First, I want to express my gratitude and sense of honour in being invited to deliver the Lionel Cohen lecture for 1995. The relationship between the Israeli and the British legal systems is a close and mutually beneficial one, and we in Britain in particular owe large debts to the legal community in Israel. This is especially the case in my field, public law, where distinguished academics have enriched our academic literature, notably Justice Zamir, whose work on the declaratory judgment has been so influential. Israeli courts, too, have made major contributions to the development of the common law generally and judicial review very notably.

In this lecture I want to discuss the process of constitutional reform in the United Kingdom, and to explore some of the difficulties that lie in the way of reform. Some quite radical reforms to our system of government — the introduction of executive agencies in the British civil service, for instance—have been introduced without resort to legislation. There has been a spate of reform to local government and the National Health Service.

In 1991, Israel enacted a new mental health law entitled the Treatment of Mental Patients Law, 1991. This law includes, for the first time, a provision authorizing involuntary outpatient commitment (“IOC”). In its simplest form, IOC is the procedure by which an individual who is determined to be mentally ill is ordered to comply involuntarily with mental health treatment outside of a hospital setting. The new Israeli involuntary outpatient commitment provision, known as “compulsory ambulatory care”, provides that an individual who meets the standards for civil commitment may be committed to involuntary outpatient treatment as a condition of release from inpatient care, or as a dispositional alternative to involuntary hospitalization.

Originally enacted in the United States as a condition of release for persons being discharged from mental hospitals, or as an alternative to involuntary hospitalization, involuntary outpatient commitment has now been enacted in various forms in different countries throughout the world. The new Israeli IOC law is modeled after American IOC laws, (particularly those enacted in the early 1980's), which seek to provide involuntary mental health treatment to persons who do not meet a strict test of dangerousness for involuntary commitment.

Ever since 1932, when Adolph Berle and Gardiner Means described the central problem of corporate law as the separation of the ownership of a company from its control, scholars in the fields of law and economics have been searching for a solution. It is difficult for a company that wishes to grow to remain under family ownership. Few financiers are capable of raising by themselves large enough sums of money to fund the capital requirements of such a company, and, in any event, it is not worthwhile for them to invest all of their money in one company and to be exposed to the risk that the company may fail. A company that wishes to grow must therefore raise funds from a number of investors, and, if large sums of money are involved, from numerous investors.

This study compares how four countries, the United States, Canada, Britain and Israel, conceive active and passive euthanasia and the right to die in dignity. I start the discussion by clarifying the scope of the analysis and by shedding light on the concepts of autonomy and dignity. Section II proceeds by drawing attention to the familiar distinction between active and passive euthanasia, reviewing the current legal positions in the United States, Canada and England. Section III addresses Ronald Dworkin's distinction between experiential and critical interests, and further contemplates the analogy he draws between the destruction of life and the destruction of masterpieces of art. The section continues by contrasting Dworkin's assertion that what we seek is life in earnest, not any form of life, with Leibowitz's view that human life is sacred. In this context I also refer to the recent Scheffer decision, the only ruling at this time by the Israeli Supreme Court on the issue of death with dignity. Section IV considers the Eyal case, involving an amyotrophic lateral sclerosis patient who expressed his wish not to be connected to a respirator. I assert that in such instances, the patients' autonomy would be sustained and their dignity better served by helping them die. It is not always true that keeping a person alive is to treat her best. In some situations we respect a person and her dignity when we help her cease living. My justification for helping such patients fulfill their request rests on the assumption that they freely and genuinely expressed their will to die, and that they persist in expressing that desire.

In 1995, the Association Agreement between Israel and the European Community was signed in Brussels. This instrument is the product of years of negotiations. Europe's traditional policy on a linkage between the nature of its economic and political ties with Israel and progress in the Middle East peace process have led to static relations between the two, despite the importance attached by the Community to the region as part of its Mediterranean policy. The achievements of the Israeli-Palestinian (and Israeli-Arab) peace process, which was renewed with the October 1991 Madrid Conference, have at last enabled Israel and the Community to establish the Association status sought by Israel. A true comprehensive understanding of the Association Agreement necessitates therefore an examination of several other subjects such as the previous relations between the sides and the legal arrangements institutionalising these relations; Israel's trade position with Europe; the European Community's Mediterranean Agricultural and Commercial policies, and many other. This, however, cannot be done within the limits of this paper. Instead, this section merely seeks to briefly survey the legal regime embodied in the Association Agreement, that is, its general structure, main features and important legal, economic and political provisions. It should be emphasised that no detailed analysis of the provisions of the Association Agreement is intended, for the Association Agreement encompasses many fields and areas.