BOOK: Andrew C. RATH, The Crimean War in Imperial Context, 1854-1856 (New York: Palgrave, 2015), ISBN 9781137544513.

 

(image source: Palgrave)

Abstract:

The Crimean War was fought far from its namesake peninsula in Ukraine. Until now, accounts of Britain's and France's naval campaigns against Czarist Russia in the Baltic, White Sea, and Pacific have remained fragmented, minimized, or thinly-referenced. This book considers each campaign from an imperial perspective extending from South America to Finland. Ultimately, this regionally-focused approach reveals that even the smallest Anglo-French naval campaigns in the remote White Sea had significant consequences in fields ranging from medical advances to international maritime law. Considering the perspectives of neutral powers including China, Japan, and Sweden-Norway, allows Rath to examine the Crimean conflict's impact on major historical events ranging from the 'opening' of Tokugawa Japan to Russia's annexation of large swaths of Chinese territory. Complete with customized maps and an extensive reference section, this will become essential reading for a varied audience.

 On the author:

Andrew Rath received his Ph.D. in History from McGill University, Canada. He and his wife Sarah live in Bethesda, Maryland.

See more here: DOI 10.1057/9781137544537

BOOK: Maartje ABBENHUIS & Gordon MORRELL, The First Age of Industrial Globalization. An international History 1815-1918 [New Approaches to International History] (London: Bloomsbury, 2019), 264 p. ISBN 9781474267090

 

(image source: Bloomsbury)

Abstract:

This book offers an accessible and lively survey of the global history of the age of industrialization and globalization that arose in the wake of the Napoleonic Wars and collapsed in the maelstrom of the First World War. Through a combination of industrialization, technological innovation and imperial expansion, the industrializing powers of the world helped to create inter-connected global space that left few regions untouched. In ten concise chapters, this book relays the major shifts in global power, economics and society, outlining the interconnections of global industrial, imperial and economic change for local and regional experiences, identities and politics. It finishes with an exposé on the catastrophic impact of the First World War on this global system. The First Age of Industrial Globalization weaves together the histories of industrialization, world economy, imperialism, international law, diplomacy and war, which historians usually treat as separate developments, and integrates them to offer a new analysis of an era of fundamental historical change. It shows that the revolutionary changes in politics, society and international affairs experienced in the 19th century were inter-connected developments. It is essential reading for any student of modern global history.

Table of contents:

List of illustrations and tables
Acknowledgements
A note on sources
Chapter 1: Contours of the first age of industrial globalization, 1815-1918
Chapter 2: Of concerts and restraints: the international diplomatic system, 1815-1856
Chapter 3: Industrializing empires and global capitalism after 1815
Chapter 4: Building globalization's infrastructure after 1856
Chapter 5: Migration and the spread of formal and informal empires
Chapter 6: Global commodities and the environmental costs of industrial capitalism
Chapter 7: A world of war after 1856
Chapter 8: Where local meets global: ideas and politics on a global scale
Chapter 9: Industrial globalization and the origins of the First World War
Chapter 10: Industrial globalization at total war, 1914-1918
Index

(source: Bloomsbury)

BOOK: Christopher CAPOZZOLA, Bound by War How the United States and the Philippines Built America's First Pacific Century (New York: Hachette Books, 2020), ISBN 9781541618268, 19,99 USD

(image source: Hachette Group)

Book presentation:

A sweeping history of America’s long and fateful military relationship with the Philippines amid a century of Pacific warfare Ever since US troops occupied the Philippines in 1898, generations of Filipinos have served in and alongside the US armed forces. In Bound by War, historian Christopher Capozzola reveals this forgotten history, showing how war and military service forged an enduring, yet fraught, alliance between Americans and Filipinos. As the US military expanded in Asia, American forces confronted their Pacific rivals from Philippine bases. And from the colonial-era Philippine Scouts to post-9/11 contractors in Iraq and Afghanistan, Filipinos were crucial partners in the exercise of US power. Their service reshaped Philippine society and politics and brought thousands of Filipinos to America. Telling the epic story of a century of conflict and migration, Bound by War is a fresh, definitive portrait of this uneven partnership and the two nations it transformed.

(source: Hachette Book Group)

SEMINAR SERIES: Global History and International Law – Online (April-June 2020)

(Source: Global History and International Law)

We recently learned of an online seminar series on “Global History and International Law”, with weekly sessions. The sessions are also uploaded on a dedicated Youtube channel here.

Sessions:

The Nuremberg Moment, April 29, 2020

Genocide and Crimes Against Humanity in Historical Perspective, May 6-7, 2020

Theory and History of International Law, May 13, 2020

Imperial Origins of the World Order, May 20, 2020

International Law and Global Governance, May 27, 2020

International Law and Imperial Constitutions, June 3, 2020

Colonial Law and Assimilation Policies, June 10, 2020

International Law, Slavery and Forced Labor, June 17, 2020

Concluding Thoughts, June 24, 2020

More info about the Seminar series can be found on the dedicated website globalhistoryandil.com

(source: ESCLH Blog)

BOOK: Jochen VON BERNSTORFF and Philipp DANN, eds., The Battle for International Law South-North Perspectives on the Decolonization Era (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2019). ISBN 9780198849636, £80.00

(Source: OUP)

Oxford University Press is publishing a new edited collection on South-North perspectives to the decolonisation era.

ABOUT THE BOOK

This volume provides the first comprehensive analysis of international legal debates between 1955 and 1975 related to the formal decolonization process. It is during this era, couched between classic European imperialism and a new form of US-led Western hegemony, that fundamental legal debates took place over a new international legal order for a decolonised world. The book argues that this era presents in essence a battle, a battle that was fought out in particular over the premises and principles of international law by diplomats, lawyers, and scholars. In a moment of relative weakness of European powers, 'newly independent states' and international lawyers from the South fundamentally challenged traditional Western perceptions of international legal structures engaging in fundamental controversies over a new international law. The legal outcomes of this battle have shaped the world we live in today.

Contributions from a global set of authors cover contemporary debates on concepts central to the time, such as self-determination, sources and concessions, non-intervention, wars of national liberation, multinational corporations, and the law of the sea. They also discuss influential institutions, such as the United Nations, International Court of Justice, and World Bank. The volume also incorporates contemporary regional approaches to international law in the 'decolonization era' and portraits of important scholars from the Global South.

ABOUT THE EDITORS

Edited by Jochen von Bernstorff, Chair of International Law and Human Rights, Law Faculty, University of Tübingen, and Philipp Dann, Chair of Public and Comparative Law, Faculty of Law, Humboldt University Berlin

Jochen von Bernstorff is currently the Dean of the Tübingen Law Faculty (since 2018), holds the Chair for Constitutional law, International Law and Human Rights (since 2011), and has taught international law as a visiting professor at the German Federal Foreign Office Academy Berlin, Université Panthéon-Assas (institut des hautes études internationales), Université Aix-Marseille and National Taiwan University Taipei. He has acted as a consultant for the German Government and various UN-institutions on human rights, development and international environmental law issues.

Philipp Dann holds the Chair of Public and Comparative Law at Humboldt University Berlin (since 2014) and is principal investigator in the Cluster of Excellence 'Contestations of the Liberal Script' (since 2019). He holds degrees from Frankfurt University (PhD and post-doctoral Habilitation) and Harvard Law School (LL.M.) and has taught German, European and public international law in Germany, France, India, Kenya, the Sudan and the US.

TABLE OF CONTENTS

Introduction

The Battle for International Law: A Sketch, Jochen von Bernstorff and Philipp Dann

Part I: Sites of Battle

A. Concepts - Kampfbegriffe

1: The Common Heritage of Mankind: Annotations on a Battle, Surabhi Ranganathan

2: The Battle for the Recognition of Wars of National Liberation, Jochen von Bernstorff

3: The Developmental State: Independence, Dependency and the History of the South, Luis Eslava

4: Colonial Fragments: Decolonisation, Concessions and Acquired Rights, Matthew Craven

5: Acquired Rights and State Succession - The Rise and Fall of the Third World in the International Law Commission, Anna Brunner

6: Rival Worlds and the Place of the Corporation in International law, Sundhya Pahuja and Anna Saunders

7: The Battle Continues: Rebuilding Empire through Internationalization of State Contracts, Muthucumaraswamy Sornarajah

8: (De)colonizing Human Rights, Florian Hoffmann and Bethania Assy

9: Picking Battles: Race, Decolonization, and Apartheid, Rotem Giladi

B. Institutions

10: The International Court of Justice During the Battle for International Law (1955-1975)-Colonial Imprints and Possibilities for Change, Ingo Venzke

11: The Battle and the United Nations, Guy Sinclair

12: The World Bank in the Battles of the 'Decolonization Era', Philipp Dann

Part II Individual Protagonists and Regional Perspectives

A. Individual Protagonists

13: Reading R.P. Anand in the Postcolony: Between Resistance and Appropriation, Prabhakar Singh

14: Taslim Olawale Elias: From British Colonial Law to Modern International Law, Carl Landauer

15: Determining New Selves: Mohammed Bedjaoui on Algeria, Western Sahara, and Post-Classical International Law, Umut Özsu

16: Charles Chaumont's Third World International Legal Theory, Emamanuelle Tourme Jouannet

B. Regional Perspectives

17: Literal 'Decolonisation': Re-reading African International Legal Scholarship through the African Novel, Christopher Gevers

18: The Soviets and the Right to Self-Determination of the Colonized: Contradictions of Soviet Diplomacy and Foreign Policy in the Era of Decolonization, Bill Bowring

19: The Failed Battle for Self-Determination: The United States and the Postwar Illusion of Enlightened Colonialism, 1945-1975, Olivier Barsalou

Epilogue

What's Law Got to Do with it? Recollections, Impressions, Martti Koskenniemi

More info here

(source: ESCLH Blog)

PhD Fellowships: “Global History of Empires”, University of Turin – Higher School of Economics (Moscow/St Petersburg) (DEADLINE: 17 April 2019)

(Source: HSozKult)

We learned of 7 PhD fellowships at the University of Turin/Higher School of Economics (Moscow and St. Petersburg) on the Global History of Empires. One of the thematic foci is “legal pluralism in comparative perspective”.

“The Program in Global History of Empires announces the call for applications for admission in 2019. The program is implemented by the University of Turin (Italy) and the Higher School of Economics (Moscow and St. Petersburg, Russia). The program is for three years, enrolled students pursue their dissertation research in the international environment and enjoy international academic supervision. Scholarships are allocated at the University of Turin (4 scholarships) and Higher Schools of Economics (3 scholarships) […]”

More info can be found on Hsozkult

(source: ESCLH Blog)

CONFERENCE: International Organizations and Decoloniation in Historical Perspective (Munich: LMU München, 25-26 Jan 2019)

(image source: LMU)

FRIDAY, February 25, 2019

Venue: Historisches Kolleg, Kaulbachstraße 15, 80539 München

9:00 – 9:15 COFFEE and REGISTRATION*

9:15 – 9:35 INTRODUCTION

Eva-Maria Muschik (University of Bern)

9:45 – 11:00 PANEL 1: Debating the Meaning of Decolonization – International Organizations as Venues

Anne-Isabelle Richard (Leiden University): “Negotiating Decolonization: African Delegates at the Council of Europe”

Elisabeth Leake (University of Leeds): “Debating Decolonization During the Soviet Invasion of Afghanistan”

Chair and Discussant: Jennifer Foray (Purdue University)

11:00 – 11:30 BREAK

11:30 – 13:00 PANEL 2: The Imperialism of International Decolonization

Giorgio Poti (American University of Rome): “The Matryoshka of Empire: Egypt, Sudan and the League of Nations, 1919 –1924”

Stella Krepp (University of Bern): “America Para Los Americanos: The British Caribbean, Decolonization and the Inter-American System, 1940-1969”

Angela Loschke (Leipzig University): “Development, Decolonization and African Relations: South Africa, the UN and the Creation of the Economic Commission for Africa, 1950-1958”

Chair and Discussant: Jason Parker (Texas A&M University)

13:00 – 15:00 LUNCH BREAK*

15:00 – 16:30 PANEL 3: International Organizations as Platforms for Anti-Colonial Struggles

Giuliano Garavini (New York University Abu Dhabi): “Baghdad 1960: the Birth of OPEC as the First International Organization of the Global South”

Jeffrey Byrne (University of British Columbia): “African Unity and the Competing Apparata of the Third World Project”

Alanna O’Malley (Leiden University): “A View from Inside: Examining the Agency of UN officials on the Committee of 24 in Reconstituting the Means and Methods of Decolonization from 1961-1975”

Chair and Discussant: Simon Stevens (University of Sheffield)

16:30 – 17:00 COFFEE BREAK*

17:00 – 18:30 KEYNOTE LECTURE

Susan Pedersen (Columbia University): “Legitimation Crisis: The Italo-Ethiopian Dispute in International Politics”

Introduction: Madeleine Herren-Oesch (University of Basel)

18:30 – 19:30 RECEPTION*

SATURDAY, February 26, 2019

Venue: Historisches Seminar, Ludwig-Maximilians-Universität München, Amalienstr. 52, 80799 München; Room: K 001

9:30 – 10:30  PANEL 4: Shaping Decolonization through Advocacy, Standard Setting and Law Making

Meredith Terretta (University of Ottawa): “Early Human Rights NGOs, Anticolonial Activists and Freedom of Movement in Decolonizing Africa”

Bastiaan Bouwman (London School of Economics): “Christianity after Empire: The Ecumenical Movement’s Advocacy of Religious Freedom in Decolonizing Indonesia and Nigeria, 1945-1960”

Boyd van Dijk (University of Amsterdam): “Pluralizing Colonial Sovereignty: Creating International Law for the Wars of Decolonization”

Chair and Discussant: Pamela Ballinger (University of Michigan)

10:30 – 10:45 COFFEE BREAK*

10:45 – 12:15 PANEL 5: Decolonizing Knowledge and Expertise

Bogdan Iacob (University of Exeter): “Malariology, Peripheries, and Decolonization: East European Experts from the League of Nations to the World Health Organization”

William Carruthers (University of East Anglia): “Archaeological (Non?) Alignments: Egypt, India and the Scientific Geographies of UNESCO’s Nubian Campaign”

Su Lin Lewis (University of Bristol): “Competitive Cultural Diplomacy and Civil Society in 1950s Burma”

Chair and Discussant: Jessica Pearson (Macalaster College)

12:15 – 13:15 LUNCH BREAK*

13:15 – 14:45 PANEL 6: Decolonization and Humanitarian Interventions

Noelle Turtur (Columbia University): “Mothers without Milk: A Humanitarian Crisis in British Occupied Italian East Africa”

Brian McNeil (US Air War College): “The Battle of Geneva: The International Committee of the Red Cross and the Humanitarian Crisis in Biafra”

Emily Baughan (University of Sheffield): “Decolonising Development? The International Council of Child Welfare in Western Nigeria, 1963-1970”

Chair and Discussant: Tehila Sasson (Emory University)

14:45 – 15:00 COFFEE BREAK*

15:00 – 16:00 CONCLUDING DISCUSSION

Introduction: Roland Wenzlhuemer (Ludwig Maximilian University of Munich)

(more information here)

JOURNAL: Journal of Modern Intellectual History, Forum "Law, Empire and Global Intellectual History" (July 2018)

(image source: Cambridge Core)

Introduction (Mililnda Banerjee & Kersten Von Lingen, "Law, Empire and Global Intellectual History: An Introduction"):

In recent years, there has been a deepening convergence between scholarship on global intellectual history and on legal history. To take just one example, a recent book on international law, by Arnulf Becker Lorca (2014), carries “global intellectual history” in its subtitle—a stance related to the author's emphasis on the constitutive role in the field of non-European legal actors.1 A sustained reflection on the convergence between legal studies and global intellectual history, however, still remains a desideratum, at least in the sense that we do not yet have even a basic platform where scholars with different space/time and (trans-) cultural specialization come together to reflect on how studying legal concepts gains from global intellectual history. This forum, which results from a conference organized at Heidelberg University in 2016, attempts a preliminary intervention here. The introductory remarks are not meant to be conclusive; they invite responses.

"Property and Political Norms: Hanafi Juristic Discourse in Agrarian Bengal" (Andrew Sartori)

This article explores the reception of discourses about land and property in Islamic jurisprudence in colonial Bengal. I argue that Hanafi fiqh provided a sophisticated conceptual repertoire for framing claims to property that agrarian political actors in Muslim Bengal drew upon. Yet the dominant framework for understanding property claims in postclassical jurisprudence was ill-fitted to claims of the kind that agrarian movements in colonial Bengal were articulating. As a result, twentieth-century agrarian movements in the region spoke the language of fiqh, but nonetheless inhabited the ideological landscape of a much broader twentieth-century world of political aspirations and norms.

"Sovereignty as a Motor of Global Conceptual Travel: Sanskritic Equivalents of “Law” in Bengali Discursive Production" (Milinda Banerjee)

How may one imagine the global travel of legal concepts, thinking through models of diffusion and translation, as well as through obstruction, negation, and dialectical transfiguration? This article offers some reflections by interrogating discourses (intertextually woven with Sanskritic invocations) produced by three celebrated Bengalis: the nationalist littérateur Bankimchandra Chattopadhyay (1838–94), the Rajavamshi “lower-caste” peasant leader Panchanan Barma (1866–1935), and the international jurist Radhabinod Pal (1886–1967). These actors evidently took part in projects of vernacularizing (and thereby globalizing through linguistic–conceptual translation) legal–political frameworks of state sovereignty. They produced ideas of nexus between sovereignty, law, and “divine” lawgiving activity, which resemble as well as diverge from notions of political theology associated with the German jurist Carl Schmitt. Simultaneously, these actors critiqued coercive impositions of state-backed positive law and sovereign violence, often in the name of globally oriented concepts of “ethical”/natural law, theology, and capacious forms of solidarity, including categories like “all beings,” “self/soul,” “humanity,” and “world.” I argue that “sovereignty,” as a metonym for concrete practices of power as well as a polyvalent conceptual signifier, thus dialectically provoked the globalization of modern legal intellection, including in the extra-European world.

"Legal Flows: Contributions of Exiled Lawyers Toward the Concept of ‘Crimes Against Humanity’ During the Second World War" (Kerstin Von Lingen)

This article addresses the normative framework of the concept of “crimes against humanity” from the perspective of intellectual history, by scrutinizing legal debates of marginalized (and exiled) academic–juridical actors within the United Nations War Crimes Commission (UNWCC). Decisive for its successful implementation were two factors: the growing scale of mass violence against civilians during the Second World War, and the strong support and advocacy of “peripheral actors,” jurists forced into exile in London by the war. These jurists included representatives of smaller Allied countries from around the world, who used the commission's work to push for a codification of international law, which finally materialized during the London Conference of August 1945. This article studies the process of mediation and the emergence of legal concepts. It thereby introduces the concept of “legal flows” to highlight the different strands and older traditions of humanitarian law involved in coining new law. The experience of exile is shown to have had a significant constitutive function in the globalization of a concept (that of “crimes against humanity”).

"Liberalism, Cultural Particularism, and the Rule of Law in Modern East Asia: The Anti-Confucian Essentialisms of Chen Duxiu and Fukuzawa Yukichi Compared" (Kiri Paramore)

How and why are universalist modes of political thought transformed into culturally essentialist and exclusionary practices of governance and law? This article considers this question by analyzing the interaction between Confucianism and liberalism in East Asia. It argues that liberalism, particularly as it was used in attacking Confucianism, was instrumental in embedding ideas of cultural particularism and cultural essentialism in the emergence of modern political thought and law in both China and Japan. Both Confucianism and liberalism are self-imagined as universalist traditions, theoretically applicable to all global societies. Yet in practice both have regularly been defined in culturally determined, culturally exclusivist terms: Confucianism as “Chinese,” liberalism as “British” or “Western.” The meeting of Confucian and liberal visions of universalism and globalism in nineteenth-century East Asia provides an intriguing case study for considering the interaction between universalism and cultural exclusivism. This article focuses on the role of nineteenth-century global liberalism in attacks upon the previous Confucian order in East Asia, demonstrating the complicity of liberalism in new, culturally essentialist and particularist constructions of governance and law in both China and Japan.

"Autonomy and Decentralization in the Global Imperial Crisis: The Russian Empire and Soviet Union in 1905–1924" (Ivan Sablin & Alexander Semyonov)

This article brings the case of imperial transformation of the Russian Empire/Soviet Union into global discussions about empire, nationalism, and postimperial governance, and highlights the political and legal imaginaries that shaped this transformation, including their global and entangled character. This article argues that the legal and political discourses of decentralization, autonomism, and federalism that circulated at the time of the imperial crisis between the Revolution of 1905 and the adoption of the Soviet Constitution in 1924 contributed to the formation of an ethno-national federation in place of the Russian Empire, despite both the efforts of the Bolsheviks to create a unitary state, and the expectations of a different future among contemporary observers. At the same time, the postimperial institutional framework became a product of political conjunctures rather than the legal discourse. Its weakness before the consolidating party dictatorship made the Soviet Union a showcase of sham federalism and autonomism.

"Jewish Modern Law and Legalism in a Global Age: The Case of Rabbi Joseph Karo" (Roni Weinstein)

During the late sixteenth and early seventeenth centuries, Rabbi Joseph Karo composed two major Jewish codes of law: the Beit Yosef, and its abridged version, Sulchan ‘Aruch. Though several centuries of legal discussion and scholarship have passed since their publication, these double codes of law were never superseded. This codification project defined the axial place of law in Jewish tradition. I argue that it responded to changes in legal processes and the enforcement of law that simultaneously transformed early modern Europe and the Ottoman world. Transcontinentally connected changes in political institutions—the formation of a centralized Islamic empire in the Ottoman case, and the formation of centralized states in Europe—dramatically redefined the role of law and legal codification in the forging of state power and community identities. The resultant belief among Sephardi rabbis, including Karo, that changes in Jewish legal tradition were now needed, prompted a redefinition of Jewish legal culture, whereby law (a gradually centralized conception of it) began to be seen as the foundation of Jewish religious heritage and ethnic identity. Despite the absence of state backing, early modern transformations in Jewish law were thus part of comparable changes taking place in the European and Islamic legal worlds.

Find the full issue on Cambridge Core.

BOOK AND PROJECT WEBSITE: Global History of International Ideas - Histoire globale des idées internationales

(image source: globalhistoryofinternationallaw)

Prof. dr. Emmanuelle Tourme-Jouannet (Sciences Po Law School), dr. Dominique Gaurier (Université de Nantes, emeritus) and Prof. dr. Alix Toublanc (Paris I Panthéon-Sorbonne) launched the website of the bilingual project Global History of Public International Ideas/Histoire globale des idées internationalistes.

Project description (in English):

We have long been convinced that it is both necessary and useful to assemble a new collection of texts relating to the field of public international law. Such a collection would go further than previous compilations, such as the one assembled in 1927 by Louis Le Fur and Georges Chklaver, or Pierre-Marie Dupuy and Yann Kerbrat’s more recent collection which essentially focusses on post-World War II positive international law.
Our text collection will be different. It will look at international law from a global perspective, leaving behind the Eurocentric perspective that Western internationalists have imposed upon the rest of the world, as part of what Jack Goody famouly coined as The Theft of History (CUP, 2006). Our goal will be to provide our readers with the tools to develop a global history of international law. Being more global and more open to influences from all over the world, this history of international law will draw non-European ideas, both ancient and new. Thus, it will allow for the kind of comparisons, connexions, and oppositions which have always played a central part in the global history of international ideas – a history which cannot be written any longer by resorting only to Western categories and concepts.
Together, the selected texts will form a global panorama of internationalist ideas. They will be part of an evolving project which will rely upon a global network of co-ordinators. These co-ordinators will gradually assemble the texts that will complement our first, then our second, collection.
Rather than aiming at being exhaustive – a thing of the impossible in our field – the panorama we have in mind will be a simple one. Inevitably, some of the basic choices we made at the outset might appear arbitrary, such as using a lineary time-frame typical of Western cultures – although we might eventually be able to integrate other approaches. We proceeded by collecting texts that seemed particularly relevant to us. Other texts, which we were not able to include, are just as relevant. However, all three of us being French, we necessarily only have limited access to non-European sources. This is why we intend to rely heavily on all members of our network to enrich our collection in the future.We prefer using the term ‘internationalist ideas’, rather than ‘great authors in the field of international law’, for two reasons. Firstly, because the history of internationalist thought goes back to internationalist ideas that were not produced by European ‘internationalists’ in the current sense of the word, but by politicians, philosophers, theologians, thinkers discussing war and peace, commerce and currency, and many other things common to different peoples.
We feel that acknowledging these early histories and presenting them to the reader is indispensable in order to understand which kind of concerns led to the birth of international law. Secondly, the very idea of ‘great authors’ is problematic and over-simplifying, as it would have led us to make arbitrary choices which, from a scientific perspective, would have been rather questionable. It leaves out the intricacies, nuances, and subtle distinctions made by other texts which, despite being less well-known, are just as relevant than those written by more prominent authors.
At this point, two volumes have already been conceived in this fashion. The first volume, which will be presented hereafter, will present texts ranging from Antiquity to the beginning of the modern period (in the European sense of the word), i.e. the end of the 18th century. This period saw a decisive change in the evolution of internationalist ideas. As a matter of fact, it was at the end of the 18th century that the European inter-state law of nations began spreading to the rest of the world. However, this European law of nations, once imitated, translated, and taught in regions colonized or dominated by European powers, also started opening up to the influences other cultures.
We hope that this first volume of our series will provide large readership with direct access to internationalist ideas. We organized the relevant sources thematically and presented them in their original forms, without any accompanying interpretation. Nothing will ever beat direct access to original texts, although presenting these texts in a translated form (i.e. in French and, eventually, at least also in English and Spanish) might already be considered a form of betrayal. 

Translated by Michel Erpelding
Max Planck Institute Luxembourg

The open access e-book Une histoire globale des idées internationalistes, associated with the project, can be downloaded here.

Full information and the text of the two first online contributions, as well as maps and documents drawn from recent scholarship can be found on the website.

WORKSHOP: The History and Theory of Treaty-Making with Indigenous Peoples (London, Queen Mary, 22 October 2014)

(image source: International Law Reporter)

 International Law Reporter announced a workshop on "Treaty-Making with Indigeneous Peoples", organised by the Centre for Law and Society in a Global Context at Queen Mary University (London), on Tuesday 22 October 2014.

The organisers describe their topic as follows:

The issue of indigenous peoples and treaties is one of the most interesting and intriguing questions of international law. The 2007 United Nations Declaration on the Rights of Indigenous Peoples mentions in several places of its Preamble and in Article 37 rights granted by ‘treaties, agreements and other constructive arrangements between States and indigenous peoples are, in some situations, matters of international concern, interest, responsibility and character.’ The workshop will analyse the legacy of these historical treaties with indigenous peoples. It will also assess whether these instruments can play a role in fostering the rights of indigenous peoples within States at a present time.

 More information on Queen Mary's website.

ANNOUNCEMENT: The Global Humanitarianism Research Academy (Leibniz Institute Mainz/ICRC/Exeter)

(image source: ICRC)




The Leibniz Institute for European History (Mainz), the International Committee of the Red Cross and the University of Exeter announce the launch of the "Global Humanitarianism Research Academy", starting July 2015. The initiative is designed to offer training to young researchers in the field of human rights, international law or international relations.

Mission statement:

This international Research Academy will offer research training to a group of advanced international PhD candidates and early postdoctoral scholars selected by the steering committee. It will combine academic sessions at the Leibniz Institute of European History in Mainz and the Imperial and Global History Centre at the University of Exeter with archival sessions at the Archives of the International Committee of the Red Cross in Geneva. The Research Academy is open to early career researchers who are working in the related fields of humanitarianism,humanitarian law, peace and conflict studies as well as human rights covering the period from the 18^th to the 20^th centuries. It supports scholarship on the ideas and practices of humanitarianism in the context of international, imperial and global history thus advancing our understanding of global governance in humanitarian crises of the present.

 An official call will follow later on http://hhr.hypotheses.org/.