that succession law is in harmony with the latest technological developments of the era. We argue that de lege ferenda, legal order should allow testators to execute audiovisual wills through electronic means of communication. Within this stance, the option of audiovisual wills should not be restricted to cases of emergency. Everyone should be allowed to make an audiovisual will at any time, and such wills should not be automatically terminated if the testator is still alive after a specific time following the execution of the will. However, one needs a feasible and secure system that will ensure that audiovisual wills bestow the functions of testamentary formalities. Accordingly, we propose that each state create a digital registry. Testators could upload their audiovisual wills to such a registry, and these wills could be shared directly with competent public authorities. © 2022, Boom Uitgevers. All rights reserved.Item Open Access A shortfall of rights and justice: Judicial review of immigration detention in Greece(European University Institute, 2022) Angeli, Danai; Anagnostou, DiaThis article critically examines the judicial review of immigration detention in Greece. Specifically, it analyzes the inconsistencies in domestic court rulings, particularly in differentiating between asylum and pre-removal detention, as well as between restrictions on and deprivation of liberty. On the basis of an extended review of decisions by Greece's first instance courts and the Council of State, this article argues that the above-described deficiencies in domestic judicial control must be attributed to the system's institutional design. Greece's lower administrative courts are tasked with reviewing the lawfulness of detention orders and their rulings are not subject to appeal. Although this system ensures speediness, it has also allowed the development of an inconsistent and often unpredictable jurisprudence, to the detriment of the effectiveness required by European norms. The article calls for an institutional reform that would allow for higher administrative courts, such as the Council of State, to act as appellate courts and review the constitutionality of detention orders. This would strengthen the ability of national judges to resolve long-standing normative questions about the law. It would ultimately lead to a kind of judicial control that is more coherent and more conducive to human rights protection.Item Open Access Constitutional courts’ helpdesk: The venice commission’s advisory role in constitutional adjudication(Walter de Gruyter GmbH, 2022-11-22) Yolcu, SerkanThis article aims to analyse how constitutional courts make use of advisory opinions of the European Commission for Democracy through Law (Venice Commission). Despite that national constitutional courts significantly engage with the advisory work of the Venice Commission, the causes and effects of this engagement remain less explored in constitutional law scholarship. In order to address this gap, this article, from a macro perspective, examines the case law in which the Venice Commission is referred to by constitutional courts, drawn from the Venice Commission’s constitutional adjudication database (CODICES). In addition, appropriate data from the case law of the Constitutional Court of Turkey is examined in particular to expand the scope of the research through micro lens. The article argues that constitutional advice has some advantages for constitutional judges given that it provides a strategic tool for determining reasoning. Despite its non-binding nature, the Venice Commission’s constitutional advice is occasionally considered by constitutional courts, depending on the strategic preferences of the courts, and the judges in a given jurisdiction.Item Open Access Single sanction for effects of single strategy in multiple markets - 'Ne Bis in Idem' recognised by the highest administrative court in Turkey(Oxford University Press, 2022-01-01) Gürkaynak, Gönenç; Öztürk, K. Burak; Baytaş, AydenizItem Open Access Constitutions and political systems(Routledge, 2022) Ozbudun, E.; Jongerden, J.Item Open Access Predicting outcomes of the court of cassation of Turkey with recurrent neural networks(IEEE, 2022-08-29) Öztürk, Ceyhun E.; Özçelik, Ş. Barış; Koç, AykutNatural Language Processing (NLP) based approaches have recently become very popular for studies in legal domain. In this work, the outcomes of the cases of the Court of Cassation of Turkey were predicted with the use of Deep Learning models. These models are GRU, LSTM and BiLSTM which are variants of the recurrent neural network. Models saw only fact description parts of the case decision texts during training. Firstly, the models were trained with the word embeddings that were created from the texts from daily language. Then, the models were trained with the word embeddings that were created from downloaded legal cases from Turkish courts. The results of the experiments on the models are given in a comparative and detailed manner. It is observed based on this study and the past studies that the outcomes of the Court of Cassation can be predicted with higher accuracy than most of the courts that were investigated in previous legal NLP studies. The model which is best at predicting decisions is GRU. The GRU model achieves 96.8% accuracy in the decision prediction task.Item Open Access Roma hukukunda haksız fiil ve suç ilişkisi ışığında tazminatın cezalandırıci fonksiyonu(Ankara University, 2020-12-28) Emiroğlu, Haluk; Uçaryılmaz, Talha ŞansRoma hukukunda haksız fiil ve suç ilişkisi, özel hukuk ve kamu hukukunun iç içe geçtiği özel bir yapıya işaret eder. Roma hukukunda suçlar, kamu suçlarını ifade eden crimina /delicta publica ve özel hukuka ilişkin haksız fiilleri karşılayan delicta privata olarak iki farklı rejime tabi olmuşlardır. Delicta privata bakımından, suç karşılığı öngörülen ceza hem failin cezalandırılmasına, hem de zarar gören kişinin zararının giderilmesine yönelmiştir. Zamanla haksız fiil-suç ilişkisinin netleşmesi, haksız fiiller bakımından tazminatın cezalandırıcı fonksiyonunu kaybetmesine neden olmuş; haksız fiiller sonucu öngörülen tazminat sadece zarar görenin malvarlığında status quo ante sağlama amacına odaklanmıştır. Öte yandan çağımız hukuki paradigması Roma hukukuna dönüşe işaret etmektedir. Bugün Kıt’a Avrupası hukukunda “özel hukuk cezası” kurumunun, özellikle rekabet hukuku ya da fikri ve sınai mülkiyet hukuku bakımından kabul edilmeye başlandığı görülmektedir. Özel hukuk cezalarının hukuki niteliğinin anlaşılması ise, haksız fiil ve suç kavramlarının tarihsel bir değerlendirmeye tabi tutulmasını gerektirmektedir. Gelecekte Kıt’a Avrupası hukuku bakımından daha da yaygınlaşacağı öngörülen özel hukuk cezaları, Roma hukukunun hukuk ve ekonomi öğretisini ne denli içselleştirdiğinin bir kanıtıdır.Item Open Access Çelişkili mahkeme kararları ve adil yargılanma hakkı(2021) Yılmaz, EjderUygulamada alt dereceli mahkemelerin benzer vakıalara uygulanacak hukuk kuralım farkh yorumlayarak farklı kararlar vermesi olağan bir durum olup yapılması gereken bu tür kararların kanun yollu incelemesinde yüksek mahkemeler tarafından düzeltilerek tüm ülkede hukuk ve içtihat birliğinin sağlanmasıdır. Ancak bazen, alt dereceli mahkemelerin verdikleri çelişik kararlar, yüksek mahkemelerin ayni uyuşmazlıklar! inceleyen ayri ayri daireleri arasinda mevcut bulunan görüş farklılıklar! sebebiyle düzeltilmeden aynen kesinleşebilmektedir. Bu sakıncalı durumun çözümü, İçtihadı birleştirme müessesesi olmakla birlikte özellikle aşırı işyükü gerekçe gösterilerek yüksek mahkemelerce İçtihadı birleştinne müessesesinin yavaş işletildiği söylenebilir. Anayasa Mahkemesi, bireysel başvuru üzerine verdiği yeni tarihli bir kararında ise sırf farklı Yargıtay daireleri arasındaki görüş ayrılığından dolayi farkh bölge adliye mahkcmeleri arasinda ayni tip uyuşmazlık bakımından farklı kararlar verilmesini hukuk güvenliği ve adil yargılanma hakkına aykırı bularak tazminata hükmetmekle yetinmemiş konuya ilişkin içtihadı birleştirme kararı verilmesi için dosyayı Yargıtay’a göndermiştir. Benzer örneklerin çoğalmaması adına, olması gereken hukuk bakımından, içtihadı birleştirme müessesesinin istinaf mahkemesi kararlarını da içine alacak şekilde yeniden düzenlenmesi ve içtihadı birleştirme müessesesine işlerlik kazandırıcı tedbirlerin alınması önem arz etmektedir.Item Open Access Über die verteidigung der demokratie und rechtsstaatlichkeit in der Türkei(Nomos, Baden-Baden, 2021) Göztepe, EceZusammenfassung: In Zeiten der Autokratisierung scheint es immer schwieriger zu werden, Kriterien für eine funktionierende rechtsstaatliche Demokratie aufzustellen. Doch bedarf es dieser Kriterien dringend, da sich der Abbau von Rechtsstaatlichkeit und Demokratie nicht über eine offene Aufhebung der Grundprinzipien vollzieht, sondern vermittels kleiner Schritte, durch Aushöhlung der Substanz bei Aufrechterhaltung der Form oder durch Lethargie der Institutionen, ihre Zuständigkeiten wahrzunehmen. Der Beitrag zeigt am Beispiel der Türkei, wie einfallsreich autoritäre Regierungen darin sein können, vorhandene demokratische Strukturen zu instrumentalisieren, auszuhöhlen und den Pluralismus der Demokratie abzubauen. Dabei wird ersichtlich, wie der sog. »Volkswille« manipuliert und gegen die rechtsstaatliche Demokratie gewendet werden kann.Item Open Access Uygulamada amacına ulaşamayan belirsiz alacak davasına ilişkin hüküm yürürlükten kaldırılmalıdır(Yeditepe Üniversitesi, 2021-06-24) Yılmaz, EjderBelirsiz alacak davası, 6100 sayılı Hukuk Muhakemeleri Kanunu’nun 107 nci maddesiyle kabul edilmiş bir davadır. İstisnaî bir dava türü olan bu dava, dava konusu miktarın başlangıçta belirlenmesinin mümkün olamadığı bazı tazminat davaları için kabul edilmiştir. Bu davalar işin niteliği gereği, asgarî miktar üzerinden az bir harç ödenerek açılır; alacağın yargılama (dava) sürecinde belirlenmesi üzerine davacı, davayı değiştirme yasağına tâbi olmaksızın talebini arttırabilir. Bunun yanısıra belirsiz alacak davasında zamanaşımı kesilmesi, kısmî davadan farklı olarak, alacağın tümü bakımından ortaya çıkar. Dava konusunun belli veya belirlenebilir olması halinde, belirsiz alacak davası açılamaz; buna rağmen belirsiz alacak davası açılmışsa, bu dava hukukî yararın bulunmaması sebebiyle dava şartı eksikliğinden dolayı reddedilir. 6100 sayılı Kanunun yürürlüğe girmesinden bu yana on yıl geçmiş olmasına rağmen, hangi hallerde belirsiz alacak davası açılabileceği veya açılamayacağı konusunda uygulamada büyük tereddütler bulunmakta ve Yargıtay çelişkili kararlar vermektedir. Özellikle iş uyuşmazlıklarında daha belirgin olarak ortaya çıkan bu durum, hukukî güvenli açısından sakıncalar yaratmaktadır. Bu durum içtihadı birleştirme konusu olarak Yargıtay İçtihadı Birleştirme Büyük Genel Kurulu’na getirilmiş ise de, Kurul, bu talebi reddetmiş ve konuyu her somut olayla ilgili olarak uygulamaya bırakmıştır.Item Open Access The principle of proportionality in modern ius gentium(Ubiquity Press Ltd., 2021-02-23) Uçaryılmaz, TalyaThe principle of proportionality refers to the criteria for fair and optimal balancing of interests. It is widely applied to international disputes and has gained institutional and scholarly acceptance in the field of international law. This paper aims to explore the longue durée of the principle, drawing on an interdisciplinary perspective on international law. It affirms the traditional role of proportionality in international legal sphere and values its familiar role in introducing flexibility in law, remaining close to its conventional interpretation. However, the paper also questions its contemporary ethos, as it is based historically on its relation to equity. To this end, it examines the historical roots of the principle as part of the early modern law of nations, as well as how such a general principle should be seen as applicable to private relationships. The aim is therefore to re-think the principle of proportionality in modern ius gentium as based on how public and private law principles need to be interpreted relative to each other and continue to be shaped continuously as an extension of their shared history. It is in this sense that we can examine the need for equity in the international sphere, which will be demonstrated concretely for three distinct areas where proportionality predominates: the law of war, the law of maritime delimitation and international human rights law.Item Open Access Rethinking the relationship between the enforceability of penalty clauses and the debtor's fault in breach of his/her obligation under Swiss law(Akademie Ved Ceske Republiky * Ustav Statu a Prava, 2021-04-01) Aksoy, Hüseyin CanDespite the lack of an explicit provision within the Swiss Code of Obligations (OR), the considerable majority of the Swiss doctrine as well as the Federal Court accept that contractual penalty shall be paid if and only if the debtor’s breach is based on his/her fault. In this paper, we question such dogma and analyze the wording and purposes of Articles 161/2 and 163/2 of the Swiss Code of Obligations by taking their historical background into account. We argue that unless otherwise agreed by the parties, the debtor’s obligation to pay the penalty shall be deemed independent of his/her fault.