Ramnath: Intertwined Itineraries: Debt, Decolonization, and International Law in Post-World War II South Asia

Kalyani Ramnath (Harvard Univ. - Center for History and Economics) has published Intertwined Itineraries: Debt, Decolonization, and International Law in Post-World War II South Asia (Law and History Review, Vol. 38, no. 1, pp. 1-24, February 2020). Here's the abstract:

This Article brings a Tamil-speaking Chettiar widow and a Dutch scholar of international law - two seemingly disparate characters - together through a footnote. Set against the background of decolonizing South and Southeast Asia in the aftermath of World War Two, it follows the judgment in a little-known suit for recovery of debt, filed at a district-level civil court in Madras in British India, which escaped the attention of local legal practitioners, but made its way into an international law treatise compiled and written in Utrecht, twenty years later. Instead of using it to trace how South Asian judiciaries interpreted international law, the Article looks at why claims to international law were made by ordinary litigants like Chettiar women in everyday cases like debt settlements, and how they became “evidence” of state practice for international law. These intertwined itineraries of law, that take place against the Japanese occupation of Burma and the Dutch East Indies and the postwar reconstruction efforts in Rangoon, Madras and Batavia, show how jurisdictional claims made by ordinary litigants form an underappreciated archive for histories of international law. In talking about the creation and circulation of legal knowledges, this Article argues that this involves thinking about and writing from footnotes, postscripts and marginalia - and the lives that are intertwined in them.

de Wet: Military Assistance on Request and the Use of Force

Erika de Wet (Univ. of Graz - Law) has published Military Assistance on Request and the Use of Force (Oxford Univ. Press 2020). Here's the abstract:

In countries such as Syria, Iraq, South Sudan, and Yemen, internationally recognized governments embroiled in protracted armed conflicts, and with very little control over their territory, have requested direct military assistance from other states. These requests are often accepted by the other states, despite the circumvention of the United Nations Security Council and extensive violation of international humanitarian law and human rights.

In this book, Erika De Wet examines the authority entitled to extend a request for (or consent to) direct military assistance, as well as the type of situations during which such assistance may be requested, notably whether it may be requested during a civil war. Ultimately, De Wet addresses the question of if and to what extent the proliferation of military assistance on the request of a recognized government is changing the rules in international law applying to the use of force.

New Issue: Transnational Dispute Management

The latest issue of Transnational Dispute Management (2020, no. 3) is out. This is a special issue on "The United States-Mexico-Canada Agreement (USMCA)." The table of contents is here.

New Issue: Zeitschrift für ausländisches öffentliches Recht und Völkerrecht

The latest issue of the Zeitschrift für ausländisches öffentliches Recht und Völkerrecht (Vol. 80, no. 1, 2020) is out. Contents include:

• Abhandlungen
• Christoph Grabenwarter & Matti Pellonpää, “High Judicial Office” and “Jurisconsult of Recognised Competence”: Reflections on the Qualifications for Becoming a Judge at the Strasbourg Court
• Jan Klabbers, Governance by Academics: The Invention of Memoranda of Understanding
• Helmut Philipp Aust, Die Anerkennung von Regierungen: Völkerrechtliche Grundlagen und Grenzen im Lichte des Falls Venezuela
• Winfried Huck, Informal International Law-Making in the ASEAN: Consensus, Informality and Accountability
• Stellungnahmen und Berichte
• Gordon Goodman, The Ethics of War and the Law of the Sea
• Matthias Hartwig, Bericht zur völkerrechtlichen Praxis der Bundesrepublik Deutschland im Jahr 2018
• 70 Years of the Indian Constitution
• Adeel Hussain, Theorizing Indian Democracy
• Rainer Grote, The Underestimated Relevance of the Indian Constitution for Comparative Constitutional Law Scholarship: A Review of the Oxford Handbook of the Indian Constitution

New Issue: Journal of International Economic Law

The latest issue of the Journal of International Economic Law (Vol. 23, no. 1, March 2020) is out. Contents include:

• Amrita Bahri & Monica Lugo, Trumping Capacity Gap with Negotiation Strategies: the Mexican USMCA Negotiation Experience
• Kathleen Claussen, Reimagining Trade-Plus Compliance: The Labor Story
• Geraldo Vidigal, A Really Big Button That Doesn’t Do Anything? The Anti-NME Clause in US Trade Agreements Between Law and Geoeconomics
• Regis Y Simo, Trade in Services in the African Continental Free Trade Area: Prospects, Challenges and WTO Compatibility
• Chien-Huei Wu, ASEAN at the Crossroads: Trap and Track between CPTPP and RCEP
• Tom S H Moerenhout, Energy Pricing Policies and the International Trade Regime
• Csongor István Nagy, Clash of Trade and National Public Interest in WTO Law: The Illusion of ‘Weighing and Balancing’ and the Theory of Reservation
• Jong Bum Kim, Cross-Cumulation Arrangement as FTA Under GATT Article XXIV
• Mira Burri & Rodrigo Polanco, Digital Trade Provisions in Preferential Trade Agreements: Introducing a New Dataset
• Ines Willemyns, Agreement Forthcoming? A Comparison of EU, US, and Chinese RTAs in Times of Plurilateral E-Commerce Negotiations
• Julien Chaisse & Jamieson Kirkwood, Chinese Puzzle: Anatomy of the (Invisible) Belt and Road Investment Treaty
• J Robert Basedow, The Achmea Judgment and the Applicability of the Energy Charter Treaty in Intra-EU Investment Arbitration

New Issue: Journal of Conflict Resolution

The latest issue of the Journal of Conflict Resolution (Vol. 64, no. 5, May 2020) is out. Contents include:

• Articles
• Brian C. Rathbun & Rachel Stein, Greater Goods: Morality and Attitudes toward the Use of Nuclear Weapons
• Daniel Masterson & M. Christian Lehmann, Refugees, Mobilization, and Humanitarian Aid: Evidence from the Syrian Refugee Crisis in Lebanon
• Chad Hazlett, Angry or Weary? How Violence Impacts Attitudes toward Peace among Darfurian Refugees
• Gaku Ito & Kaisa Hinkkainen Elliott, Battle Diffusion Matters: Examining the Impact of Microdynamics of Fighting on Conflict Termination
• Luke Abbs, Govinda Clayton, & Andrew Thomson, The Ties That Bind: Ethnicity, Pro-government Militia, and the Dynamics of Violence in Civil War
• James Meernik & Kimi King, The Security Consequences of Bearing Witness
• Brandon Ives & Jacob S. Lewis, From Rallies to Riots: Why Some Protests Become Violent
• Data Set Feature
• Vincent Arel-Bundock, Clint Peinhardt, & Amy Pond, Political Risk Insurance: A New Firm-level Data Set

Longobardo: The Relevance of the Concept of Due Diligence for International Humanitarian Law

Marco Longobardo (Univ. of Westminster - Law) has posted The Relevance of the Concept of Due Diligence for International Humanitarian Law (Wisconsin International Law Journal, Vol. 37, pp. 44-87, 2019). Here's the abstract:

This article explores the relevance of due diligence for international humanitarian law. The article identifies international humanitarian law rules requiring the application of due diligence and demonstrates that the use of the concept of due diligence in international humanitarian law strengthens some well-established ideas on due diligence in general international law. Finally, the article argues that the inclusion of some due diligence obligations in international humanitarian law furthers states’ implementation of this branch of law.

New Issue: Revista de Direito Internacional

The latest issue of Revista de Direito Internacional (Vol. 17, no. 1, 2020) is out. This is a special issue on "O direito comparado e seus protagonistas: qual uso, para qual fim, com quais métodos?" The table of contents is here.

New Issue: European Journal of International Relations

The latest issue of the European Journal of International Relations (Vol. 26, no. 1, March 2020) is out. Contents include:

• Steven Bernstein, The absence of great power responsibility in global environmental politics
• Jana Grittersová, Foreign banks and sovereign credit ratings: Reputational capital in sovereign debt markets
• Adam B. Lerner, The uses and abuses of victimhood nationalism in international politics
• Chenchen Zhang, Right-wing populism with Chinese characteristics? Identity, otherness and global imaginaries in debating world politics online
• Andrew Glencross, ‘Love Europe, hate the EU’: A genealogical inquiry into populists’ spatio-cultural critique of the European Union and its consequences
• Özgür Özdamar & Erdem Ceydilek, European populist radical right leaders’ foreign policy beliefs: An operational code analysis
• Tim Aistrope, Popular culture, the body and world politics
• Cian O’Driscoll, No substitute for victory? Why just war theorists can’t win
• Magnus Lundgren, Causal mechanisms in civil war mediation: Evidence from Syria
• Roos Haer, Christopher Michael Faulkner, & Beth Elise Whitaker, Rebel funding and child soldiers: Exploring the relationship between natural resources and forcible recruitment
• Vincenzo Bove, Mauricio Rivera, & Chiara Ruffa, Beyond coups: terrorism and military involvement in politics
• Ida Danewid, The fire this time: Grenfell, racial capitalism and the urbanisation of empire

New Issue: Review of International Organizations

The latest issue of the Review of International Organizations (Vol. 15, no. 2, April 2020) is out. Contents include:

• Lisa Maria Dellmuth & Jonas Tallberg, Why national and international legitimacy beliefs are linked: Social trust as an antecedent factor
• Mette Eilstrup-Sangiovanni, Death of international organizations. The organizational ecology of intergovernmental organizations, 1815–2015
• Takaaki Masaki & Bradley C. Parks, When do performance assessments influence policy behavior? Micro-evidence from the 2014 Reform Efforts Survey
• Ka Zeng, Karen Sebold, & Yue Lu, Global value chains and corporate lobbying for trade liberalization
• Tana Johnson & Johannes Urpelainen, The more things change, the more they stay the same: Developing countries’ unity at the nexus of trade and environmental policy
• Diana Panke, Regional cooperation through the lenses of states: Why do states nurture regional integration?
• Thomas Bernauer, Steffen Mohrenberg, & Vally Koubi, Do citizens evaluate international cooperation based on information about procedural and outcome quality?
• Christian Bjørnskov & Martin Rode, Regime types and regime change: A new dataset on democracy, coups, and political institutions

Ramcharan: A History of the UN Human Rights Programme and Secretariat

Bertrand G. Ramcharan has published A History of the UN Human Rights Programme and Secretariat (Brill | Nijhoff 2020). Here's the abstract:

This volume constitutes a valuable and unique history of the United Nations human rights programme and its secretariat. It offers interpretations of the history of the programme and its secretariat against the background of historical currents such as the Cold War, colonialism and decolonisation, and covers the seminal period during which the programme moved decisively towards human rights fact-finding and the denunciation of violations of human rights, which took place in the latter part of the 1970s and the 1980s. The author was a central player in this period, having served as the Special Assistant to three Directors of the Human Rights Division, and so provides historical materials that only he is aware of, having been at the heart of the action. He also provides snapshots of United Nations human rights leaders from the beginning of the United Nations, all of whom he knew personally, and writes about the contributions of NGOs and NGO leaders who served the cause of human rights with fortitude and determination.

d'Aspremont: International Law, Theory and History: Ordering Through Distinctions

Jean d'Aspremont (Sciences Po - Law; Univ. of Manchester - Law) has posted International Law, Theory and History: Ordering Through Distinctions (in The History and Theory of International Law, Jean d'Aspremont ed., forthcoming). Here's the abstract:

A wide variety of mechanisms can potentially be used to order discourses. Distinctions are one of them. Indeed, distinctions are not only common modes of thinking. They are also powerful modes of ordering. Distinctions’ ordering does not solely boil down to a repression that demotes impermissible thoughts to the realm of the impossible, the metaphysical, or the magic. Distinctions also organize the critique of the order they put in place. This paper, which constitutes the introduction to two major resources volumes, focuses on two key distinctions at work in international legal thought and practice, namely the inter-disciplinary distinction between international law and history, as well as the intra-disciplinary distinction between theory and practice. This paper questions these distinctions in their own terms and seeks to project an alternative image to that shaped by the dominant inter-disciplinary and intra-disciplinary orders of international law. The alternative image promoted here is one of an international lawyer who, whether she is a judge, a counsel, an academic, or an activist, constantly theorizes and historicizes. According to such an image, theorizing and historicizing constitute the core business of international lawyers in the many capacities with which they intervene in the problems of the world.

New Additions to the UN Audiovisual Library of International Law

The Codification Division of the UN Office of Legal Affairs recently added two lectures to the UN Audiovisual Library of International Law Podcast Channel. Due to current circumstances, the AVL team can post these only to the podcast channel and not the website. The lectures were given by Diane A. Desierto on "Economic, Social and Cultural Rights in International Investment Law" and Karine Bannelier-Christakis on "Enjeux du principe de due diligence dans la prévention et la réaction aux cyber-attaques."

Slocum & Wong: The Vienna Convention and the Ordinary Meaning of International Law

Brian G. Slocum (Univ. of the Pacific - McGeorge School of Law) & Jarrod Wong (Univ. of the Pacific - McGeorge School of Law) have posted The Vienna Convention and the Ordinary Meaning of International Law (Yale Journal of International Law, forthcoming). Here's the abstract:

This Article offers the first sustained interdisciplinary critique of international law’s ordinary meaning standard. The Vienna Convention of the Law of Treaties (VCLT) prominently mandates judicial interpretation of treaties “in accordance with the ordinary meaning to be given to the terms of the treaty in their context and in the light of its object and purpose.” While the conventional view is that the VCLT’s interpretive directive is “obvious” and largely unproblematic, it fails to adequately constrain judicial interpretive discretion. As well, the VCLT does not address fundamental interpretive issues such as indeterminate ordinary meaning and multiple language communities.

We argue that while the VCLT purports to mandate “ordinary meaning,” it in fact allows a different objective of interpretation known as “communicative meaning,” which we define as the meaning an appropriate hearer would most reasonably take a speaker to be trying to convey in employing a given verbal vehicle in the given communicative-context. Even with this understanding, though, the VCLT leaves judicial interpretive discretion unconstrained because it does not meaningfully restrict the allowable sources of meaning or how those sources can be used. Rather, the VCLT’s references to “context” and “purpose” lack sufficient guidance and permit courts to engage in speculative, unregulated inferences about purpose. Furthermore, the VCLT does not constrain judicial discretion regarding important interpretive issues such as whether implied meanings that transcend explicit treaty language should be recognized, even when those subject to the treaty come from different cultures and may speak English as a second language. Thus, while the ordinary meaning standard in the VCLT is a fundamental principle of international law, it falls short in its mission to provide coherent guidance to courts and tribunals engaged in the interpretation of treaties.

New Issue: Die Friedens-Warte

The latest issue of Die Friedens-Warte (Vol. 92, nos. 3-4, 2017-2019) is out. Contents include:

• Debatte
• Lothar Brock, Anna Geis, Sabine Jaberg, Hanne-Margret Birckenbach, Hans-Georg Ehrhart, Dan Krause, Michael Brzoska, Herbert Wulf, Michael Staack, Götz Neuneck, Alexander Graef, Jürgen Scheffran, & Tobias Ide, Mythen der etablierten Sicherheitspolitik
• Beiträge
• David Groten, Respektsensibilität als Grundvoraussetzung für Konfliktmanagement im Südchinesischen Meer
• Dilek Türközü, Two Sides of the Same Coin: Temporary Protection as a Practical but Unsettled Concept

Call for Submissions: Overlap between Bankruptcy/Insolvency Proceedings and Arbitrations

Transnational Dispute Management has issued a call for submissions on the topic "Overlap between Bankruptcy/Insolvency Proceedings and Arbitrations." The call is here.

New Issue: Revue Générale de Droit International Public

The latest issue of the Revue Générale de Droit International Public (Vol. 124, no. 1, 2020) is out. This issue is open access here. Contents include:

• Articles
• Pierre Michel Eisemann, Qu’est-ce qu’un rocher au sens de la Convention de Montego Bay de 1982 ? Observations sur la sentence arbitrale du 12 juillet 2016 relative à la mer de Chine méridionale
• Olivier Corten, François Dubuisson, Vaios Koutroulis, & Anne Lagerwall, L’exécution de Quassem Soleimani et ses suites : aspects de jus contra bellum et de jus in bello
• Note
• Denis Alland, Un adieu au droit international public ? A propos d’une déclaration américaine relative aux colonies israéliennes en Cisjordanie et ses suites

Call for Papers: When International Courts and Tribunals Defer to States

A call for papers has been issued for a PluriCourts-iCourts "Concepts & Methods" workshop on the topic "When International Courts and Tribunals Defer to States," to be held in Oslo on November 24-25, 2020. The call is here.

Engle: The Grip of Sexual Violence in Conflict: Feminist Interventions in International Law

Karen Engle (Univ. of Texas - Law) has published The Grip of Sexual Violence in Conflict: Feminist Interventions in International Law (Stanford Univ. Press 2020). Here's the abstract:

Contemporary feminist advocacy in human rights, international criminal law, and peace and security is gripped by the issue of sexual violence in conflict. But it hasn't always been this way. Analyzing feminist international legal and political work over the past three decades, Karen Engle argues that it was not inevitable that sexual violence in conflict would become such a prominent issue.

Engle reveals that as feminists from around the world began to pay an enormous amount of attention to sexual violence in conflict, they often did so at the cost of attention to other issues, including the anti-militarism of the women's peace movement; critiques of economic maldistribution, imperialism, and cultural essentialism by feminists from the global South; and the sex-positive positions of many feminists involved in debates about sex work and pornography. The Grip of Sexual Violence in Conflict offers a detailed examination of how these feminist commitments were not merely deprioritized, but undermined, by efforts to address the issue of sexual violence in conflict. Engle's analysis reinvigorates vital debates about feminist goals and priorities, and spurs readers to question much of today's common sense about the causes, effects, and proper responses to sexual violence in conflict.

Kessedjian & Cantú Rivera: Private International Law Aspects of Corporate Social Responsibility

Catherine Kessedjian (Université Paris 2 Panthéon-Assas - Law) & Humberto Cantú Rivera (Universidad de Monterrey - Law) have published Private International Law Aspects of Corporate Social Responsibility (Springer 2020). The table of contents is here. Here's the abstract:

This book addresses one of the core challenges in the corporate social responsibility (or business and human rights) debate: how to ensure adequate access to remedy for victims of corporate abuses that infringe upon their human rights. However, ensuring access to remedy depends on a series of normative and judicial elements that become highly complex when disputes are transnational. In such cases, courts need to consider and apply different laws that relate to company governance, to determine the competent forum, to define which bodies of law to apply, and to ensure the adequate execution of judgments. The book also discusses how alternative methods of dispute settlement can relate to this topic, and the important role that private international law plays in access to remedy for corporate-related human rights abuses.

This collection comprises 20 national reports from jurisdictions in Europe, North America, Latin America and Asia, addressing the private international law aspects of corporate social responsibility. They provide an overview of the legal differences between geographical areas, and offer numerous examples of how states and their courts have resolved disputes involving private international law elements. The book draws two preliminary conclusions: that there is a need for a better understanding of the role that private international law plays in cases involving transnational elements, in order to better design transnational solutions to the issues posed by economic globalisation; and that the treaty negotiations on business and human rights in the United Nations could offer a forum to clarify and unify several of the elements that underpin transnational disputes involving corporate human rights abuses, which could also help to identify and bridge the existing gaps that limit effective access to remedy.

New Issue: International Journal of Refugee Law

The latest issue of the International Journal of Refugee Law (Vol. 31, no. 4, December 2019) is out. Contents include:

• Madeline Gleeson, Protection Deficit: The Failure of Australia’s Offshore Processing Arrangements to Guarantee ‘Protection Elsewhere’ in the Pacific
• Idil Atak, Graham Hudson, & Delphine Nakache, Policing Canada’s Refugee System: A Critical Analysis of the Canada Border Services Agency
• Femke Vogelaar, A Legal Analysis of a Crucial Element in Country Guidance Determinations: Country of Origin Information
• Domenica Dreyer-Plum, Commitment of States, Access to Asylum, and Material Benefits: Assessing Key Legislative Battles and Their Structural Impact on the Common European Asylum System
• Jazmine Hesham Elmolla, Birth Registration in Crisis: Exploring a Rights-Based Approach to Birth Registration through the Experience of Syrian Refugees
• Ilias Kouvaras, Evidentiary Burden of Proof regarding Exclusion Grounds for Asylum: The Case of the Turkish Military Asylum Seekers in Greece
• Reinhard Marx, The European Union’s Plan to Amend the ‘First Country of Asylum’ and ‘Safe Third Country’ Concepts

New Addition to the UN Audiovisual Library of International Law

The Codification Division of the UN Office of Legal Affairs recently added a lecture to the UN Audiovisual Library of International Law. It was given by Gian Luca Burci on “International Law and Infectious Disease Control.”

Wang: Selective Reshaping: China’s Paradigm Shift in International Economic Governance

Heng Wang (Univ. of New South Wales - Law) has posted Selective Reshaping: China’s Paradigm Shift in International Economic Governance (Journal of International Economic Law, forthcoming). Here's the abstract:

Differing from a selective adaptation approach towards external norms in its accession to the World Trade Organization, China plays an increasingly proactive role on the international stage, with the Belt and Road Initiative at the center of these activities. How can we understand this new approach by China towards international economic governance? What is responsible for China's shifting approach, and what are the implications of this shift? The paper presents selective reshaping as a new theoretical framework, and argues first that China is shifting towards the selective reshaping of institutions and rules within the global economic order. Second, perception and conception, complementarity and legitimacy are influencing components that affect selective reshaping, and which manifest substantially differently in this context, when compared with selective adaptation. Third, selective reshaping is likely to transform the institutions and rules within the international economic order, which has profound implications.

Cismas & Heffes: Not the Usual Suspects: Religious Leaders as Influencers of International Humanitarian Law Compliance

Ioana Cismas (Univ. of York - Law) & Ezequiel Heffes (Geneva Call) have posted Not the Usual Suspects: Religious Leaders as Influencers of International Humanitarian Law Compliance (Yearbook of International Humanitarian Law, forthcoming). Here's the abstract:

It is undeniable that the effectiveness of international humanitarian law (IHL) faces challenges from different quarters. To address these, humanitarian organizations have, in the main, pursued a direct engagement strategy with the parties to a conflict. Although this has remained the dominant strategy to date, in the last two decades the humanitarian sector has, on an ad hoc basis and without the benefit of a solid evidence base, engaged other societal actors identified as having the potential to influence parties to armed conflict, and among them religious leaders. This chapter addresses the role of these leaders in influencing compliance (or lack thereof) with IHL by States and non-State armed groups. In particular, two issues are explored: 1) what makes religious leaders influential among their constituencies?, and 2) how can they be useful actors to increase respect for IHL in armed conflict?

Herro: Demanding Their Rights? Collective Identity and the Tactics of Older Persons’ Organisations at the UN

Annie Herro (Univ. of New South Wales - School of Social Sciences) has posted Demanding Their Rights? Collective Identity and the Tactics of Older Persons’ Organisations at the UN (Global Society, forthcoming). Here's the abstract:

Recent scholarship in International Relations focuses on the tactics of international non-government organisations and transnational advocacy networks, with scholars mostly explaining the diverse and dynamic tactics of organisations working on similar issues. Based on multiple qualitative data sources, this article explores why the members of a transnational advocacy network, comprising organisations of, and representing, older persons, that are calling for a UN Convention on the Rights of Older Persons adopt tactics that are static, uniform and surprisingly softly-softly, despite their modest gains since the issue was put on the UN’s agenda nine years ago. The article demonstrates many of the existing explanations for tactical choices, but it extends what we know by importing the concept of collective identity from social movement studies. It argues that the older persons’ network has a weak collective identity that is conservative in nature, which influences the tactics deployed at the UN.

Hsieh: Rethinking Non-Recognition: The EU’s Investment Agreement with Taiwan under the One-China Policy

Pasha L. Hsieh (Singapore Management Univ. - Law) has posted Rethinking Non-Recognition: The EU’s Investment Agreement with Taiwan under the One-China Policy (Leiden Journal of International Law, forthcoming). Here's the abstract:

The article reexamines the theories of recognition and non-recognition in the context of the evolving framework of the European Union (EU)’s trade and investment relations with Taiwan from legal and international relations perspectives. Notwithstanding its one-China policy, the EU has developed a pragmatic approach to engaging Taiwan under bilateral consultations and World Trade Organization negotiations that have built the foundation for the bilateral investment agreement (BIA). The article argues that since the 1980s, the EU has accorded diverse forms of recognition to Taiwan and the BIA will buttress the process. To substantiate the contention, the article systemically explores the political and trade policies of European states and EU institutions in line with their strategies toward cross-strait relations.

By deciphering the new momentum that has galvanized the European Commission’s strategy towards the EU-Taiwan BIA, the research sheds light on the implications of European Parliament resolutions and the EU’s investment talks with China. The structure and impact of the BIA are also analyzed in light of EU investment protection agreements with Singapore and Vietnam. Hence, the findings contribute to the interdisciplinary study of international law and international relations and enhance the understanding of the EU’s Asia-Pacific trade and investment agreements.

Call for Submissions: Force Majeure etc.

Transnational Dispute Management has issued a call for submissions for article proposals related to legal doctrines, such as force majeure, changes in circumstances, hardship, impracticality, impossibility, frustration, and the like, that are implicated as a result of the numerous cancellations, suspensions, and performance challenges in international transactions stemming from the spread of COVID-19. The call is here.

Bartolini: A History of International Law in Italy

Giulio Bartolini (Università degli studi Roma Tre - Law) has published A History of International Law in Italy (Oxford Univ. Press 2020). Contents include:

• Giulio Bartolini, What is a History of International Law in Italy for? International Law through the Prism of National Perspectives
• Claudia Storti, Early “Italian” Scholars of Ius Gentium
• Walter Rech, International Law as a Political Language, 1600– 1859
• Edoardo Greppi, The Risorgimento and the “Birth” of International Law in Italy
• Eloisa Mura, The Construction of the International Law Discipline in Italy between the Mancinian and Positive Schools
• Giulio Bartolini, Italian Legal Scholarship of International Law in the Early Decades of the Twentieth Century
• Antonello Tancredi, The (Immediate) Post- World War II Period
• Ivan Ingravallo, The Formation of International Law Journals in Italy: Their Role in the Discipline
• Mirko Sossai, Catholicism and the Evolution of International Law Studies in Italy
• Lorenzo Gradoni, Burn Out and Fade Away: Marxism in Italian International Legal Scholarship
• Pietro Franzina, The Integrated Approach to Private and Public International Law— A Distinctive Feature of Italian Legal Thinking
• Sergio Marchisio, The Unification of Italy and International Law
• Tommaso Di Ruzza, The “Roman Question”: The Dissolution of the Papal State, the Creation of the Vatican City State, and the Debate on the International Legal Personality of the Holy See
• Tullio Scovazzi, The Italian Approach to Colonialism: The First Experiences in Eritrea and Somalia
• Giulio Bartolini, Italy between the Two World Wars: International Law Issues
• Roberto Virzo, The Influence of Italian International Law Scholars on the Crafting of the 1948 Constitution
• Enrico Milano, The Main International Law Issues Arising in the Aftermath of World War II
• Giovanni Distefano & Robert Kolb, Some Contributions from and Influence of the Italian Doctrine of International Law
• Paolo Palchetti, The Italian Doctrine over Recent Decades

Job Opening: Singapore Management Univ. (Global Visiting Assistant Professor)

The Singapore Management University School of Law invites applications for two posts of Global Visiting Assistant Professor to begin in July 2020 or January 2021, for a period of one year with the possibility to extend for another. The advertisement is here.

Lahmann: Unilateral Remedies to Cyber Operations: Self-Defence, Countermeasures, Necessity, and the Question of Attribution

Henning Lahmann (Digital Society Institute) has published Unilateral Remedies to Cyber Operations: Self-Defence, Countermeasures, Necessity, and the Question of Attribution (Cambridge Univ. Press 2020). Here's the abstract:

Addressing both scholars of international law and political science as well as decision makers involved in cybersecurity policy, the book tackles the most important and intricate legal issues that a state faces when considering a reaction to a malicious cyber operation conducted by an adversarial state. While often invoked in political debates and widely analysed in international legal scholarship, self-defence and countermeasures will often remain unavailable to states in situations of cyber emergency due to the pervasive problem of reliable and timely attribution of cyber operations to state actors. Analysing the legal questions surrounding attribution in detail, the book presents the necessity defence as an evidently available alternative. However, the shortcomings of the doctrine as based in customary international law that render it problematic as a remedy for states are examined in-depth. In light of this, the book concludes by outlining a special emergency regime for cyberspace.