In this chapter, we will explore the nature of Basque impersonals in comparison with inchoatives, passives, and middles. Our analysis reveals that Basque impersonals share key characteristics with subject-suppressing impersonals (Blevins 2003): (i) they are built on transitive, unergative, and unaccusative verbs; (ii) they feature a human (suppressed) subject; and (iii) their implicit subject cannot be expressed by an oblique. However, Basque impersonals exhibit a detransitivized morphology, contrasting with the transitive shape of this construction in other languages such as Polish. In any case, we demonstrate that Basque impersonals involve a syntactically active external argument, as the implicit subject can bind certain reflexive and reciprocal anaphors, act as a possessor in inalienable possession relations, and license secondary predication. Therefore, Basque impersonals should not be considered passive or middle constructions and must be regarded as subject-suppressed impersonals.

The focus of this Chapter is the ratione loci - the geographical scope of applicability - of IHL during NIAC. This chapter is divided into four sections. The first section provides a critical examination of the orthodox ‘territorial approach’ to determining IHL’s geographical reach during NIAC. The second section explores and evaluates the principal alternative to the territorial approach, referred to here as the ‘battlefield approach’. While both approaches possess certain advantages and limitations, it is argued that neither produce entirely satisfactory results. As a result, the third section proposes and explores a third alternative: a ‘functional approach’, the utility of which is demonstrated by its practical application to select provisions of both the hostilities and protections regime. The fourth section examines the legal implications of extraterritorial military operations, and briefly explores three legal bases for crossing an international border during NIAC: the consent of the territorial state; Chapter VII authorization from the UN Security Council; and self-defence pursuant to Article 51 of the UN Charter.

In this chapter, we will examine the alignment of intransitive verbs in Basque, with a particular focus on distinguishing between unergative and unaccusative verbs. We will discuss the semantic factors that have been related to unaccusativity in the literature and show that some of those factors do not always serve as reliable predictors, including in Basque. Furthermore, we will explore various syntactic tests where unergatives and unaccusatives typically exhibit distinct behaviors – such as participating in the causative/inchoative alternation, accepting partitive marking on the subject, and triggering a resultative interpretation in participial contexts. As we will show, the boundary between unergatives and unaccusatives is not always clear-cut. Additionally, this chapter will address the characteristics of complex unergative verbs; that is, unergatives that are built with the light verb egin ‘do’. Finally, it will examine dialectal variations that impact certain agentive simple intransitive verbs (though not their complex counterparts).

This chapter, which is divided into four sections, examines the personal scope of IHL during NIAC by identifying the principal bearers of obligations and beneficiaries of protection. The first section analyses the conventional ratione personae architecture of both CA3 and APII to identify areas of convergence and divergence between the two and determine whether a single ratione personae framework exists for NIAC. The second section identifies the principal bearers of IHL obligations and explores how and when IHL creates obligations for both entities and individuals. The third section determines the primary beneficiaries of protections, with an exclusive focus on the concept of civilian during NIAC. The fourth section explores the relationship between obligations and protections by examining the phenomenon of intra-Party violence to determine whether and, if so under what conditions, IHL provides legal protection to non-opposing forces during NIAC.

This Chapter seeks to address the legal and factual challenges resulting from the proliferation of battlefield actors through a framework for the  classification of battlefield actors during NIAC. This framework is predicated on the factual and legal distinction between the concept of a ‘Party’ to a NIAC, actors that ‘belong’ to a Party to a NIAC, and actors ‘supporting’ a Party to a NIAC. The Chapter is comprised of four sections. The first section introduces the rationale that underpins and informs the proposed framework, and outlines its practical application. The second section explores the concept of a Party to a NIAC, and in particular the distinction between a Party and the ‘armed forces‘ of a Party. The third section seeks to define the external parameters of a Party to a NIAC by way of the concept of ‘belonging’ under IHL. The fourth section will explore the concept of ‘supporting’ a Party to a NIAC to determine if and when the arrival of new actors on the battlefields of existing NIACs are bound by and subject to IHL, and in doing so, will interrogate the concepts of associated forces and co-belligerents, both of which are contrasted against the support-based approach advanced by the ICRC.

In this chapter, we aim to analyze Basque psych predicates following Belletti and Rizzi’s (1988) three-way classification of Italian psych verbs. As we will see, some Basque psych predicates fit into these authors’ classification, although the case and agreement marking of experiencer and stimulus in Basque follows an ergative pattern rather than a nominative one. We will also explore the alternations in which some of these verbs participate, such as the psych causative alternation and the antipassive construction. Additionally, we will analyze psych predicates that involve psych nouns and adjectives in both intransitive and transitive constructions. As will be shown, in intransitive constructions, there are two types of datives in combination with psych nouns and adjectives: those that express the experiencer and those that express the stimulus. These experiencer and stimulus datives behave in opposite ways with regards to some tests such as agreement, constituency, hierarchy, and selection. Lastly, we will analyze those transitive constructions that involve a dative experiencer and an ergative stimulus, as well as those that involve a dative stimulus and an ergative experiencer. The analysis of all these constructions provides us with a more nuanced picture for a typology of psych predicates.

In this chapter, we will introduce some of the basic grammatical properties that will be relevant to our discussion throughout the book. Specifically, we will explore Basque ergativity in both its case and agreement marking (Section 1.1). We will also analyze auxiliary alternation across intransitive, transitive, and ditransitive forms (Sections 1.3 and 1.5). Additionally, we will discuss the various types of datives found in Basque, alongside their particular combinations with other arguments (Section 1.6). Further, allocutives will be revisited (Section 1.8). Lastly, we will briefly introduce two dialectal phenomena that deviate from the more general patterns presented throughout the chapter (Section 1.9).

In this chapter, we will analyze a Basque morphological causative construction involving a causative morpheme and the verbal root or a verbal participle. As will be demonstrated, in these morphological causative constructions, the verb and the causative behave as a complex predicate, heading a monoclausal construction. Various diagnostics will be provided in the chapter to support this hypothesis, including case and agreement arrangements, PCC effects, and the behavior of temporal adjuncts, among others. Additionally, we will explore the nature of the causee. On the one hand, we will show that, despite its dative marking, the causee is, in fact, a subject and not an indirect object. In this regard, Basque morphological causatives behave similarly to the faire-infinitif causative type found in languages such as French. On the other hand, we will show that the causee must be animate, as observed in other languages such as Italian. Furthermore, we will analyze causee-less causatives, constructions in which there is no overt causee. In these constructions, there is an implicit causee that is both semantically and syntactically active. In this chapter, we will also explore impersonal causee-less causatives and another causative construction where the causer is implicit but the causee is morphologically overt.

In this chapter, we will analyze constructions including dative arguments. To begin with, we will discuss ditransitive constructions. On the one hand, we will present the different types of datives involved in these constructions, such as recipients, benefactives, external possessors, affected datives, and sources. On the other hand, we will analyze the nature of trivalent verbal forms, particularly auxiliary selection and applicative morphemes. Additionally, we will explore constructions that involve two arguments instead of three. We will start with those constructions that involve an ergative and a dative argument, referred to as bivalent unergatives by Fernández and Ortiz de Urbina (2012). Then, we will analyze constructions involving an absolutive and a dative argument, termed bivalent unaccusatives by the same authors (2010). Dative alternations will also be discussed. Other contexts where dative marks subjects or objects predicating from (psych) nouns and adjectives will be explored in Chapter 4.