Weekend Roundup: July 7-13, 2012

This week, Opinio Juris was a bit lighter on the blogging due to the Fourth of July holiday in the US, but we did feature a post from Peggy McGuinness that pointed out a discussion on the St. John’s Center for Law and Religion Forum around the question of whether American foreign policy is Christian, in a conversation Mark Movsesian had with Andrew Preston. Preston is the author of Sword of the Spirit, Shield of the Faith, a book examining the role of faith in US foreign policy and military strategy.

Kevin Jon Heller kept us abreast of the sentencing of Thomas Lubanga Dyilo at the ICC this week, wherein Lubanga received 14 years (minus the six years he has already served while in the custody of the Court) for conscripting enlisting and using children under the age of 15 to directly participate in hostilities. Additionally, Kevin blogged about the implications of a story in the UK’s The Guardian wherein Professor James Crawford alleged that the EU may ban imports from the West Bank.

Kevin also blogged about the new PhD program in law at Yale University, the first of its kind (though there are other universities in the US offering interdisciplinary PhD programs coupled with legal or jurisprudential studies), which drew many insightful comments on the introduction of such a degree to the American system. And finally, Kevin compared the criticism about the operation of the ICC found in Eric Posner’s recent op-ed with the costs involved in the military commissions system in the United States. Both legal systems are celebrating their 10th anniversary this year.

The Opinio Juris readers’ survey closed at midnight on Friday, so to those who participated: a big Thank You Very Much! The results of the survey will certainly give us here at OJ helpful insight about what we might be able to do to make the site better for all of you.

Have a great weekend, everyone!