Like Duncan, I had my first week of public international law. In a brief introductory discussion on customary international law one of the students asked, "How does a practice that has achieved the status of customary international law cease to become customary international law?" It is an interesting question. We spend plenty of time in international law...
I started teaching my introductory course to international law this week. I've got nearly 80 upper-level students, which is a pretty good number considering that an equal if not greater number of students had the opportunity this past spring to take international law as a first year elective. Nor is Temple alone in moving international law into the first year...
The success of a UN Secretary General is largely dependent on two things: (1) the charisma and personal drive of the office holder; and (2) his (to date, they have all been men) ability to lead and work well with the Secretariat. On both dimensions, recent evidence suggests Ban Ki-moon appears to be in real trouble. Unless...
Cross-posted at Balkinization UPDATE: The long-awaited report by the CIA Inspector General completed in 2004 and kept secret since has now been released by the Administration. The memos former Vice President Cheney says demonstrate the efficacy of torture in eliciting information are also now available. Note the Cheney memos are heavily, heavily redacted and it is impossible to tell...
Kathleen Sullivan has filed a petition for certiorari (2009 WL 2173302) in Abdullahi v. Pfizer arguing that there is a circuit split on the question of corporate liability under international law: There is no general international common law of torts. Thus, to establish subject matter jurisdiction under the ATS for a violation of international law by a private corporation or individual,...
I received this notice that I thought our readers may find of interest: The National Law School of India Review (NLSIR) is the flagship journal of one of India's premier law institutions, the National Law School of India University, Bangalore. The NLSIR is a peer-reviewed journal, and is published twice a year. The latest issue - Volume 21(1) - included contributions...
Aaron Zelinsky, YLS '10, smart person and occasional correspondent with me, has an article up at HuffPo arguing for a certain parallel (a negative one) between the Lockerbie release this week and the Guantanamo detainees. Aaron argues that it was wrong for the Lockerbie bomber to have been released, and would not have been, had he been tried and convicted...
Controversy continues to surround John Yoo and the memos he wrote while a Justice Department lawyer that were used as the legal basis for torture in U.S. interrogation operations. Under the circumstances, I thought it appropriate to reprint here an email recently circulated to UC Berkeley faculty, administration and students by Dean Christopher Edley of Berkeley Law School. (Happy to...
The Journal of International Law and International Relations, published by the University of Toronto, is actively seeking submissions. Here is their call for papers: Call for Submissions Volume 6, Issue 1 (Fall 2009) Deadline for Submissions: September 21, 2009 The Journal of International Law and International Relations (JILIR) invites submissions from scholars of both International Law and International Relations for its Fall 2009 issue....
A few weeks ago, a regular reader asked why we don't do more with private international law/conflicts of law matters here at Opinio Juris. I'm not sure I had a good answer. Certainly, those who follow these topics already have some resources to turn to, most notably the European-based Conflicts of Law.Net blog. But these are important topics, and those who follow international...
Here is the official call for papers for the 2010 ASIL Lieber Society Military Prize essay. To enter a paper, you do not have to be a member of ASIL, but you do have to be a member of your "nation's regular or reserve armed forces." This particular essay contest, in other words, is for military personnel. The prize is...
I spent last week on a beach in Florida (because everyone from Philly vacations in Florida in August). I had left all my work at home, and was settling into a crime novel, David Hewson's The Sacred Cut, about a serial killer loose in my favorite city--Rome. It was a light read, so I was willing to go along with...
