Eliav Lieblich (Tel Aviv University – Buchmann Faculty of Law) has posted Autonomous Weapons Systems and the Obligation to Exercise Discretion (Address at the Convention on Certain Conventional Weapons (CCW) Informal Meeting of Experts on Lethal Autonomous Weapons Systems (Geneva Apr. 14, 2016)) on SSRN. Here is the abstract:
This presentation argues that a key problem posed by AWS is that they constitute a use of administrative powers against individuals without the exercise of proper discretion. AWS are based on pre-programmed algorithms, and therefore – as long as they are incapable of human like metacognition – when they are deployed administrative discretion is bound. Operating on the basis of bound discretion is per se arbitrary and contradicts basic notions of administrative law, notions that, as argued here, complement modern standards of international humanitarian and human rights law. This realization explains better some of the concerns relating to AWS, which are usually expressed in circular arguments and counter-arguments between consequentialist and deontological approaches.