Call for Papers: The Concept of Obligation in International Law

The School of Law, University of Milano-Bicocca, with the support of the European Society of International Law, has issued a call for papers for a conference on "The Concept of Obligation in International Law," to be held May 23-24, 2022, in Milan. The call is here.

Barnes: State-Owned Entities and Human Rights: The Role of International Law

Mihaela Maria Barnes has published State-Owned Entities and Human Rights: The Role of International Law (Cambridge Univ. Press 2022). Here's the abstract:

The monograph focuses on the human rights challenges that are associated with the involvement of States in economic activities and on the role that international law has to play in addressing and understanding some of those challenges. State-owned entities are looked at through the lens of several topics of international law that have been found to hold particular relevance in this context, such as the concept of legal personality in international law, the process of normativity in international law, State immunity and State responsibility. The monograph shows how SOEs have had a significant role in shaping the evolution of international law and how, in turn, international law is currently shaping the evolution of State-owned entities. By focusing on State-owned or State-controlled business entities, rather than private corporations, the monograph aims to offer an alternative perspective on the challenges associated with corporations and human rights.

d’Aspremont: After Meaning: The Sovereignty of Forms in International Law

Jean d’Aspremont (Sciences Po - Law; Univ. of Manchester - Law) has published After Meaning: The Sovereignty of Forms in International Law (Edward Elgar Publishing 2021). Here's the abstract:

Inspiring and distinctive, After Meaning provides a radical challenge to the way in which international law is thought and practised. Jean d’Aspremont asserts that the words and texts of international law, as forms, never carry or deliver meaning but, instead, perpetually defer meaning and ensure it is nowhere found within international legal discourse.

In challenging the dominant meaning-centrism of the international legal discourse and shedding light on the sovereignty of forms, this book promotes a radical new attitude towards textuality in international law. The author offers new perspectives on interpretation, critique, history, comparison, translation and referencing, inviting international lawyers to reinvent their engagement with these discourses. Chapters define meaning and form in international law, explore deferral of meaning and make an unprecedented use of post-structuralist theory to rethink international law.

Petrig: Unconventional Law for Unconventional Ships? The Role of Informal Law in the International Maritime Organization’s Quest to Regulate Maritime Autonomous Surface Ships

Anna Petrig (Univ. of Basel - Law) has posted Unconventional Law for Unconventional Ships? The Role of Informal Law in the International Maritime Organization’s Quest to Regulate Maritime Autonomous Surface Ships (in Unconventional Lawmaking in the Law of the Sea, Natalie Klein ed., forthcoming). Here's the abstract:

New technologies have regularly been triggers for the creation of new rules by the International Maritime Organization (IMO). Maritime Autonomous Surface Ships (MASS) are not novel in this respect. All the same, MASS stand out from previous technological inventions in various respects and their regulation poses exceptional challenges, not only in terms of the content of rules but also as regards the regulatory techniques to be deployed. This chapter probes the normative techniques that seem suitable in the context of MASS by concentrating on the role informal law could play in the IMO’s quest to regulate this novel type of vessel.

Chaponnière: Henry Dunant: The Man of the Red Cross

Corinne Chaponnière has published Henry Dunant: The Man of the Red Cross (Bloomsbury 2022). Here's the abstract:

A pioneer of humanitarianism and founder of the International Red Cross, Henry Dunant was many things over his lifetime. A devout Christian and social activist, an ambitious but failed businessman, a humanitarian genius, and a bankrupt recluse. In this biography, Corinne Chaponnière reveals the tumultuous trajectory of Henry's life. From his idyllic childhood in Geneva, she follows Henry through the horrors of the Battle of Solferino, his creation of the Red Cross and role in the Geneva Conventions, the disgrace of his bankruptcy and his resurrection as a Nobel Peace Prize winner. It shows how this champion of wounded soldiers and prisoners of war was not an unblemished picture of piety and goodness, but that his empathy and good works played out in tandem with his social ambition and personal drive. It shows how even the best of us fall on hard times, and that the Red Cross was born out of humanitarian ideals coupled with a desire for personal success. This book reveals the story of Henry Dunant, blemishes and all, against the backdrop of the horrors of war, the weight of religion and the birth of humanitarianism in the 19th century.

Behn, Fauchald, & Langford: The Legitimacy of Investment Arbitration: Empirical Perspectives

Daniel Behn (Queen Mary Univ. of London - Law), Ole Kristian Fauchald (Univ. of Oslo - Law), & Malcolm Langford (Univ. of Oslo - Law) have published The Legitimacy of Investment Arbitration: Empirical Perspectives (Cambridge Univ. Press 2022). The table of contents is here. Here's the abstract:

International investment arbitration remains one of the most controversial areas of globalisation and international law. This book provides a fresh contribution to the debate by adopting a thoroughly empirical approach. Based on new datasets and a range of quantitative, qualitative and computational methods, the contributors interrogate claims and counter-claims about the regime's legitimacy. The result is a nuanced picture about many of the critiques lodged against the regime, whether they be bias in arbitral decision-making, close relationships between law firms and arbitrators, absence of arbitral diversity, and excessive compensation. The book comes at a time when several national and international initiatives are under way to reform international investment arbitration. The authors discuss and analyse how the regime can be reformed and ow a process of legitimation might occur.

An-Naim: Decolonizing Human Rights

Abdullahi Ahmed An-Naim (Emory Univ. - Law) has published Decolonizing Human Rights (Cambridge Univ. Press 2021). Here's the abstract:

In his extensive body of work, Professor Abdullahi Ahmed An-Naim challenges both historical interpretations of Islamic Sharia and neo-colonial understanding of human rights. To advance the rationale of scholarship for social change, An-Naim proposes advancing the universality of human rights through internal discourse within Islamic and African societies and cross-cultural dialogue among human cultures. This book proposes a transformation from human rights organized around a state determined practice to one that is focused on a people-centric approach that empowers individuals to decide how human rights will be understood and integrated into their communities. Decolonizing Human Rights aims to illustrate the decisive role of human agency on the subject of change, without implying that Islamic or any other society are exceptionally disposed to politically motivated violence and consequent profound political instability.

New Issue: Human Rights Law Review

The latest issue of the Human Rights Law Review (Vol. 22, no. 1, March 2022) is out. Contents include:

• Nikolaos A Papadopoulos, Revisiting the Preamble of the European Social Charter: Paper Tiger or Blessing in Disguise?
• Kalina Arabadjieva, Worker Empowerment, Collective Labour Rights and Article 11 of the European Convention on Human Rights
• Carmelo Danisi & Nuno Ferreira, Legal Violence and (In)Visible Families: How Law Shapes and Erases Family Life in SOGI Asylum in Europe
• Gaëtan Cliquennois, Sonja Snacken, & Dirk van Zyl Smit, The European Human Rights System and the Right to Life Seen through Suicide Prevention in Places of Detention: Between Risk Management and Punishment
• Rick Lines, Julie Hannah, & Giada Girelli, ‘Treatment in Liberty’ Human Rights and Compulsory Detention for Drug Use
• Sarah Sacher, Risking Children: The Implications of Predictive Risk Analytics Across Child Protection and Policing for Vulnerable and Marginalized Children
• Nikos Vogiatzis, Interpreting the Right to Interpretation under Article 6(3)(e) ECHR: A Cautious Evolution in the Jurisprudence of the European Court of Human Rights?
• Michelle Farrell, The Marks of Civilisation: The Special Stigma of Torture
• Helen Keller, Corina Heri, & Réka Piskóty, Something Ventured, Nothing Gained?—Remedies before the ECtHR and Their Potential for Climate Change Cases
• Róisín Á Costello, Genetic Data and the Right to Privacy: Towards a Relational Theory of Privacy?

New Issue: Arbitration International

The latest issue of Arbitration International (Vol. 37, no. 4, December 2021) is out. Contents include:

• Articles
• Darius Chan & Louis Lau Yi Hang, Proper characterisation of the parol evidence rule and its applicability in international arbitration
• David L Wallach, The Emergence of Early Disposition Procedures in International Arbitration
• Simon P Camilleri, Between rags and riches: rethinking security for costs in international commercial arbitration
• Recent Development
• Julien Chaisse, Delays Expected but Duration of Delays Unpredictable: Causes, Types, and Symptoms of Procedural Applications in Investment Arbitration

New Issue: World Trade Review

The latest issue of the World Trade Review (Vol. 21, no. 1, February 2022) is out. Contents include:

• Yoram Z. Haftel, Soo Yeon Kim, & Lotem Bassan-Nygate, High-Income Developing Countries, FDI Outflows and the International Investment Agreement Regime
• Dongchul Kwak, No More Strategical Neutrality on Technological Neutrality: Technological Neutrality as a Bridge Between the Analogue Trading Regime and Digital Trade
• Mahdi Ghodsi & Huseyin Karamelikli, The Impact of Sanctions Imposed by the European Union against Iran on their Bilateral Trade: General versus Targeted Sanctions
• Jakob Rauschendorfer, Anna Twum, Unmaking of a Customs Union: Regional (Dis)integration in the East African Community
• Mahdi Ghodsi & Robert Stehrer, Non-Tariff Measures and the Quality of Imported Products
• Research Note
• Jonas Kasteng, Ari Kokko, & Patrik Tingvall, Who Uses the EU's Free Trade Agreements? A Transaction-Level Analysis of the EU–South Korea FTA
• Debate
• Timothy Meyer & Todd N. Tucker, A Pragmatic Approach to Carbon Border Measures
• Simon Lester, How the United States Can Lead the Effort To Reduce Carbon Emissions
• Timothy Meyer & Todd N. Tucker, Trade and Climate, Law and Politics: A Response

Special Issue: The International Adjudication of Mega-Politics

The latest issue of Law and Contemporary Problems (Vol 84, no. 4, 2021) is a special issue on "The International Adjudication of Mega-Politics." Contents include:

• Special Issue: The International Adjudication of Mega-Politics
• Karen J. Alter & Mikael Rask Madsen, The International Adjudication of Mega-Politics
• Dorte Sindbjerg Martinsen & Michael Blauberger, The Court of Justice of the European Union and the Mega-Politics of Posted Workers
• Laurence R. Helfer & Clare Ryan, LGBT Rights as Mega-Politics: Litigating Before the ECTHR
• Silvia Steininger & Nicole Deitelhoff, Against the Masters of War: The Overlooked Functions of Conflict Litigation by International Courts
• Salvatore Caserta & Pola Cebulak, Territorial Disputes by Proxy: The Indirect Involvement of International Courts in the Mega-Politics of Territory
• Hélène Ruiz Fabri & Edoardo Stoppioni, Jus Cogens Before International Courts: The Mega-Political Side of the Story
• James Thuo Gathii & Olabisi D. Akinkugbe, Judicialization of Election Disputes in Africa's International Courts
• Karen J. Alter & Mikael Rask Madsen, Beyond Backlash: The Consequences of Adjudicating Mega-Politics

New Volume: Annuaire français de droit international

The latest volume of the Annuaire français de droit international (Vol. 66, 2020) is out. The table of contents is here.

New Volume: Hague Yearbook of International Law

The latest volume of the Hague Yearbook of International Law (Vol. 32, 2019) is out. Contents include:

• Jure Vidmar, The Structural Crack of the International Legal System: What Happens with Unattributed Conduct?
• Amrei Müller, De Facto Independent Regimes and Overarching Human Rights Duties
• Sarah McGibbon, The ‘Unwilling or Unable’ Doctrine Unmasked: A Case Study of ISIL in Syria
• Marios C. Iacovides, Topoi of Ambiguity: WTO Membership without Statehood: The Case of Separate Customs Territories
• Alice Panepinto, International Courts and Contested Statehood: The ICJ and ICC in Palestine
• Daniëlla Dam-de Jong, Greening the Economy of Armed Conflict: Natural Resource Exploitation by Armed Groups and Their Engagement with Environmental Protection
• Tom Hadden, Armed Groups and Emergent States: Legal and Pragmatic Approaches to Filling the Gaps in International Law

Lecture: Murphy on "The Conundrum for International Law of Rising Sea Levels"

On January 17, 2022, Sean Murphy (George Washington Univ. - Law) will deliver the sixth lecture of the 2021-2022 Essex Public International Law Lecture Series. The topic is: "The Conundrum for International Law of Rising Sea Levels." Details are here.

Lorenzini, Tulli, & Zamburlini: The Human Rights Breakthrough of the 1970s: The European Community and International Relations

Sara Lorenzini, Umberto Tulli, & Ilaria Zamburlini have published The Human Rights Breakthrough of the 1970s: The European Community and International Relations (Bloomsbury 2022). The table of contents is here. Here's the abstract:

During the 1970s human rights took the front stage in international relations; fuelling political debates, social activism and a reconceptualising of both East-West and North-South relations. Nowhere was the debate on human rights more intense than in Western Europe, where human rights discourses intertwined the Cold War and the European Convention on Human Rights, the legacies of European empires, and the construction of national welfare systems. Over time, the European Community (EC) began incorporating human rights into its international activity, with the ambitious political will to prove that the Community was a global “civilian power.”

This book brings together the growing scholarship on human rights during the 1970s, the history of European integration and the study of Western European supranational cooperation. Examining the role of human rights in EC activities in Latin America, Africa, the Mediterranean, Eastern Europe and the Soviet Union, The Human Rights Breakthrough of the 1970s seeks to verify whether a specifically European approach to human rights existed, and asks whether there was a distinctive 'European voice' in the human rights surge of the 1970s.

New Issue: International Affairs

The latest issue of International Affairs (Vol. 98, no. 1, January 2022) is out. Contents include:

• Special Issue: Race and imperialism in International Relations: theory and practice
• Jasmine K. Gani & Jenna Marshall, The impact of colonialism on policy and knowledge production in International Relations
• Amitav Acharya, Race and racism in the founding of the modern world order
• Jasmine K. Gani, From discourse to practice: Orientalism, western policy and the Arab uprisings
• Kwaku Danso & Kwesi Aning, African experiences and alternativity in International Relations theorizing about security
• Althea-Maria Rivas & Mariam Safi, Women and the Afghan peace and reintegration process
• Randolph B. Persaud, Ideology, socialization and hegemony in Disciplinary International Relations
• Jan Wilkens & Alvine R. C. Datchoua-Tirvaudey, Researching climate justice: a decolonial approach to global climate governance
• Sizwe Mpofu-Walsh, Obedient rebellion: conceiving the African nuclear weapon-free zone
• Tomohito Baji, Colonial policy studies in Japan: racial visions of Nan’yo, or the early creation of a global South
• Nivi Manchanda & Sharri Plonski, Between mobile corridors and immobilizing borders: race, fixity and friction in Palestine/Israel Somdeep Sen, The colonial roots of counter-insurgencies in international politics
• Amal Abu-Bakare, Exploring mechanisms of whiteness: how counterterrorism practitioners disrupt anti-racist expertise
• Srdjan Vucetic, Elite–mass agreement in British foreign policy
• Katrin Antweiler, The coloniality of Holocaust memorialization in post-apartheid South Africa
• Lucian M. Ashworth, Warriors, pacifists and empires: race and racism in international thought before 1914
• Centenary conversations
• Helen Clark, Interviewed by Robert Yates

New Issue: Manchester Journal of International Economic Law

The latest issue of the Manchester Journal of International Economic Law (Vol. 18, no. 3, 2021) is out. Contents include:

• Muhammad Ashfaq Ahmed, The UN Model Tax Convention Article 6: The Selective Territoriality: The Specter of Privileged Player in a Rigged Game
• Morinul Azam, Are the UNFCCC Paris Agreement and the TRIPS Agreement Facilitating Access to and Transfer of Climate Technologies for the LDCs?
• Pei-kan Yang, Policy Implications of Pharmaceutical Provisions in KORUS FTA on National Health Insurance Scheme
• Xun Li, How Effective are the Transnational Regulatory Networks? A Perspective of International Financial Regulation

Roundtable: Prosecuting Ecocide: Can We Fill the Accountability Gap for Environmental Harm?

On January 19, 2022, the fifth Practitioner-Scholar Roundtable on "Prosecuting Ecocide: Can We Fill the Accountability Gap for Environmental Harm?" will be hosted by the ActInCourts Network at the University of British Columbia, the Toxic Crimes Project of the Erik Castrén Institute of International Law and Human Rights at the University of Helsinki, and the Law Interest Group of the Environmental Peacebuilding Association. Details and registration are here.

New Volume: Finnish Yearbook of International Law

The latest volume of the Finnish Yearbook of International Law (Vol. 26, 2016) is out. Contents include:

• Articles
• Outi Manninen, 'De-Materialization' of Genetic Resources: Can Evolutionary Interpretation Ensure the Relevance of the International Access and Benefit-Sharing Regime?
• Maija Dahlberg, The Judicial Legitimacy of the European Court of Justice's Fundamental Rights Cases

Call for Papers: Fifth International History and Diplomacy Conference

A call for papers has been issued for the fifth annual International History and Diplomacy conference, to be held at Liverpool John Moores University, on May 13, 2022. IHD’s 2022 conference will explore the history of human rights and humanitarianism, broadly construed. The call is here.

Call for Papers: Socialisms and International Law in the Contemporary World

The National University of Political Studies and Public Administration, supported by the Romanian Research Council, has issued a call for papers for a conference on "Socialisms and International Law in the Contemporary World," to take place September 15-16, 2022, in Bucharest. The call is here.

Call for Papers: PhD Workshop on Responding to Complex Relationships in International Law

The SLS International Law Section, in collaboration with the European Journal of Legal Studies, invites abstracts from PhD researchers in international law (public or private) for an online workshop on "Responding to Complex Relationships in International Law," to take place May 13, 2022. The call is here.

Reyes & Gu: Multi-Tier Approaches to the Resolution of International Disputes: A Global and Comparative Study

Anselmo Reyes (Judge, Singapore International Commercial Court) & Weixia Gu (Univ. of Hong Kong) have published Multi-Tier Approaches to the Resolution of International Disputes: A Global and Comparative Study (Cambridge Univ. Press 2022). The table of contents is here. Here's the abstract:

Multi-tier dispute resolution (MDR) entails an early attempt at mediation followed by arbitration or litigation if mediation is unsuccessful. Seemingly, everyone acknowledges MDR's attractiveness as a means of resolving disputes due to its combination of the flexibility and informality of mediation with the rigour and formality of arbitration or litigation. Yet, the question is why, except in China and some Asian jurisdictions, MDR is not resorted to around the world and MDR clauses in commercial contracts remain relatively uncommon. This book responds to that question by (1) surveying global regulatory approaches frameworks for MDR, (2) comparing MDR trends in Asia and the wider world, (3) identifying MDR's strengths and weaknesses, and (4) prescribing ways to address MDR's weaknesses (the enforceability of MDR clauses, the difficulties arising when the same person acts as mediator and decision-maker in the same dispute, and the enforcement of mediated settlement agreements resulting from MDR).