BOOK: Robert MCQUORDALE & Jean-Pierre GAUCI (eds.), British Influences on International Law, 1915-2015. Leiden/Boston: Martinus Nijhoff/Brill, 2016, XVIII + 524 p. ISBN 9789004284166, €225

 (image source Brill)

Book abstract:

This book considers British influences on the development of international law over 100 years from 1915. This century has been marked by unprecedented developments in international law, not least the setting up of an array of international organisations, including the United Nations and the League of Nations, and international courts and tribunals (including the International Court of Justice and its predecessor the Permanent Court of International Justice, as well as the International Criminal Court). Two world wars, complex transboundary issues and increased globalisation have shown the importance of international law. This volume addresses these developments – domestic, regional and international - and looks at how Britain and British people (broadly defined) have influenced these changes.
The contributors to the book have examined an array of different issues. These include British influences on treaty-making, recognition and immunity, as well as on specific fields of international law, such as armed conflict, criminal law, environment and human rights. It has commentary on the British influence on the sources of international law, including by its courts and Foreign Office, in the development of the European Union and in the idea of a professional international lawyer. There are also reflections on many of the key people over the century.
The book provides a novel perspective, which surveys and appraises the contributions of British people and institutions in domestic and international legal forums and their key role in the development, interpretation and application of international law.

 Table of contents:

• Robert McCorquodale & Jean-Pierre Gauci, From Grotius to Higgins: British Influences on International Law from 1915–2015
• Antonios Tzanakapoulos, The Influence of English Courts on the Development of International Law
• Kate Jones, Marking Foreign Policy by Justice: The Legal Advisers to the Foreign Office, 1876–1953
• Philip Allott, Britain and Europe: Managing Revolution
• Stephen Samuel, British Influences on the Ideals of International Lawyers
• Kasey McCall-Smith, British influence on the law of treaties
• Martin Clark, British Contributions to the concept of recognition during the inter-war period: Williams, Baty and Lauterpacht
• Philippa Webb, British Contribution to the Law of State Immunity
• David H. Anderson, British Influence on the Law of the Sea 1915–2015
• Mario Prost & Yoriko Otomo, British influences on international environmental law: the case of wildlife conservation
• Merris Amos, The Influence of British Courts on the Jurisprudence of the European Court of Human Rights
• Nigel S. Rodley, The Contribution of British NGOs to the Development of International Law
• Amina Higgins & Noelle Adanan, Britain’s Influence on the Regulation of the Slave Trade in the Twentieth Century
• Nicholas Tsagourias, Contribution of British International Lawyers to the Law on the Use of Force
• Matthew Garrod, The British Influence on the development of the laws of war and the punishment of war criminals: from the Grotius Society to the United Nations War Crimes Commission
• Shavana Musa, The British and the Nuremburg Trials
• James Upcher, Neutral and Beligerent Rights: the development of a British Position?
• Anne Marie Brennan, Historical Reflections on the Criminalisation of Terrorism under International Law from the League of Nations to R v. Mohammed Gul: How Britain has Swollen the Tide of Obscurity
• Richard Collins, The Progressive Conception of International Law: Brierly and Lauterpacht in the Interbellum Period
• Robert Cryer, International Law and the Illusion of Novelty: Georg Schwarzenberger
• Gerry Simpson, Juridical Intervention: Martin Wight as International Lawyer
• Philippe Sands & Arman Sarvarian, The Contribution of the UK Bar to International Courts

More information on the Brill website.
Source: International Law Reporter.

BOOK: Emmanuelle TOURME JOUANNET, Horatia MUIR WATT, Olivier DE FROUVILLE & Jean MATRINGE (eds.), Droit international et reconnaissance (Paris: Pedone, 2016), 370 p. ISBN 978-2-233-00801-5, € 38

(image source: LGDJ)

Book abstract:

Cet ouvrage est le résultat d'une journée d'étude organisée le 26 janvier 2013 à la suite de la sortie du livre d'Emmanuelle Tourme Jouannet, Qu'est-ce qu'une société internationale juste ? Le droit international entre développement et reconnaissance (Paris, Pedone, 2013). Il s'agissait de soumettre à la discussion l'idée formulée par Emmanuelle Tourme Jouannet dans son dernier livre, selon laquelle une nouvelle branche du droit international serait en voie d'émergence : un droit de la « reconnaissance » qui viserait à répondre à un certain nombre de revendications formulées dans le cadre d'une « société post-coloniale et post-guerre froide ».

Un grand nombre de dimensions du droit de la reconnaissance sont abordées, qu'il s'agisse de la problématique des droits sociaux ou des droits culturels, de la réparation des crimes du passé, ou encore des demandes de reconnaissance des afro-descendants, des peuples autochtones et des « révoltes arabes ».

Toutes les contributions sont écrites par des juristes qui, tous, ont opté pour l'interdisciplinarité, mélangeant les perspectives du droit, de la philosophie, de l'histoire ou des relations internationales. 

Table of contents:

• Emmanuelle Tourme Jouannet, Le droit international de la reconnaissance

• Jean d’Aspremont, De la reconnaissance à l’anthropomorphisme en droit international

• Robert Howse, “Kojevian” Recognition and Contemporary International Law

• Charalambos Apostolidis, Le droit international de la reconnaissance comme champ de recherche. Réflexions autour de l’ouvrage d’Emmanuelle Tourme Jouannet « Qu’est-ce qu’une société internationale juste ? »

• Olivier de Frouville, La lutte pour la reconnaissance : une nouvelle théorie explicative de l’évolution du droit international ? A propos de « Pour une société internationale juste. Entre droit du développement et reconnaissance », d’Emmanuelle Tourme Jouannet

• Albane Geslin, De l’entre-soi à l’entre-autre(s). Enjeux et ambiguités de la reconnaissance internationale des droits des peuples autochtones

• Carlos-Miguel Herrera, La reconnaissance par les droits (en partant des droits sociaux)

• Emmanuel Decaux, La reconnaissance des droits culturels

• Livia Kummer, Legal Recognition of Historic Crimes in the Present Day: Case Study of the Katyń Massacre

• Jose Manuel Coelho, Réflexion(s) sur les crimes de l’histoire et le droit international de la reconnaissance

• Cécile de Caunes & Juan Branco, Les reconnaissances juridiques des afro-descendants

• Noura Kridis, Droit de la reconnaissance dans le cadre des révoltes arabes

• Horatia Muir Watt, La reconnaissance entre philosophie politique et droit international privé : un rendez-vous manqué ?

• Paul Lagarde, Introduction au thème de la reconnaissance des situations : rappel des points les plus discutés

• Ivana Isailovic, La reconnaissance politique en droit transnational : les identités, les marginalisations et le droit international privé

• Dominique Gaurier, La vision de l’autre, étranger ou non européen à travers le regard des auteurs classiques du droit international

BOOK: Jakob ZOLLMANN, Naulila 1914. World War I in Angola and International Law: A Study in (Post-)Colonial Border Regimes and Interstate Arbitration [Studien zur Geschichte des Völkerrechts; 35]. Baden-Baden: Nomos Verlag, 2016, 516 p. ISBN 978-3-8487-2547-2, € 98.

(image source: blogger)

 Jakob Zollmann published Naulila 1914. World War I in Angola and International Law: A Study in (Post-)Colonial Border Regimes and Interstate Arbitration in Nomos' collection Studien zur Geschichte des Völkerrechts.

Abstract:

In 1885, Germany and Portugal became neighbours in Africa. The newly founded colony of German Southwest Africa prevented the southwards expansion of the ancient colony of Angola. The border along the Cunene and Kavango Rivers remained under dispute. After the outbreak of World War I in Europe, Portugal’s neutrality was questioned in German Southwest Africa, and when a group of German officials waiting near the border of Angola for food transports were shot in the Angolan fortress Naulila, a state of war between both colonies seemed inevitable. German troops launched several military reprisals against fortresses in southern Angola, most significantly against Naulila in December 1914. After their victory at Naulila, the Germans retreated to GSWA. However, African powers, most notably Kwanyama forces led by King Mandume, used the weakness of the defeated Portuguese army to expel the colonial troops from southern Angola. In 1915, a counter-offensive was launched with troops from Portugal that ended with the complete occupation of Kwanyama territories. After the war, a Luso-German arbitration procedure according to the Treaty of Versailles (1919) assessed the damages in Angola and Germany’s responsibility to pay reparations. The arbitration award of 1928 that established Germany’s responsibility for the violation of international law when attacking Naulila became a landmark case. It still holds relevance for modern international law. The final part of this book analyses the memorial culture that developed in Angola, Namibia, Germany and Portugal around the war in 1914/15.

More information here.
Source: International Law Reporter.

SYMPOSIUM on James Lorimer in EJIL XXVII (2016), No. 2

(image source: Oxford Journals)

The European Journal of International Law, organ of the European Society of International Law, published its most recent issue, containing a symposium on Scottish international lawyer James Lorimer (1818-1890).

Articles:

Stephen Tierney & Neil Walker, "Through a Glass, Darkly: Reflections on James Lorimer’s International Law" (409-413) (PDF)
Martti Koskenniemi, "Race, Hierarchy and International Law: Lorimer’s Legal Science" (415-429)  (PDF)
Gerry Simpson, "James Lorimer and the Character of Sovereigns: The Institutes as 21st Century Treatise" (431-446) (PDF)
Karen Knop, "Lorimer’s Private Citizens of the World" (447-475) (PDF)
Stephen C. Neff, "Heresy in Action: James Lorimer's Dissident Views on War and Neutrality" (PDF)

More information at Oxford Journals.

BOOK: Yasuaki ONUMA, Le droit international et le Japon : une vision trans-civilisationnelle du monde [Doctrines: Ecole de Droit Sciences Po Paris] (Paris: Pedone, 2016), 398 p. ISBN 978-2-233-00798-8, € 44

(image source: LGDJ)

Book presentation:

Selon Yasuaki Onuma, grand théoricien et historien japonais du droit international, si le droit international est généralement considéré comme un droit commun à toute l'humanité, ce constat doit être examiné de façon critique pour être dépassé. Un droit international plus légitime d'un point de vue global, représentant le monde non occidental, doit être écrit et mis en oeuvre. Les contributions présentées dans cet ouvrage reflètent plus précisément deux préoccupations fondamentales qui ont accompagné l'auteur toute sa vie. Dans les textes rassemblés dans la première partie, il a cherché à clarifier les limites du droit international actuel, tourné vers l'Occident, cherchant à surmonter celles-ci en proposant une approche « trans-civilisationnelle » ou « inter-civilisationnelle » qui permettrait à la fois de s'engager en faveur d'un système global plus légitime et de comprendre de manière plus pertinente les questions associées à l'international, à l'universel et au global. Dans les textes de la deuxième partie, il a tenté d'élucider les liens entre le Japon moderne et l'ordre juridique international. Ces liens sont fondamentalement ambivalents, le Japon étant un État non occidental et pourtant occidentalisé. Ainsi a-t-il lutté contre l'hégémonie occidentale mais en a-t-il reproduit certains des pires traits (colonialisme, guerre d'agression, sentiments racistes et discriminatoires, basés sur la nationalité, à l'encontre des peuples « non-blancs »). Fort d'une formation qui emprunte à différentes cultures et de sa qualité de Japonais, fondamentalement asiatique mais également occidentalisé, Yasuaki ONUMA est particulièrement autorisé à proposer sa thèse majeure en faveur d'un déplacement du droit international « occidentalo-centré » au profit d'une approche de celui-ci qui se nourrit de l'apport mutuel des civilisations.

On the author:

Yasuaki Onuma, est professeur distingué de l'Université Meiji et professeur émérite de droit international de l'Université de Tokyo. Ses principales publications sont A Transcivilizational Perspective on International Law (Martinus Nijhoff, Leiden/Boston, 2010) ; (en tant qu'éditeur) A Normative Approach to War: Peace, War, and Justice in Hugo Grotius (Clarendon Press, Oxford, 1993) et, en japonais, Senso sekinin ron Josetsu (Prolegoma to the Responsibility for War) (Tokyo University Press, 1975). 

 More information with LGDJ.

PAPER ON SSRN: Samuel MOYN (Harvard), "From Aggression to Atrocity: Rethinking the History of International Criminal Law"

(image source: SSRN)

Prof. Samuel Moyn (Harvard) posted "From Aggression to Atrocity: Rethinking the History of International Criminal Law" on SSRN.

Abstract:

Explaining the shift from the priority of the charge of "aggression" in the beginning of the field of international criminal law to its exclusion in the age of the its reinvention around a suite of atrocity charges is the central task for historians in understanding this domain — and it also should matter for observers of the world today. Yet routinely, international criminal law is presented as running through a smooth trajectory, rather than a stark reversal or at least massive shift. For this reason, this essay gathers together elements for a case for the transformation in the first place, and floats some hypotheses about its timing and causes.

 (Source: International Law Reporter)

BOOK: Benjamin Allen COATES, Legalist Empire: International Law and American Foreign Relations in the Early Twentieth Century. Oxford, OUP, 2016, 296 p. ISBN 9780190495954, $ 35

(image source: OUP)

The Legal History Blog signalled the publication of Legalist Empire: International Law and American Foreign Relations in the Early Twentieth Century by Benjamin Allen Coates (Wake Forest University).

Abstract:

America's empire expanded dramatically following the Spanish-American War of 1898. The United States quickly annexed the Philippines and Puerto Rico, seized control over Cuba and the Panama Canal Zone, and extended political and financial power throughout Latin America. This age of empire, Benjamin Allen Coates argues, was also an age of international law. Justifying America's empire with the language of law and civilization, international lawyers-serving simultaneously as academics, leaders of the legal profession, corporate attorneys, and high-ranking government officials-became central to the conceptualization, conduct, and rationalization of US foreign policy.

Just as international law shaped empire, so too did empire shape international law. Legalist Empire shows how the American Society of International Law was animated by the same notions of "civilization" that justified the expansion of empire overseas. Using the private papers and published writings of such figures as Elihu Root, John Bassett Moore, and James Brown Scott, Coates shows how the newly-created international law profession merged European influences with trends in American jurisprudence, while appealing to elite notions of order, reform, and American identity. By projecting an image of the United States as a unique force for law and civilization, legalists reconciled American exceptionalism, empire, and an international rule of law. Under their influence the nation became the world's leading advocate for the creation of an international court.
Although the legalist vision of world peace through voluntary adjudication foundered in the interwar period, international lawyers-through their ideas and their presence in halls of power-continue to infuse vital debates about America's global role.

 Table of Contents:

Acknowledgments
Introduction
Chapter 1: International Law in Europe and America to 1898
Chapter 2: Selling Empire, 1898-1904
Chapter 3: Legalism at Home: Professionalizing International Law, 1900-1913
Chapter 4: Legalism in the World, 1907-1913
Chapter 5: International Law and Empire in Latin America, 1904-1917
Chapter 6: Legalism, Neutrality, and the Great War, 1914-1918
Chapter 7: World War, Collective Security, and International Law, 1914-1941
Conclusion
List of Abbreviations
Notes
Bibliography
Index

More information at OUP.