Weekend Roundup: June 22-28, 2013

This week on Opinio Juris, our main event was a book symposium on Katerina Linos’ The Democratic Foundations of Policy Diffusion, introduced here (along with details on OUP’s special offer to our readers). David Zaring and Larry Helfer kicked off the symposium on Monday, and Katerina responded here. On Tuesday, Eric Posner commented on the relationship between policy diffusion and international law, and Ryan Goodman discussed the findings of Katerina’s political opinion experiments. Katerina’s response at the end of day 2 can be found here. On Wednesday, Anu Bradford described how the book can inform the debate on international organizations, and Rachel Brewster welcomed the book’s insights on the influence of international law on national politics. Katerina’s response is here. On the final day of the symposium, Pierre Verdier asked whether the mechanism of policy diffusion would also apply in other areas of international law and policy co-ordination; Harlan Cohen reflected on the book’ conclusions and implications; and Roger raised the question about the role of courts in the diffusion process. Katerina’s final response is here.

The symposium also tied in nicely with Peter’s post on a new sovereigntist essay in Foreign Affairs. As Peter points out, Katerina’s findings may suggest that the tide is shifting on international law.

Roger reviewed Andrew Guzman’s book Overheated, following Hari Osofsky’s review last Friday.

Kevin followed up on the fallout of Judge Harhoff’s letter, called NBC’s new show Crossing Lines an “unmitigated disaster” and was sceptical about the implications, according to John Dugard’s article, of the ASP’s President’s failure to table a letter on Palestinian statehood. He also recommended a new essay by Ohlin, Van Sliedregt, and Weigend on the Control Theory of Perpetration.

In the category of “oddball questions of international law”, Duncan discussed a Canadian case on diplomatic immunity in case of a dog bite.

Finally, we listed events and announcements and provided weekday news wraps.

Many thanks to our guest contributors, and have an nice weekend!