ESIL Interest Group History of International Law

ESIL Interest Group History of International Law

Thursday, 29 April 2021

BOOK: Dante FEDELE, The Medieval Foundations of International Law. Baldus de Ubaldis (1327-1400), Doctrine and Practice of the Ius Gentium [Legal History Library, 49; Studies in the History of International Law, 17, ed. Randall LESAFFER] (Leiden/Boston: Martinus Nijhoff/Brill, 2021). ISBN 978-90-04-44712-7

(image source: Brill)

On the book:

Dante Fedele’s new work of reference reveals the medieval foundations of international law through a comprehensive study of a key figure of late medieval legal scholarship: Baldus de Ubaldis (1327-1400). A student of Bartolus de Sassoferrato, Baldus wrote both extensive commentaries on Roman, canon and feudal law and thousands of consilia originating from particular cases. His writings dealt with numerous issues related to sovereignty, territorial jurisdiction, diplomacy and war, combining a rich conspectus of earlier scholarship with highly creative ideas that exercised a profound influence on later juristic thought. The detailed picture of the international law doctrines elaborated by a prominent medieval jurist offered in this study contributes to our understanding of the intellectual archaeology of international law. 

"Dr. Fedele’s monograph will no doubt become a necessary work of reference for any scholar interested in the history of international law. [...] Beyond the specific doctrines on particular areas of international law, Dr. Fedele’s study of Baldus shows how in the area of international governance, jurists sought to marshal different expressions of normativity." - Alain Wijffels, Foreword

 On the author:

Dante Fedele Ph.D. (2014), is Research Fellow at the CNRS (CHJ UMR 8025 - Lille). His publications on the history of diplomacy and international law include Naissance de la diplomatie moderne (XIIIe-XVIIe siècles). L’ambassadeur au croisement du droit, de l’éthique et de la politique (Nomos, 2017).

(read more with Brill

Friday, 23 April 2021

BOOK: Glenda SLUGA, The Invention of International Order: Remaking Europe After Napoleon (Princeton: Princeton UP, NOV 2021), 336 p. ISBN 978-0691208213, € 30,82

 

(image source: amazon)

Abstract:

In 1814, after decades of continental conflict, an alliance of European empires captured Paris and exiled Napoleon Bonaparte, defeating French military expansionism and establishing the Concert of Europe. This new coalition planted the seeds for today's international order, wedding the idea of a durable peace to multilateralism, diplomacy, philanthropy, and rights, and making Europe its center. Glenda Sluga reveals how at the end of the Napoleonic wars, new conceptions of the politics between states were the work not only of European statesmen but also of politically ambitious aristocratic and bourgeois men and women who seized the moment at an extraordinary crossroads in history. In this panoramic book, Sluga reinvents the study of international politics, its limitations, and its potential. She offers multifaceted portraits of the leading statesmen of the age, such as Tsar Alexander, Count Metternich, and Viscount Castlereagh, showing how they operated in the context of social networks often presided over by influential women, even as they entrenched politics as a masculine endeavor. In this history, figures such as Madame de Staël and Countess Dorothea Lieven insist on shaping the political transformations underway, while bankers influence economic developments and their families agitate for Jewish rights. Monumental in scope, this groundbreaking book chronicles the European women and men who embraced the promise of a new kind of politics in the aftermath of the Napoleonic wars, and whose often paradoxical contributions to modern diplomacy and international politics still resonate today.

On the author:

Glenda Sluga is professor of international history and capitalism at the European University Institute, Florence, and Kathleen Fitzpatrick Laureate Fellow and professor of international history at the University of Sydney. Her books include Internationalism in the Age of Nationalism and Women, Diplomacy, and International Politics since 1500. Twitter @IntHist 

(source: amazon

Wednesday, 21 April 2021

WEBINAR: European Approaches to International Law in a Historical Perspective. Taking Stock of Some Contemporary Appraisals (Firenze: EUI, 11 MAY 2021)

(image: EUI; source: Wikimedia Commons)

This webinar aims to take stock of a series of recent publications adopting a critical and historical perspective to national approaches to international law in the European context.

The turn to history in international law has coincided with a heightened sensitivity to the need to explore international law from comparative and specific local/national perspectives. The intersection of these two movements has increased awareness of how national and local contexts have fundamentally contributed to shaping international legal rules, institutions and doctrines since the inception of the modern law of nations. It has also drawn attention to how the international dimension has influenced the conceptualization, interpretation and reform of law at the local/national levels. More and more, scholarship in international law has begun to uncover and scrutinize how political, economic, diplomatic, and historical elements affecting states might significantly contribute to introduce distinctive characteristics and peculiarities, or even diverging perspectives, to the international legal order and its rules.

Against this background, this webinar critically reflects on the legacy and characteristics (if any) of national approaches to international by bringing together recent scholarship on the European context as viewed from the perspective of broader debates in the history of international law.

The webinar is organized by the Department of Law of the EUI in cooperation with Roma Tre University and with the kind support of the European Society of International Law.

 

Session one (14.00-15.15)

The first panel will focus on overarching conceptual and methodological issues including the relevance of studies exploring potential national features; the relationship and dialogue (if any) among international scholars, legal historians and historians in this research; the long-term/contemporary legacy of national approaches; and the complex relationship between the domestic and global dimensions in the evolution of the discipline of international law.

Speakers:

Martti Koskennimi (University of Helsinki)

Inge van Hulle (University of Tilburg)

Jean-Marc Thouvenin (Hague Academy of International Law; University Paris X Nanterre)

Moderator: Neha Jain (European University Institute).

Q&A session with the virtual audience

Session Two (15.15-16.45)

The second session will take the form of an informal roundtable with the authors of some of the most recent scholarship in this area. Authors will be invited to discuss the rationale, methodological approaches, and main features of this scholarship. The conversation will be structured around a set of common themes such as points of commonality and divergence in the approach to national traditions present in such analysis; the role of international law and the academic community in signaling international/national historical markers in different contexts; and the potential legacy of national approaches in domestic contexts.

Speakers:

Peter Hilpold (University of Innsbruck)

Iulia Motoc (European Court of Human Rights, University of Bucharest)

Ignacio de la Rasilla del Moral (University of Wuhan)

Vincent Genin (Catholic University of Leuven)

Giulio Bartolini (University of Roma Tre)

Moderator: Lauri Mälskoo (University of Tartu)

Q&A session with the virtual audience

Concluding observations: Veronika Bilkova (ESIL Secretary-General; University of Prague)

Registration link here.

Tuesday, 20 April 2021

BOOK: Saikko KAIGA, Britain and the Intellectual Origins of the League of Nations, 1914–1919 (Cambridge: CUP, 2021), ISBN 9781108774130, 75 GBP

 

(image source: CUP)

Book abstract:

In this innovative account of the origins of the idea of the League of Nations, Sakiko Kaiga casts new light on the pro-League of Nations movement in Britain in the era of the First World War, revealing its unexpected consequences for the development of the first international organisation for peace. Combining international, social, intellectual history and international relations, she challenges two misunderstandings about the role of the movement: that their ideas about a league were utopian and that its peaceful ideal appealed to the war-weary public. Kaiga demonstrates how the original post-war plan consisted of both realistic and idealistic views of international relations, and shows how it evolved and changed in tandem with the war. She provides a comprehensive analysis of the unknown origins of the League of Nations and highlights the transformation of international society and of ideas about war prevention in the twentieth century to the present.

On the author:

Sakiko Kaiga is a Research Fellow at the Institute of Social Science, University of Tokyo. 

(source: CUP


Monday, 19 April 2021

BOOK: John SHOVLIN, Trading with the Enemy. Britain, France, and the 18th-Century Quest for a Peaceful World Order (New Haven (Conn.): Yale UP 2021), 352 p.

 

(image source: Yale UP)

Abstract:

Britain and France waged war eight times in the century following the Glorious Revolution, a mutual antagonism long regarded as a “Second Hundred Years’ War.” Yet officials on both sides also initiated ententes, free trade schemes, and colonial bargains intended to avert future conflict. What drove this quest for a more peaceful order? In this highly original account, John Shovlin reveals the extent to which Britain and France sought to divert their rivalry away from war and into commercial competition. The two powers worked to end future conflict over trade in Spanish America, the Caribbean, and India, and imagined forms of empire-building that would be more collaborative than competitive. They negotiated to cut cross-channel tariffs, recognizing that free trade could foster national power while muting enmity. This account shows that eighteenth-century capitalism drove not only repeated wars and overseas imperialism but spurred political leaders to strive for global stability.

On the author:

John Shovlin is associate professor of history at New York University and the author of The Bordeaux–Dublin Letters, 1757 and The Political Economy of Virtue. 

 (source: Yale UP)

Tuesday, 13 April 2021

BOOK LAUNCH: Frédéric MÉGRET & Immi TALLGREN (eds.), The Dawn of a Discipline. International Criminal Justice and Its Early Exponents (Helsinki: Erik Castrén Institute, 26 APR 2021, ONLINE)

(image source: Helsinki)

Event abstract:

Welcome to the book launch of 'The Dawn of a Discipline – International Criminal Justice and Its Early Exponents' (Cambridge University Press, 2020) edited by Fréderic Mégret and Immi Tallgren on Monday, 26 April 2021, at 4-5.30 pm. Focusing principally on the inter-war years up to Nuremberg, this book examines the intellectual contribution of a dozen figures in the early development of international criminal justice. The book not only provides an in-depth study of these leading figures, but also contextualizes international criminal justice in its various intellectual stages addressing the diversity of ideas and questioning its hegemonic (white) male narrative. The presentation will bring together the contributors of the book who will discuss the  relevance of the respective authors, how their writings might help us interrogate the present moment of international criminal justice and what concepts have passed the test of time.

This book was earlier announced on this blog.

Register here.

Monday, 12 April 2021

ESIL IGHIL Pre-Conference event: The Founding of Solidarity in the International Community (Catania, ESIL Research Forum, 15 APR 2021, ONLINE))

 

(image: Catania Port; source: Wikimedia Commons)
 

Welcome (09:00 CET)

Presentations (09:05 CET)

09:05

‘Louis Bara (1821-1857) and the Liberal-scientific Restatement of International Law in the Nineteenth Century Peace Movement’, Wouter De Rycke (Brussels) (30 minutes)

Discussion (15 minutes)

09:50

‘The Role of the Brazilian Academic Elite in the “Civilization Project” during the XIX Century: An Analysis from the Example of the Whitening of the Population’, Luisa Cortat Simonetti Goncalves-Renato Coutinho (Maastricht)

Discussion (15 minutes)

Break (5 minutes)

10:40

‘Views in the Literature on Interdisciplinarity Research Between History and Law’ Jaanika Erne (Tartu, ESIL IGHIL Steering Committee)

Discussion (15 minutes)

Interest Group Meeting (11:25 CET)

Registration is mandatory, until 23:59 CET on 12 April. Click here.