BOOK: Wolfgang Graf VITZTHUM, Der stille Staufenberg. Der Verschwörer, Georgeaner und Völkerrechtler Berthold Schenk Graf von Stauffenberg [Zeitgeschichtliche Forschungen, vol. 68] (Berlin: Duncker & Humblot, 2024), 180 p., ISBN 978-3-428-19195-6

 

ABOUT THE BOOK:

Berthold Schenk Graf von Stauffenberg war ein Völkerrechtler, ein Anhänger des Dichters Stefan George und der engste Vertraute seines Bruders Claus. Als Heranwachsende waren die Stauffenbergs George vorgestellt worden. Seither lebten sie im Bannkreis des Dichters und der Vision eines »Neuen Reiches«. An den Ständigen Internationalen Gerichtshof abgeordnet, verfasste Berthold Stauffenberg das zentrale Werk über dessen Rechtsordnung. Vor allem die deutschen Kriegsverbrechen führten ihn in den aktiven Widerstand. Das Scheitern der rettenden Tat am 20. Juli 1944 bedeutete seinen gewaltsamen Tod. Die vorliegende Studie gibt der verschwiegenen, hintergründigen Persönlichkeit Gestalt und Stimme.

ABOUT THE AUTHOR:

Prof. Dr. Dr. h.c. Wolfgang Graf Vitzthum, LL.M., studierte Rechtswissenschaften in Berlin (FU), Freiburg i.Br. und New York (Columbia). Nach Promotion und Habilitation (Freiburg i.Br.) wurde er 1978 an die Münchner Universität der Bundeswehr berufen. Von 1981 bis zur Emeritierung 2009 hatte er den Lehrstuhl für Öffentliches Recht und Völkerrecht in Tübingen inne. Im Mittelpunkt vieler seiner Arbeiten steht der Staat, u.a. seine föderale Gliederung, völkerrechtliche Umhegung und maritime Ausdehnung. Graf Vitzthum hat das Lehrbuch Völkerrecht und das Handbuch des Seerechts herausgegeben. Er ist Vorsitzender des Stiftungsrates der Stefan George Stiftung, ausgezeichnet mit einem Ehrendoktor (Aix-Marseille) und einem Bundesverdienstkreuz Erster Klasse.

Read more here.

SEMINAR: Rudolf von Jhering e la missione del giurista nel tempo presente - (Rome: Istituto Luigi Sturzo, 18 SEPT 2024)

(Source: Storia del diritto)

SEMINAR SERIES: Helsinki Legal History Series - University of Helsinki, 2024

(Source: University of Helsinki)

SEMINAR SERIES: Between Exchange and Expulsion Jews and Christians in France, 1096–1394 (Paris: Institut historique allemand, 17-19 SEPT 2024)

(Image source: Institut de Recherche et Histoire des textes)

Ce colloque, organisé du mardi 17 au jeudi 19 septembre 2024 à l'Institut historique allemand (Paris), abordera les relations entre juifs et chrétiens en France de 1096 à 1394 en évaluant les facteurs sociaux, juridiques, économiques et culturels qui ont influencé la cohabitation judéo-chrétienne pendant et après les croisades.

L’accent sera mis sur les échanges interreligieux et les évolutions des deux religions: en ce qui concerne le rapport aux textes sacrés, il existe des preuves d’un dialogue soutenu; au niveau social, de nombreux indices laissent supposer une intégration harmonieuse de la communauté juive dans la société chrétienne. Cependant, jusqu‘au xiie siècle, il n’existe pas de dispositions exhaustives ancrant la place de la population juive dans le droit. Au lieu de cela, on observe à partir de la fin du XIIe siècle, des expulsions récurrentes, motivées par des intérêts religieux, économiques et politiques, aboutissant finalement à l‘expulsion définitive des juifs de France en 1394.

The conference explores the interactions between Christians and Jews in France from 1096 to 1394, focussing on social, legal, economic and cultural factors that influenced Jewish-Christian coexistence during and after the Crusades. It centres on interreligious exchange and the transformations of both religions: With regard to the handling of sacred scriptures, there is evidence of an intensive dialogue. This also applies to the social sphere where many indications suggest an inclusion of the Jewish community in Christian society. On the other hand, until the 12th century there were no detailed regulations that formalised the place of the Jewish population in law. Instead, it can be observed that from the end of the 12th century onwards, successive expulsions fuelled by religious, economic and political interests ultimately led to the final expulsion of the Jews from France in 1394.

Sur inscription : event@dhi-paris.fr

PROGRAM

Tuesday, 17 September 2024

14.00–14.30 – Welcome and Introduction, Klaus Oschema (DHIP), Görge Hasselhoff (TU Dortmund), Judith Kogel (IRHT/CNRS), Amélie Sagasser (DHIP)

14.45–16.45 – Panel 1: Everyday Life Chair: Amélie Sagasser (DHIP)

• Manon Banoun (Univ. Paris I Panthéon-Sorbonne), Jews in Medieval Paris and Rouen. Two Different Archaeological and Topographical Approaches
• Marie Dejoux (Univ. Paris I Panthéon-Sorbonne), The Jews and the Territorial Officers. From Cooperation to Forced Collaboration (13th–14th centuries)
• Nureet Dermer (Hebrew Univ. of Jerusalem), Jews in Paris Between Expulsions, 1360–1394 17.

15–18.00 – Keynote Lecture, William Chester Jordan (Princeton Univ.), Expulsions of Jews from France Chair: Klaus Oschema (DHIP)

Wednesday, 18 September 2024

9.15–11.15 – Panel 2: Juridical and Court Life Chair: Kirsten Wallenwein (DHIP)

• Amélie Sagasser (DHIP), Jews and Judaism in the French Canonical Collections of the 12th Century
• Pinchas Roth (Bar-Ilan Univ.), Jewish Urban Life in Medieval Paris: Glimpses from the Rulings of Rabbi Yehiel of Paris
• Mario Macias López (Univ. Autònoma de Barcelona), Odo of Châteauroux’s 1248 Sentence as a Source of Jurisdictional Legitimation in Fourteenth-Century Inquisitorial Manuals

11.40–13.00 – Panel 3: Bishops and Jews Chair: Alexander Fidora (Univ. Autònoma de Barcelona)

• Görge Hasselhoff (TU Dortmund), The Bishop and the Jews. William of Auvergne and the Talmud Trials
• Judith Kogel (IRHT/CNRS), Jewish-Christian Controversies in Narbonne During the Thirteenth Century: The Milhemet Mitswa

14.00–15.20 – Panel 4: Cultural and Scribal Activites Chair: Judith Kogel (CNRS/IRHT)

• Sarit Shalev-Eyni (Hebrew Univ. Jerusalem), Jewish-Christian Encounters in French Illuminated Manuscripts
• Katelyn Mesler (Univ. Heidelberg), Vernacular Verses: New Approaches to Medieval Hebrew-French Bible Glossaries
• 16.00–17.30 – Guided Tour: The Jewish Marais, Musée d‘art et d‘histoire du Judaïsme (mahJ) 71 Rue du Temple, 75003 Paris

Thursday, 19 September 2024

9.00–11.00 – Panel 5: Intellectual Life Chair: Görge Hasselhoff (TU Dortmund)

• Wout van Bekkum (Univ. Groningen), Hebrew Poetry from Medieval France and Provence as Hypotext for Latin Translations
• Miri Rubin (Queen Mary Univ. London), Ecclesia and Synagoga. Some Thirteenth Century French Interpretations
• Judah Galinsky (Bar-Ilan Univ.), »The Law as Allegory«? French Rabbinic Responses to a Christian Polemic

11.20–12.30 – Round table: Between Exchanges and Expulsions. Perspectives with Elisheva Baumgarten (Hebrew Univ. Jerusalem), Alexander Fiodora (Univ

More information can be found here.

VACANCY: Postdoctoral researcher legal history (Tilburg: Tilburg University, DEADLINE 1 OCT 2024)

(image: view on Tilburg; Source: Wikimedia Commons)

 Department:                 Public Law and Governance (PLG)

Location:                 Tilburg
Contract size:                 1.0 FTE (40 hours per week)
Full-time gross monthly salary:    €4,492 – €6,148
Contract duration:             24 months
Desired starting date:             1 February 2025

 

Are you a PhD graduate in (legal) history with a passion for archival research? Then we are looking for you!

 

Tilburg University is hiring a postdoctoral researcher in legal history for the project ‘Multilevel Governance in Late Medieval and Early Modern Cities of Commerce’. The project consists of two major work packages: ‘Professionals and the People’ and ‘The Rhine as Legal Entity? Exploring Multilevel Governance and Intercity Relations in the 16th-century Wine Trades across the Rhine Region.’ As part of the second work package, you will conduct research on regulations relevant to the wine trade in several German cities along the Rhine. You will join a team of enthusiastic (legal) historians who are studying various aspects of urban institutions in the late medieval and early modern periods.

 

Your position
As postdoctoral researcher, you will conduct archival and literature research within the aforementioned project. Together with the principal investigators, Dr. Marco in ’t Veld (wp 2) and Dr. Maurits den Hollander (wp 1), you will dive into the history of the wine trade in cities such as Wesel, Cologne, Bonn, Koblenz, Mainz, and/or Worms. What expectations did wine merchants have of the urban institutions? Did cities meet these expectations? And if so, how exactly? Did cities collaborate with each other, or did they rather compete?

 

You will inventorize the available archival material in the relevant cities and produce academic publications, both independently and in collaboration with the principal investigators, to report the research findings. You will also be co-responsible for organizing an international scientific conference. There is ample opportunity to contribute your own ideas and to take initiatives. This way, we develop the project and shape it further collectively. At your request, opportunities to gain teaching experience can be explored. This position allows you to take the next step in your academic career.

 

The project team
The project team consists of two principal investigators and two postdoctoral researchers, and is embedded in the theme ‘Urban Constitutionalism’ of the faculty’s research program ‘Global Law and Governance’. Our department has approximately twelve legal historians. Many of them work on closely related topics, for instance, as part of the ERC-project CaPANES, which investigates the economic sovereignty of several medieval and early modern cities.

 

To maintain a lively and active community, it is important that we see each other regularly and maintain strong connections. The project team meets at least once a month to exchange literature and research findings. Additionally, you will also have informal and other organized meetings with colleagues. There is ample opportunity to work independently. As a project team, we are present on our beautiful, green campus in Tilburg about two days a week. On other days, you can also work from home. The department regularly organizes team-building and social events, allowing you to get to know colleagues from other specializations better and to feel quickly at home within the Department of Public Law and Governance.

 

Your profile
Tilburg University is curious about how you can contribute to our research, education, impact, and the team you will be joining. Therefore, we would like to get the best possible picture of your knowledge, skills, and personality. Below you will find a number of qualifications that we consider important for the position.

 

•    You have written a (legal) historical dissertation on a related medieval or early modern topic.
•    You have demonstrable experience in independently conducting archival research with handwritten sources from this period.
•    You are interested in the institutional, economic, and legal history of the relevant period.
•    You possess excellent oral and written communication skills, preferably evidenced by relevant academic publications and conference contributions.
•    You have an excellent proficiency of the English and German language, both spoken and written. Proficiency in Dutch and/or Latin is a plus.

 

Personal competencies:

•    You demonstrate scientific integrity and personal leadership, take responsibility for your work and career, and have good self-awareness.
•    You have team spirit. You feel part of a team and express this through collaboration, sharing knowledge and experience, and contributing to an open and inclusive work environment.

 

What do we offer?

Tilburg University offers excellent terms of employment with attention to flexibility and room for (personal) development. We recognize and reward our employees and encourage the use of talents and strengths.

 

For this position, we offer:
•    A position based on 1.0 FTE (40 hours per week);
•    It is a vacancy for which the work is temporarily funded on the basis of project funding in accordance with Article 2.3 paragraph 7(b) of the CLA for Dutch Universities, namely ‘The Rhine as Legal Entity?’. You will be given a temporary employment contract for the duration of 24 months. Continuation of this position depends on the availability of financial resources.
•    A salary of minimum €4,492 and maximum €6,148 gross per month for full time employment, based on UFO profile Postdoctoral Researcher and salary scale 11 of the Collective Labour Agreement for Dutch Universities. Tilburg University uses a neutral remuneration system for salary scaling that is based on relevant education and work experience;
•    Vacation allowance (8%) and a year-end bonus (8.3%);
•    Vacation days (41 days for a 40-hour work week);
•    The opportunity to work partly on campus and partly from home with a home office allowance of €2 per day.
•    Reimbursement for sustainable commuting: walking, cycling, and public transportation;
•    A monthly internet fee of €2;
•    An Options Model in which you exchange benefits for things such as additional leave, more pension, a bicycle or personal training at our Sports Center.
•    A moving allowance (subject to conditions).
•    Employees from outside the Netherlands may be eligible for the 30/20/10% tax facility. We will apply for this reimbursement for you;
•    A pension with ABP; the most sustainable Dutch pension fund.
•    Training in personal development, career development, leadership, education, and research or a language course at our Language Center.
•    A work culture in which we embrace differences, everyone is welcome and given equal opportunities.
•    A vibrant campus in green surroundings that is easily accessible by public transport.

 

Information and application 
Would you like to know more before applying? Feel free to contact dr. Marco in ‘t Veld, Assistant Professor of Legal History, c.m.intveld@tilburguniversity.edu.

 

We cordially invite you to apply before 1 October 2024; this can only be done online. Address your cover letter to dr. Marco in ‘t Veld and attach your CV. In order to make a good selection, we also ask you to provide the following documents: 

 

•     Cover letter
•     CV
•     An official copy of your university degree 
•     Grades list 
•     (Link to) digital version of your dissertation
•     Publication list and your best publication 
•     Contact details of at least two referees (name, phone number, and e-mail address)

 

The selection interviews will take place on 8 October 2024. 

 

The selection committee consists of: 
1.    Dr. Marco in ‘t Veld, Assistant Professor of Legal History
2.    Dr. Maurits den Hollander, Assistant Professor of Legal History
3.    Prof. dr. Dave De ruysscher, Professor of Legal History
4.    Ing. Gaby Coenen, Manager of Department

 

You will ideally start working for Tilburg University on 1 February 2025. 

 

This job posting has been published simultaneously internally and externally. In case of equal suitability, our preference is for an internal candidate. 

 

 

Tilburg Law School

Since its founding in 1963, Tilburg Law School has become one of the leading law schools in Europe. Through top research and the provision of high-quality university education, the School contributes to society. Tilburg Law School is organized into five Departments: Public Law and Governance; Law, Technology, Markets and Society; Private, Business and Labour Law; the Fiscal Institute Tilburg; and Criminal Law. The mission of the School is to understand and improve the role of law and public administration in addressing the social problems of today and tomorrow. Through research and education, our scholars contribute to that mission. 

More than 4,000 students pursue a Bachelor's, pre-Master's or Master's degree at Tilburg Law School. Through this education, we train students in law, public administration, and data science. The Tilburg Educational Profile (TEP) is unique in the Netherlands. Central to it are three core concepts: knowledge, skill and character. A university education provides students with the latest substantive knowledge and trains them to be critical thinkers and resilient professionals. In addition, the School is committed to innovative educational concepts and, partly in response to the coronavirus crisis, has invested heavily in the quality of online education and in innovative didactic tools to make and keep students inquisitive. 

Tilburg Law School's research is highly regarded nationally and internationally. The Tilburg Law School Departments work closely together in their research in four signature research programs: 1) Global Law and Governance; 2) Law and Security; 3) Connecting Organizations; and 4) Regulating Socio-Technical Change. 
 

 

 

Recruitment code

Tilburg University applies the recruitmentcode of the Dutch Association for Personnel Management & Organization Development (NVP).

 

Disclaimer
The text of this vacancy advertisement is copyright-protected property of Tilburg University. Use, distribution and further disclosure of the advertisement without express permission from Tilburg University is not allowed, and this applies explicitly to use by recruitment and selection agencies which do not act directly on the instructions of Tilburg University. Responses resulting from recruitment by non-contractors of Tilburg Universities will not be handled.

More information here.

BOOK: Jean QUATAERT & Laura WILDENTHAL (eds.), The Routledge History of Human Rights (London: Routledge, 2021), 690 p. ISBN 9781032089669, 43,99 GBP

(image source: Routledge)

Book abstract:

The Routledge History of Human Rights is an interdisciplinary collection that provides historical and global perspectives on a range of human rights themes of the past 150 years. The volume is made up of 34 original contributions. It opens with the emergence of a "new internationalism" in the mid-nineteenth century, examines the interwar, League of Nations, and the United Nations eras of human rights and decolonization, and ends with the serious challenges for rights norms, laws, institutions, and multilateral cooperation in the national security world after 9/11. These essays provide a big picture of the strategic, political, and changing nature of human rights work in the past and into the present day, and reveal the contingent nature of historical developments. Highlighting local, national, and non-Western voices and struggles, the volume contributes to overcoming Eurocentric biases that burden human rights histories and studies of international law. It analyzes regions and organizations that are often overlooked. The volume thus offers readers a new and broader perspective on the subject. International in coverage and containing cutting-edge interpretations, the volume provides an overview of major themes and suggestions for future research. This is the perfect book for those interested in social justice, grass roots activism, and international politics and society. 

Table of contents:

List of maps and images

List of contributors

Acknowledgements

1. Introduction: An Open-Ended and Contingent History of Human Rights

Jean H. Quataert and Lora Wildenthal

Part 1. The New Internationalism

2. John Anderson - Slave, Refugee, and Freedom Fighter: A Human Rights Campaign in the Age of Empire

Caroline Shaw

3. Investigating and Ameliorating Atrocities in the Nineteenth Century: International Commissions of Inquiry in the Balkans (1876-1880)

Benjamin E. Brockman-Hawe

4. Reclaiming Congo Reform for the History of Human Rights

Mairi S. MacDonald

5. The Red Cross and the Laws of War, 1863-1949: International Rights Activism before Human Rights

Kimberly Lowe

Part 2. The Interwar Era: The League of Nations

6. United in their Quest for Peace? Transnational Women Activists between the World Wars

Marie Sandell

7. The "Rights of Man" and Sex Equality: International Human Rights Discourses in the 1930s

Regula Ludi

Part 3. The Formative UN Era

A. UN Treaty Making

8. Social and Economic Rights: The Struggle for Equivalent Protection

Claire-Michelle Smyth

9. Islam and UN Human Rights Treaty Ratification in the Middle East: The Impact of International Law on Diplomacy

Rachel A. George

10. When the War Came: The Child Rights Convention and the Conflation of Human Rights and the Laws of War

Linde Lindkvist

B. Decolonization

11. "Why Then Call It the Declaration of Human Rights?" The Failures of Universal Human Rights in Colonial Africa’s Internationally Supervised Territories

Meredith Terretta

12. Decolonization, Development, and Identity: The Evolution of the Anticolonial Human Rights Critique, 1948-1978

Roland Burke

13. "When You are Weak, You Have to Stick to Principles": Botswana and Anti-Colonialism in Human Rights History

James Christian Kirby

C. Socialist and Capitalist Versions of Human Rights

14. The International Labour Organization (ILO) and the Gender of Economic Rights

Eileen Boris and Jill Jensen

15. Human Rights Movements and the Fall of the Berlin Wall: Explaining the Peaceful Revolution of 1989

Ned Richardson-Little

16. Human Rights in China: Resisting Orthodoxy

Pitman B. Potter

17. Continuity and Change in U.S. Human Rights Policy

Sarah B. Snyder

Part 4. After Formal Empire and the Cold War: How Human Rights are Practiced Around the Globe (1980s-2001)

18. The Universality of Human Rights: Early NGO Practices in the Arab World

Catherine Baylin Dureya

19. How Women Become Human: Chilean Contributions to Women’s Human Rights from Dictatorship to the 21st Century

Jadwiga E. Pieper Mooney

20. The Mothers of the Plaza de Mayo: From Dictatorship to Democracy

Jennifer Adair

21. Asma Jahangir: Personifying the Human Rights Debate in Pakistan

Afiya Shehrbano Zia

Part 5. The Universal Human Rights Pantheon in National Contexts

22. Freedom of Religion and the New Diversity: Case Studies from Canada

Lori G. Beaman

23. Indigenous Activism for Human Rights: A Case Study from Australia

Rachel Standfield and Lynette Russell

24. The International LGBT Rights Movement: An Introductory History

Laura A. Belmonte

25. Rights in Isolation: Lessons on Public Health and Human Rights from Leprosy and HIV in the Pacific Islands

Adam R Houston

Part 6. New Forms of Accountability in a National Security World (2001 to the Present)

26. Decentralization and Public-Private Diplomacy in the Business and Human Rights Field

Steven S. Nam

27. The Selectivity of Universal Jurisdiction: The History of Transnational Human Rights Prosecutions in Latin America and Spain

Ulrike Capdepón

28. Militarized Sexual Violence and Campaigns for Redress

Vera Mackie

29. Solidarity Rights and the Common Heritage of Humanity

Anca Claudia Prodan

30. Intellectual Property Law and Human Rights

Steven Wilf

31. Caged at the Border: Immigration Detention and the Denial of Human Rights to Asylum Seekers and Other Migrants

Stephanie J. Silverman and Petra Molnar

Part 7. The Transformative Impact of Human Rights on Knowledge

32. Archiving Human Rights in Latin America: Transitional Justice and Shifting Visions of Political Change

Michelle Carmody

33. Emotion in the History of Human Rights: A Case Study of the Canadian Museum for Human Rights

Christine Lavrence

34. From the Classroom to the Public: Engaging Students in Human Rights History

Jessica M. Frazier

A Bibliography on the History of Human Rights

Index

CONFERENCE: Legal Manuscripts in the Frankish World and the Transformation of Early Medieval Legal Cultures (8th-11th Centuries) (Köln: University of Cologne, 16–17 SEPT 2024)

(Image source: University of Cologne)

The codicological turn has been a game-changer in studying early medieval legal cultures over the past 40 years. The pioneering work of Hubert Mordek, Rosamond McKitterick, and others has shown that legal manuscripts were unique collections of texts, sometimes fragmentary and marred by scribal errors, but always connected to specific interests and local production conditions. This shift has led historians to turn from studying texts presented in critical editions to studying texts transmitted in manuscripts. The enormous increase in digitized manuscripts has further reinforced this “whole-book approach” in recent years. Today, it is no longer possible to conduct research into the legal history of the early Middle Ages while ignoring where and when individual manuscripts were created and transmitted. The whole-book approach is a method that underpins our international research collaboration that lasted for four years and materialized in biannual Zoom meetings. In taking an interdisciplinary approach, historians, legal historians, and art historians from Germany, Austria, France, Italy, the U.S.A., and Japan have analysed individual early medieval law manuscripts of the Carolingian empire, where Roman, Frankish, and other legal traditions coexisted and became deeply influenced by ecclesiastical law. This conference is the second of two concluding events — the first having occurred at the University of Tokyo in March 2024 – and will try to enhance our understanding by working on a typology of early medieval legal manuscripts.

PROGRAMME

Monday, 16th September

• 9:00-9:10 Stefan Esders: Introduction. Towards a typology of early medieval law manuscripts

Session 1: The usefulness of ancient texts

• 9:10-10:00 François Bougard: Isidore of Seville: The toolbox of early medieval legal manuscripts
• 10:30-11:20 Luca Loschiavo: The medieval life of the Collatio legum Mosaicarum et Romanarum. Around the Possible (and Targeted) Sending of Roman Law Texts from Rome towards the Frankish Kingdom

Session 2: Legal Pluralism

• 11:20-12:10 Shigeto Kikuchi: King, law and ordeal: Paris, BnF, Lat. 4628 as a lawbook
• 13:30-14:20 Helmut Reimitz: Patterns of legal pluralism: Histories of law in Paris, BnF, Lat. 10758

[Transfer to Düsseldorf] 17:30 Book presentation at the Academy of Sciences, Humanities and the Arts in Düsseldorf (for invited guest only)

Tuesday, 17th September

Session 3: Canon law manuscripts

• 9:30-10:20 Rosamond McKitterick: Einsiedeln, Stiftsbibliothek MS 191 and its implications
• 10:20-11:10 Till Stüber: From Carthage to Bavaria. Observations on the canonical mss. of Freising (Munich clm 6243) and Würzburg (M.p.th.f.146)

Session 4: Exceptional compilations

• 11:40-12:30 Osamu Kano: Tours or the royal court? On the origin of the manuscript Paris, BnF, Lat. 2718
• 13:30-14:20 Britta Mischke: Lupus’ Liber legum in the Mainz legal compendium Gotha Memb. I. 84

Session 5: A case study from different angles: St Gall 731

• 14:20-15:10 Beatrice Kitzinger/Jennifer Davis: Integrating Text and Image: A Case Study of the Wandalgarius Codex
• 15:40-16:30 Grigorii Borisov: Revisiting the law book of Uuandalgarius: A paleographer’s point of view
• 16:30-17:00 Karl Ubl: Conclusion and final discussion

More information can be found here. 

BOOK: Renée LERNER, The Jury: A Very Short Introduction [Very Short Introductions] (Oxford: OUP, 2023), 176 p. ISBN 9780190923914, 12,99 GBP

(image source: OUP)

 

Book abstract:

Why have so many cultures at different times and places used jurors to decide cases? Almost every society has professional judges.  But from ancient Athens to medieval England to modern Asia, cultures have wanted ordinary persons involved.  This book shows how and why societies around the world have used juries.  The twelve-person jury spread from England to British colonies in America, Canada, India, Australia, New Zealand, the Caribbean, and Africa.  American revolutionaries celebrated jury nullification, and Americans established constitutional rights to jury trial.  In criminal cases, use of lay jurors stretched beyond the English-speaking world to countries in Europe, Latin America, and Asia.  These countries aspired to democracy, greater popular participation in government, and legitimacy of the justice system.  South Korea in 2008 and Japan in 2009 are two of the most recent countries to adopt use of jurors.  Renée Lettow Lerner is an expert guide, a law professor who is both a legal historian and a comparative law specialist. Using juries is challenging.  Societies must determine how to select jurors, what cases jurors should decide and by what rules, and how to inform them about the law and evidence.  Jury nullification continues.  In English-speaking countries, jury trials are declining.  Civil juries have been virtually abolished everywhere except the United States, and even there they are rare.  Plea bargaining is taking the place of criminal jury trials.  Innovations from non-English-speaking countries may hold the key to jurors’ survival. Along the way, the book tells how a small German state invented a way of using jurors that is now found around the world.  And why some persons preferred to be crushed to death by weights rather than convicted by a jury.

On the author:

Renée Lettow Lerner is the Donald Phillip Rothschild Research Professor of Law at George Washington University Law School. After graduating from Yale Law School, she was a law clerk to Justice Anthony M. Kennedy of the U.S. Supreme Court and to Judge Stephen F. Williams of the U.S. Court of Appeals for the District of Columbia Circuit. From 2003 to 2005, she served as Deputy Assistant Attorney General in the Office of Legal Counsel at the U.S. Department of Justice. She was a witness in a murder case in Paris, France, before a mixed panel of professional judges and lay jurors. Lerner is the author of History of the Common Law: The Development of Anglo-American Legal Institutions (2009).

Read more here. 

PODCAST: Digging Into Our Forgotten Legal History (UVA Law - Common Law Podcast, 9 APR 2024)

 

(image source: Apple Podcasts)

Abstract:

UVA Law professors Cynthia Nicoletti and Joy Milligan join host Risa Goluboff for a discussion on how divergent approaches to digging into the past can reveal some surprising truths about law and history.

Biographies:

Joy Milligan studies the intersection of law and inequality, with a particular focus on race-based economic inequality. Her scholarship is interdisciplinary, drawing on social science theory and methods, and has been published in the Yale Law Journal, Virginia Law Review, UCLA Law Review, NYU Law Review, Annual Review of Law & Social Science, and the Journal of Legal Education. Her current work examines the legal and political struggles over federal administrators’ long-term role in extending racial segregation. Before entering academia, Milligan practiced civil rights law at the NAACP Legal Defense and Educational Fund Inc., where she was a Skadden Fellow, and clerked for Judge A. Wallace Tashima of the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Ninth Circuit. She earned a Ph.D. in jurisprudence and social policy from the University of California, Berkeley, with a focus on race, politics and legal history, and her law degree from New York University. She also holds an M.P.A. from Princeton University and an A.B. in social studies, magna cum laude, from Harvard-Radcliffe.

Cynthia Nicoletti is a legal historian and professor of law at Virginia Law. She has received numerous awards and fellowships, including the William Nelson Cromwell Prize for the best dissertation in legal history, awarded by the American Society for Legal History in 2011. Her book, Secession on Trial: The Treason Prosecution of Jefferson Davis, won the 2018 Cromwell Book Prize, given by the William Nelson Cromwell Foundation each year for excellence in scholarship to an early career scholar working in the field of American legal history.

Read more here. 

REMINDER CALL FOR PAPERS: 8th ESCLH BIENNIAL CONFERENCE, "Back to the Past and Building the Future" (Szeged: University of Szeged, 2-4 JUL 2025; DEADLINE 31 OCT 2024)

  

The Organising Committee and the Executive Council of the European Society for Comparative Legal History are pleased to call for papers for the upcoming Society’s 8^th Biennial Conference to be held from 2 to 4 July 2025 at the University of Szeged, Hungary.

The conference series started in Valencia (2010), followed by Amsterdam (2012), Macerata (2014), Gdansk (2016), Paris (2018), and Lisbon (2022). In 2023, we had a successful conference in Augsburg.

The theme of the conference is to call attention to the development of legal institutions that are related to and serve as the foundation of modern/contemporary state and law. We mainly expect papers based on the examination of primary sources, since the main aim of the conference is to draw attention to the importance and analysis of primary sources (e.g. archival sources, judgements, parliamentary materials) in legal historical research, across legal systems.

The organizers wish to offer the opportunity to all participants who intend to present their legal historical and comparative research based mainly on primary sources, regardless of the historical era and geographical areas.

Back to the past and analysis of primary sources, new findings can be presented which can be used for the development of law in the contemporary period. Building the future can only be based on thorough historical and legal research, which can be achieved by connecting the past to the present. Through the complex and comparative assessment of the different branches of law, we can work towards a more general picture of legal development.

To offer a paper, please submit an abstract of up to 400 words, in English, by 31 October 2024. The abstract should include the title of your proposed paper and your personal data (full name, email address, work affiliation). Please also send a short CV (no more than 4 pages). Anyone at any stage in their research career can offer a paper. The submissions should be sent to vargan@juris.u-szeged.hu. Abstracts will be assessed against: (1) the aim to have a diverse conference; (2) the novelty of the work; (3) a professionally grounded presentation proposal including a description of the sources and methodology involved and a concise description of the research results. One author may only give one paper at the conference in order to allow as many people as possible to deliver papers.

It is also possible to submit a proposal for a complete panel. Panels normally consist of three papers. A panel proposal should – in addition to the abstracts and CVs of those who wish to present a paper in that panel – include an abstract for the entire panel, as well as a CV of the panel organizer. The list of accepted papers will be announced by December 2024.

A conference website will be launched with further details of the conference in December 2024.

The conference website will also contain information on the attendance fee for those not members of the ESCLH, transport to and from Szeged, and accommodation in Szeged. The conference website will allow registration for the conference, starting in February 2025. Finally, the conference will be preceded by an additional PhD-workshop on 2 July 2025. Further information about the workshop will also be published in December 2024.

Norbert Varga
organizer

University of Szeged

Faculty of Law and Political Sciences

Department of Hungarian Legal History

CALL FOR PAPERS: Government Print in Early Modern Europe: Law, Politics and Printers (20-21 MAY 2025, St Andrews: University of St. Andrews) [DEADLINE: 31 OCT 2024]

(Image source: conference flyer)

Proposals for papers (max. 20 minutes) are invited on the subject of ‘Government Print in Early Modern Europe’ to be presented at the first COMLAWEU (Communicating the Law in Europe, 1500-1750) conference at St Andrews, to be held on 20 and 21 May 2025.

Abstracts (max. 300 words) and a short bio (max. 150) words are due to Dr Arthur der Weduwen, Principal Investigator of the COMLAWEU project, by 31 October 2024, at adw7@st-andrews.ac.uk.

Papers are invited on any aspect covered by the conference, which will seek to provide answers to some of the following questions:

• What was the impact of print on the codification and dissemination of law?
• How common was the publication of laws in printed form, and how did this change over time?
• How did secular authorities employ print to communicate with their subjects? To what extent did they seek to communicate with audiences outside their legal jurisdiction?
• How did the figure of the ‘privileged printer’ (royal, ducal, municipal, etc.) evolve, and how important was government print to the business of these artisans?
• What influence did printers exercise over the composition and appearance of placards, ordinances and declarations? How did typographical and visual standards of government print change over time?
• To what extent did copies of laws and other state publications circulate commercially? In what other forms were they republished or reprinted (such as in chronicles, periodicals and newspapers)?

It is expected that papers presented at the conference will also be published, by the end of 2026, in an edited volume.

Conference context

Early modern European politics was inextricably tied to the invention of printing with moveable type in the middle of the fifteenth century. By 1500, secular authorities throughout Europe, from Augsburg and Bologna to Deventer and Valencia, had begun to publish statutes, laws and edicts in print for dissemination among their subjects. 

Although publishing ordinances in print was common throughout Europe, the extent to which authorities committed their rulings to print varied greatly. In large cities such as Milan, Lyon and Cologne, the municipal authorities made use of print early in the sixteenth century, but they all did so irregularly, and only when exceptional circumstances demanded it. These interventions often concerned fluctuations in bread prices, outbreaks of plague, or announcements concerning markets. During the 1560s and 1570s, the magistrates of Lyon and Cologne both began to make more regular use of printed broadsheets and pamphlets, a direct result of the uncertainty unleashed by war, economic upheaval and religious tension. In contrast, very few municipal ordinances are known to have been printed in the British Isles or Scandinavia before the later seventeenth century, where virtually all edicts issued in print were published by the crown or Parliament. There were also regions in Europe, such as the Dutch Republic, where even small villages of several hundred inhabitants would have their local ordinances distributed in print.

By 1700, we know that at least 133,000 editions of ordinances and edicts had been published in Europe (as per the latest Universal Short Title Catalogue statistics), and by this date state publications were among the most common type of text to come off printing presses. This is all the more remarkable when we consider that the surviving exemplars of this genre are only a very small representative sample of the likely total production: placards affixed to walls and street corners had a poor chance to survive for posterity.

There is a growing body of work that points to the important role played by printed broadsheets and pamphlets in political conflicts and in fostering the growth of a politically-engaged public. Historians of the book and printing are also increasingly noting the importance of ‘ephemeral’ print, such as ordinances and edicts, in ensuring the long-term viability of printing and the book trade. Large publishing projects tied down capital and did not offer a rapid return on investment. Printing for the government, on the other hand, was a useful strategy to maintain a steady cash flow. Printers could complete a consignment of placards in one or two days of work, deliver the entire batch to the chancellery, and be paid in cash. Although official broadsheets and pamphlets may be considered as a form of ‘ephemera’, work of this sort was respected by the professionals of the book trade. State publications were often produced with great care, and on high quality paper. 

For printers, producing official edicts was ideal work, and the privilege of printing for the state was hotly contested. Being designated as a ‘royal printer’ or ‘printer to the city’ was desirable for the degree of status that such titles conferred, as well as for the payments that accompanied printing for government. In many European states, printers who had monopolies to produce proclamations and edicts were generally the wealthiest in the trade: in seventeenth-century The Hague, Machteld van Leuningen, printer to the States General and States of Holland, even became one of the richest citizens in the entire town. Her success was replicated elsewhere, as in Edinburgh, where Agnes Campbell dominated the Scottish print trade for over three decades thanks to her position as Royal Printer. 

Printers such as Van Leuningen and Campbell also exploited their monopolies for the commercial sale of ordinances and edicts: an important and thus far underexplored segment of the market for state publications. What is becoming clear, however, is that in early modern Europe, there existed a mutually-supportive relationship between the print industry and government. To printers, the authorities represented the best sort of customer: a regular client who demanded few risks on the part of the industry. To the authorities, the printers had come to play a critical role in the smooth functioning of daily administration, and the maintenance of the delicate political bond between rulers and their inhabitants.