public international law

Dr. Alessandra Spadaro of Utrecht University outlines several challenges to the applicability of the doctrine of superior responsibility in the context of the use of autonomous weapons systems.

Peter Quayle argues employment law of international organizations tends towards incoherence, however, mapping international administrative law onto a larger framework of international organizations law can realize a more workable version of the law.

Natalie Klein, Professor at UNSW Sydney, presents on the Geneva Declaration on Human Rights at Sea, adopted in March 2022 as an initiative of UK charity Human Rights at Sea, and on the Declaration's lawmaking potential. Natalie Klein, Professor at UNSW Sydney, presents on the Geneva Declaration on Human Rights at Sea, adopted in March 2022 as an initiative of UK charity Human Rights at Sea, and on the Declaration's lawmaking potential.

Dr Eliana Cusato, postdoctoral fellow at the Amsterdam Center for International Law, presents an overview of the key arguments in her book, 'The Ecology of War and Peace: Marginalising Slow and Structural Violence in International Law'.

Monica Feria-Tinta discusses a landmark 2022 decision of the UN Human Rights Committee which found that Australia failed to protect indigenous Torres Strait Islanders against adverse impacts of climate change, in breach of human rights law. Monica Feria-Tinta, is a barrister at Twenty Essex chambers

Dr Nikola Hajdin outlines an analytical framework for criminal complicity in a war of aggression Dr Nikola Hajdin argues against the dominant view that a perpetrator of the crime of aggression must be in a position effectively to exercise control over, or direct, the political or military action of a state, and outlines an analytical framework for criminal complicity in a war of aggression

Professor Karen Scott of the University of Canterbury, New Zealand, gives a presentation exploring the current regime complex for ocean plastics and considering how the law of the sea is likely to interact with a newly proposed plastics treaty.

Professor Errol P. Mendes of the University of Ottawa gives a presentation calling for a revisiting of the origins of the concept of sovereignty in Public International Law.

Philippa Webb, Professor of Public International Law at King’s College London, gives a presentation on recent developments in English law in cases against current and former heads of state. Apologies that there was a brief technical issue shortly after the beginning of this recording.

Freya Baetens, Professor of Public International Law at Oslo University, gives a presentation on how the International Court of Justice has addressed claims based on ‘regional’ customary international law.

Nicolas Lamp, Queen’s University, Canada gives a presentation to the Public International Law Discussion Group.

Professor Catharine Titi, French National Centre for Scientific Research (CNRS)-CERSA, University Paris II Panthéon-Assas, France, gives a talk for the Public International Law seminar series. (4/11/2021)

A presentation by Professor Stefan Talmon on Tactical Admissions in International Litigation, delivered to the Public International Law Discussion Group.

José Antonio Rodriguez, a Partner in Ashurst's international arbitration team based in Madrid, Matthew Saunders, Partner and Global Head of Ashurst's international arbitration practice based in London and Emmanuelle Cabrol, a partner in Ashurst's international arbitration team based in Paris discuss the role of public international law in renewables projects.

José Antonio, Matthew and Emmanuelle speak about all things investment treaties, arbitration claims for and against states that might arise in the course of a renewable energy project, and what key things you need to be thinking about in this context.

Our international arbitration team have written a special report in which they share more of their experiences of arbitrating disputes in the renewables space which is available now on the Globe Law website, or you can contact you usual Ashurst contact if you would like a copy

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Professor Jutta Brunnée, University of Toronto, gives a talk for the seminar series on 6th May 2021. Drawing on the practice-turn in constructivism and in international relations (IR) theory more generally, I will argue that a particular approach to managing stability and change is inherent in, and indeed characteristic of, legality in international as in domestic law. The "interactional law" framework that I developed with Stephen Toope places particular emphasis on what we call the "practice of legality". This concept is central to understanding how law can both enable and constrain state actions, and why international law is a distinctive language of justification and contestation. In turn, the focus on stability and change is helpful because it directly confronts some of the persistent doubts and assumptions about international law, in particular in relation to international politics. Our work is animated by the intuition that the dominant views in IR and international law scholarship underestimate international law's capacity to mediate stability and change, in part because they focus on the surface of law (treaties, statutes and so on) and external factors (interests, enforcement). They neglect the deeper structure of what makes norms "law," and the distinctive practices that account for both its relative stability and its capacity for change. Jutta Brunnée is Dean, University Professor and James Marshall Tory Dean’s Chair, at the University of Toronto’s Faculty of Law. Her teaching and research interests are in the areas of Public International Law, International Environmental Law and International Legal Theory. She has published extensively in each of these areas. Her current research agenda explores the role of international legality and legal practices in mediating between stability and change in international law. Dean Brunnée is co-author of International Climate Change Law (OUP 2017), which was awarded the American Society of International Law’s 2018 Certificate of Merit “in a specialized area of international law” and was recently translated into Korean, and of Legitimacy and Legality in International Law: An Interactional Account (CUP 2010), which was awarded the American Society of International Law’s 2011 Certificate of Merit “for preeminent contribution to creative scholarship.” She was elected Fellow of the Royal Society of Canada in 2013, and Associate of the Institut de Droit International in 2017. In 2019, she delivered a course on “Procedure and Substance in International Environmental Law” at The Hague Academy of International Law, published in the Academy's Collected Courses / Recueil des Cours series (2020). In 2020, Dean Brunnée was appointed University Professor, the University of Toronto’s highest and most distinguished academic rank.

International law ascribes to the conferral of a jus cogens status on a norm a particular legal significance. Bluntly put, jus cogens norms have legal consequences that norms of ordinary international law do not. International lawyers have a great many different ideas of what these legal consequences are more precisely. As of yet, the reason for this divide has not been fully clarified. This void tends to confuse jus cogens discourse on several issues such as the immunity of states and state officials in judicial proceedings originating in the violation of jus cogens norms, or the extradition of alleged perpetrators of international crimes, or again the non-applicability of amnesty law concerning such crimes. It also impedes the justification of judicial and other legal decisions. As this article argues, contrary to the general assumption, a lawyer’s conception of the legal consequences of jus cogens is not value-neutral but dependent on his or her preferred understanding of the concept of law. The argument goes briefly as follows: (1) What causes international lawyers to disagree is the issue of whether or not jus cogens norms entail obligations concerned with their own enforcement. (2) This is essentially an issue concerning the individuation of norms. (3) Depending on whether a lawyer takes the position of a legal positivist or a legal idealist, he or she uses different criteria for the individuation of jus cogens norms. (4) And this is why, for legal idealists, jus cogens norms entail obligations concerned with their own enforcement, whereas for legal positivists they do not. Ulf Linderfalk is Professor of International Law in the Faculty of Law, Lund University, which he joined in 2001. He is a general international lawyer, who takes a special interest in questions relating to international legal structure. His research has examined issues arising from phenomena such as normative conflict, legal hierarchy, treaty interpretation, the identity of special regimes, cross-fertilisation among such regimes, legal principles, legal discretion, balancing, and conceptual terms. He is the author of four monographs – including the recent ‘Understanding Jus Cogens in International Law and International Legal Discourse’ (Edward Elgar, 2020) – two textbooks (both of which are available in updated second editions); four co-edited volumes; and a total of some 30-40 articles in high-ranking peer-reviewed international law journals.

Domestic and international judges speak separately from their courts' institutional voice in myriad ways. Instances of separate judicial speech range from written and oral dissents, to posing questions from the bench, to an array of extrajudicial activities, such as media appearances and penning memoirs. In domestic systems such as the United States, despite long-standing concerns that individual speech by judges will undermine the corporate vision of a court and erode 'the cult of the robe,' many now view separate judicial speech as serving a valuable function by contributing to the judiciary’s authority and legitimacy. Yet, while legal scholars have devoted considerable attention to the practice of separate opinion writing, they often ignore differences in types of concurrences or dissents, and largely gloss over the other ways in which judges speak separately on and off the bench. International legal scholars similarly focus on separate written opinions to the exclusion of the broader array of individual judicial speech, behavior, and practices. This talk interrogates the formal and informal ways in which judges make their voices heard and offers an interdisciplinary typology of separate judicial speech, suggesting that it falls along five dimensions of variance that transcend the domestic/international law divide. It argues that different forms of separate speech reveal markedly different understandings of the role judges do and should play within society. It concludes by considering the normative stakes involved in judges speaking separately and the implications for courts in an era of backlash against international institutions and growing challenges to the rule of law. Neha Jain is Professor of Public International Law at the European University Institute. She is also Associate Professor of Law at the University of Minnesota Law (on special leave). Her scholarship focuses on public international law, criminal law, and comparative law. Prior to joining Minnesota, she was a law research fellow at Georgetown University Law Center and worked at the Max Planck Institute for Foreign and International Criminal Law in Freiburg. Jain has held fellowships at the Stellenbosch Institute of Advanced Study, the Danish National Research Foundation’s Centre of Excellence for International Courts, and the Lauterpacht Centre for International Law. She has also served as a visiting professional in the Chambers Division of the International Criminal Court and is a Board member of the European Society of International Law. Jain is the author of Perpetrators and Accessories in International Criminal Law (Hart, 2014) and her work has appeared in numerous journals, including the American Journal of International Law, European Journal of International Law, and Harvard International Law Journal.

From the instant that a State receives an early warning that mass atrocities are likely to occur, what, precisely, is it required to do in response? There is wide agreement that a duty to prevent atrocity crimes exists as a matter of both treaty and customary international law, but little agreement as to the specific content of the obligation. This need has become particularly acute as States hesitate to sign up for new multilateral treaties containing preventive provisions, and courts hesitate to enforce existing preventive duties. The obscurity surrounding preventive obligations is further complicated by the complex legal framework governing atrocity crimes, and the fact that the duty to prevent genocide, crimes against and humanity and war crimes each holds a separate status under the law, derived from distinct sources and the product of unique legal histories. In light of the fact that the precise nature of a crime is often not apparent until the bloodshed has begun, how are States meant to operationalize their responsibilities from the moment that risk appears? This talk will examine States' preventive obligations in relation to genocide, war crimes, and crimes against humanity, by first reviewing the legal frameworks governing each atrocity crime, and then assessing the areas in which further clarity is needed. It will seek to articulate further procedural and substantive guidance as to the specific content of the duty to prevent from the moment that early warnings are provided, particularly in view of the International Court of Justice’s recent Provisional Measures decision in the case between The Gambia and Myanmar. Finally, it will conclude by proposing to derive a procedural obligation from the duty to prevent, imported from other areas of public international law, which would assist in filling some of the key operational voids in implementing State responsibility before atrocities have begun. Shannon Raj Singh is a Visiting Fellow of Practice at Oxford with the Blavatnik School of Government's Institute for Ethics, Law and Armed Conflict (ELAC) Programme on International Peace and Security. She is also an Associate Legal Officer at the Special Tribunal for Lebanon, where she advises the Appeals Chamber and the Office of the President on the first terrorism trial before an international criminal tribunal. At ELAC, Shannon is researching the prevention of mass atrocities with Federica D'Alessandra, Executive Director of the Oxford Programme on International Peace and Security. Together, they are working to articulate the preventive duties of States in relation to genocide, war crimes, and crimes against humanity, and to provide substantive guidance as to implementing and operationalizing the due diligence standard. The research is intended to be part of a stream of work to guide policymakers working in the atrocity prevention and accountability space. Shannon is also an advisor to the Transatlantic Network on Atrocity Prevention, an action-oriented network for engagement across governments, multilateral institutions, academia, and practitioners. Shannon is an American attorney licensed to practice in California, and a graduate of UCLA and the University of Southern California's Gould School of Law. She is also an Officer for the War Crimes Committee of the International Bar Association, and its Special Rapporteur on the ILC Draft Articles on Crimes Against Humanity. She has spoken on expert panels around the world on international criminal law, atrocity prevention, and the intersection of technology and human rights.

What have been the key themes in the legal evolution of the UN climate regime? How were these themes addressed In the recently adopted Paris Rulebook? And what are the principal legal issues going forward? The talk will review the legal evolution of the international climate change regime, and preview the upcoming conference of the parties (COP25) in Santiago in December. Daniel Bodansky is Regents’ Professor at Arizona State University’s Sandra Day O’Connor College of Law. He served as Climate Change Coordinator at the U.S. State Department from 1999-2001. His book, The Art and Craft of International Environmental Law, received the 2011 Sprout Award from the International Studies Association as the best book that year in the field of international environmental studies. His latest book, International Climate Change Law, co-authored with Jutta Brunnée and Lavanya Rajamani, was published by Oxford University Press in June 2017, and received the 2018 Certificate of Merit from the American Society of International Law as the best book in a specialized area of international law published the previous year. He is a member of the Council on Foreign Relations and a graduate of Harvard (A.B.), Cambridge (M.Phil.) and Yale (J.D.).

If a state withdraws from a treaty in a manner that violates its own domestic law, will this withdrawal take effect in international law? The decisions to join and withdraw from treaties are both aspects of the state’s treaty-making capacity. However, while international law provides a role for domestic legal requirements in the international validity of a state’s consent when joining a treaty, it is silent on this question in relation to treaty withdrawal. This discussion will consider this issue in light of recent controversies concerning treaty withdrawal – including the United Kingdom’s exit from the European Union, South Africa’s possible withdrawal from the International Criminal Court, and the threatened US denunciation of the Paris Agreement - and will propose that the law of treaties should be interpreted so as to develop international legal recognition for domestic rules on treaty withdrawal equivalent to that when states join treaties, such that a manifest violation of domestic law may invalidate a state’s treaty withdrawal in international law. Hannah Woolaver is an Associate Professor in Public International Law at the Law Faculty of the University of Cape Town. Her research interests lie in public international law, focusing on the relationship between international law and domestic law, the law on the use of force, and international criminal law. Prior to joining the UCT Law Faculty in 2012, she completed her Ph.D. in international law at the University of Cambridge, B.C.L. at the University of Oxford, and LL.B. at the University of Durham. Dr. Woolaver is currently a Visiting Fellow at the Lauterpacht Centre for International Law, University of Cambridge, and the Faculty of Law, University of New South Wales, Australia, and has previously been a Visiting Scholar at the Faculty of Law, University of Toronto.