CALL FOR PROPOSALS: International Conference on Risk and Insurance in History (ICRIH) [HOSTING PROPOSALS FOR 2028–2029]

(image source: RKD Research)

The Scientific Committee of the International Conference on Risk and Insurance in History (ICRIH) has issued a call for proposals to organize and host the next edition of the conference in the summer of 2028 or, at the latest, 2029.

Since its inaugural meeting in Seville in 2019, followed by conferences in Basel (2022) and Warsaw (2025), the ICRIH has established itself as a major interdisciplinary forum for scholars working on the historical and long-term dimensions of risk and insurance. Previous editions brought together researchers from across the world and covered topics ranging from marine insurance and maritime law, insurance and the Atlantic slave trade, and micro-insurance, to modern financial instruments and alternative risk transfer mechanisms.

The Scientific Committee invites proposals from institutions interested in hosting the next conference. The selected organizing committee will work closely with the Scientific Committee, which will provide support regarding conference structure, call for papers, keynote speakers, paper evaluation, awards, and fundraising. A dedicated conference website is also being developed by the University of Basel.

The ICRIH welcomes interdisciplinary engagement from fields including economic, business, financial, legal, social, and cultural history, as well as economics, sociology, anthropology, management studies, and legal studies. The conference has also traditionally included participation from professionals in the insurance industry alongside established and early-career researchers.

The Scientific Committee of the ICRIH consists of: Lars Fredrick Andresson (Sweden), Gustavo de Angel (Mexico), Sabine Go (Netherlands), Phillip Hellwege (Germany), Sebastian Kohl (Germany), Jean Kwon (USA), Martin Lengwiler (Switzerland), Jeronia Pons (Spain), and Grietjie Verhoef (South Africa).

Hosting proposals and enquiries should be addressed to: Prof. Robin Pearson, Professor Emeritus of Economic History, University of Hull (UK)

Email: ehsrp70@gmail.com 

The full Call for Proposals is available in PDF format here: Full Call PDF.

CONFERENCE: Storie del Diritto marittimo dall'antichità ai giorni nostri - Macerata, 13-14 aprile 2023

 

(Source: Unimc)

BOOK: Gabriela A. FREI, Great Britain, International Law, and the Evolution of Maritime Strategic Thought, 1856 - 1914 (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2020). ISBN 9780198859932, £60.00

(Source: OUP)

Oxford University Press is publishing a book on British state practice and the evolution of international maritime law from the aftermath of the Crimean War to World War I.

ABOUT THE BOOK

Gabriela A. Frei addresses the interaction between international maritime law and maritime strategy in a historical context, arguing that both international law and maritime strategy are based on long-term state interests. Great Britain as the predominant sea power in the nineteenth and early twentieth centuries shaped the relationship between international law and maritime strategy like no other power. This study explores how Great Britain used international maritime law as an instrument of foreign policy to protect its strategic and economic interests, and how maritime strategic thought evolved in parallel to the development of international legal norms.

Frei offers an analysis of British state practice as well as an examination of the efforts of the international community to codify international maritime law in the late nineteenth and early twentieth centuries. Great Britain as the predominant sea power as well as the world's largest carrier of goods had to balance its interests as both a belligerent and a neutral power. With the growing importance of international law in international politics, the volume examines the role of international lawyers, strategists, and government officials who shaped state practice. Great Britain's neutrality for most of the period between 1856 and 1914 influenced its state practice and its perceptions of a future maritime conflict. Yet, the codification of international maritime law at the Hague and London conferences at the beginning of the twentieth century demanded a reassessment of Great Britain's legal position.

ABOUT THE AUTHOR

Gabriela A. Frei, Early Career Fellow, TORCH, The Oxford Research Centre in the Humanities

Gabriela A. Frei is an Associate Member of the Faculty of History at the University of Oxford and an Early Career Fellow at the Oxford Research Centre in the Humanities (TORCH). She holds a DPhil in History and a MSt in Historical Research from the University of Oxford, and she was awarded a degree of Licentiata Philosophiae (history, constitutional law, and English literature) from the University of Bern, Switzerland. She held postdoctoral research positions at the University of Cambridge, the Université Libre de Bruxelles, and the University of Oxford. Her research and publications focus on the relationship between international law, maritime strategy, and politics in the nineteenth and twentieth centuries. She has a particular interest in the role of jurists in international politics, and how law shapes political agendas.

TABLE OF CONTENTS

Introduction
1: The Sea as a Legal and Strategic Space
2: The Making of the Law of Neutrality
3: The Law of Neutrality and State Practice
4: The Codification of International Maritime Law
5: The Hague and London Conferences and the Rise of an International Legal Order
6: Maritime Strategic Thought and International Law
7: International Law and the Theory of War
Conclusion: Sea Power, International Law, and Future Wars

More info here

BOOK: Peter Maxwell STUART, Steve MURDOCH & Leos MÜLLER (eds.), Unimpeded Sailing. A Critical Edition of Johann Gröning's Navigatio Libera (extended 1698 edition) [Brill Studies in Maritime History; 6] (Leiden/Boston: Martinus Nijhoff/Brill, 2019), ISBN 978-90-04-35269-8, 162 p. € 95

Book abstract:
The original Latin text of Johann Gröning’s Navigatio libera has never before been translated into any modern vernacular language. Gröning’s intention was to set out the position of neutral nations (in this case the Danes and Swedes), and their right to pursue trade during the wars of the great maritime powers (particularly the English and the Dutch). It specifically sought to engage with and refute the work of Hugo Grotius while taking cognisance of the critique of Gröning’s work by Samuel Pufendorf. The text serves as a bridge between 17th-century polemical discourse surrounding the ‘free sea’ versus ‘enclosed sea’ debate and later 18th-century legal literature on the rights of neutrals and the continuation of free trade in time of war.

On the editors:

Peter Maxwell-Stuart, Ph.D. (1994) is Reader in History at the University of St Andrews. He is widely published in the fields of Greek and Latin literature and history, and in the occult sciences of Mediaeval and early modern Europe. He is about to publish a translation of Gomez Pereira’s scientific treatise, Antoniana Margarita, and Martin Delrio’s chef d’oeuvre, Disquisitiones Magicae. Steve Murdoch, Ph.D. (1998) is Professor of History at the University of St Andrews. His major monographs include; Network North: Scottish Kin, Cultural and Covert Associations in Northern Europe, 1603-1746 (Brill, 2006) and most recently with Alexia Grosjean, Alexander Leslie and the Scottish Generals of the Thirty Years’ War, 1618-1648 (Pickering & Chatto, 2014). Among maritime scholars he is best known for his award winning monograph The Terror of the Seas? Scottish Maritime Warfare, 1513-1713 (Brill, 2010). Leos Müller, Ph.D. (1998), is Professor of History and Director of the Centre for Maritime Studies, Stockholm University. He has published on Swedish early-modern and maritime history, e.g. Consuls, Corsairs and Commerce. The Swedish Consular Service and Long-Distance Shipping, 1720–1815 (Uppsala University, 2004), together with Stefan Eklöf Amirell, and Persistent Piracy. Maritime Violence and State-formation in Global Historical Perspective, (Palgrave Macmillan, 2014).

(source: ESILHIL Blog)

CONFERENCE: Conflict Management in the Atlantic, the North Sea and the Baltic, 1200-1600: Actors, Institutions and Practices of Dispute Settlement [Stichting Aemilius Papinianus] (Amsterdam/Leiden, 24-25 MAY 2019)

Conference summary:

As research on conflict management continues to flourish, its maritime dimension still deserves more attention. The overall emphasis is still mainly on state formation and should be qualified, therefore, as land-oriented. The current conference aims at focusing on the maritime perspective, and proposes an actor and dispute-centered approach. How did victims of maritime conflicts claim compensation or reparation? How and to what extent did they get support from authorities and polities? How did individual actors and public institutions negotiate disputes which transcended jurisdictional boundaries? What strategies, arrangements and agreements were resorted to in order to achieve resolution of those conflicts, and to what effect? So far, students of the maritime dimension, have studied either the Atlantic, the North Sea region or the Baltic, creating separate historiographies. This conference will foster an exchange between scholars working on these three areas of research, allowing for a comparative and long-term perspective. This may reveal connections between the three seascapes and shed a useful light on the multiplicity and complexity of the paths chosen for the management of disputes.

	FRIDAY 24 MAY, STADSARCHIEF AMSTERDAM
9:45	Welcome and Introduction LOUIS SICKING, Vrije Universiteit Amsterdam/Universiteit Leiden
	Key Note
10:00	Changing Semantics and Practice of Maritime Conflict Management in Late Medieval Northern Europe GREGOR ROHMANN, Goethe Universität, Frankfurt am Main
	Maritime Space, Expansion and Conflict Management
10:30	At the Centre of Atlantic, Mediterranean and African Exchanges. The Case of Portugal in the Later Middle Ages AMÉLIA AGUIAR ANDRADE, Universidade Nova de Lisboa (FCSH)/IEM
11:00	Break
11:30	Conflict Management in the International Trade with the North Atlantic Islands BART HOLTERMAN, Deutsches Schifffahrts-Museum, Bremerhaven
12:00	Conflict Management in ‘that remote wilde part of the worlde’: The informal Institutions of the (English) Newfoundland Fisheries, and their Limits, 1500-1634 JOSH IVINSON, University of Cambridge
12:30	General Discussion
13:00	Break
	The Emergence of Landscapes of Conflict Management
14:00	Shipwrecks, Churches, and Maritime Conflict Management in the Baltic, 1179 1318 PHILIPP HÖHN, Universität Halle-Wittenberg
14:30	‘Cut my hand off if they give you back your goods’. Reclaiming Looted Property in the Eastern Baltic about 1300 TOBIAS BOESTAD, Sorbonne, Paris/Stockholms Universitet
15.00	Maritime Conflict and Kingdoms Compared: England and Denmark c.1375 c.1415 THOMAS HEEBØLL-HOLM, Syddansk Universitet, Odense
15:30	Break
16:00	Störtebeker & Consortium. Showcasing maritime conflicts in an exhibition FRIEDERIKE HOLST, Europäisches Hansemuseum Lübeck
16:10	A “Sea” of Conflicts. The Strait of Gibraltar in the Fifteenth Century EDUARDO AZNAR VALLEJO and ROBERTO GONZÁLEZ ZALACAIN, Universidad de La Laguna
16:40	General Discussion
17:15	Drinks
	SATURDAY 25 MAY, UNIVERSITEIT LEIDEN, KOG
	Competition, Cities and State Formation
9:30	The Resolution of Conflicts between Bilbao and Nantes at the End of the Middle Ages. From Letters of Marque and Reprisal to the Company of the Safe Conduct JESÚS A. SOLÓRZANO TELECHEA, Universidad de Cantabria, Santander and JOSÉ DAMIÁN GONZÁLEZ ARCE, Universidad de Murcia
10:00	About Legitimate and Illegitimate Seizure. Juridical and Diplomatic Conflict Resolution during and after the Wendish-Danish War, 1510-12 KILIAN BAUR, Katholische Universität Eichstätt-Ingolstadt
10:30	Law, Diplomacy, Blackmail: Conflict Management in the Hollandish Salt Ships Case in Danzig, 1564-1567 JUSTYNA WUBS-MROZEWICZ, Universiteit van Amsterdam
11:00	Break
	Ships, Taverns and Ports. Conflict Management among Sailors, Merchants and Local Authorities
11:30	Piracy and Prostitution. Crimes, Conflicts and Sailors in Helsingør, 1549-1556 FREDERIK LYNGE VOGNSEN, Aarhus Universitet
12:00	Managing Conflict between Deck, Dock, and Courtroom: Mariners, Merchants, and Mutiny in the Sixteenth and Seventeenth Centuries RICHARD BLAKEMORE, University of Reading
12:30	General Discussion

More information with Louis Sicking l.h.j.sicking@hum.leidenuniv.nl or l.h.j.sicking@vu.nl Philipp Höhn philipphoehn-Philipp@web.de.

BOOK: "Governing the Sea in the Early Modern Era:Essays in Honor of Robert C. Ritchie" Peter C. Mancall and Carole Shammas (eds.) (2015)

Peter C. Mancall and Carole Shammas (eds.), Governing the Sea in the Early Modern Era:Essays in Honor of Robert C. Ritchie 

Early modern European governments clashed over laws governing the sea—an environment that featured watery borders, rampant piracy, the threat of free trade, and the large-scale transportation of human cargo. The essays in this volume explore how the exploitation of the oceans changed the institution of slavery, long-distance trade, property crime, the environment, literature, and memory, from medieval times to the nineteenth century.

here you can download the Table of Contents

Carole Shammas is Professor Emerita and John R. Hubbard Chair Emerita in History at the University of Southern California. Peter C. Mancall is Andrew W. Mellon Professor of the Humanities and Professor of History and Anthropology at the University of Southern California and director of the USC-Huntington Early Modern Studies Institute.

BOOK: Louis SICKING, Birth of a Thalassocracy. The Low Countries and the Sea on the Verge of the Golden Age (Paris: Presses de l'Université Paris-Sorbonne), 2015, 350 p. ISBN 9782840509981, € 26

 

 (image source : PUPS)

The Presses de l'Université Paris-Sorbonne recently published a book by Prof. Louis Sicking (VU Amsterdam/Leiden) entitled "La Naissance d'une thalassocratie. Les Pays-Bas et la mer à l'aube du Siècle d'Or".

Summary:

L’essor maritime sans précédent de la République des Provinces­‐Unies au XVII^e siècle a impressionné les contemporains et continue de fasciner aujourd’hui.
La Révolte des Pays-­Bas menée par Guillaume d’Orange et la naissance, pendant ce long conflit (1568‐1648), d’une république indépendante est un thème classique de l’histoire européenne et domine toujours le cadre de l’histoire nationale des Pays­‐Bas actuels. A contrario, la période qui a précédé ce point­‐pivot de l’histoire des Pays­‐Bas n’est que rarement évoquée, alors qu’elle a pourtant fortement influencé la constitution de la République des Provinces‐Unies et son succès sur les mers du monde.
Ce livre vise à montrer l’importance de l’histoire maritime des anciens Pays‐Bas pour la Révolte et l’expansion maritime des Provinces‐Unies. Commençant avec l’intégration des provinces néerlandaises aux XV^e et XVI^e siècles par les Bourguignons et les Habsbourg, La Naissance d’une thalassocratie analyse les changements et les ruptures, mais aussi les continuités de l’histoire des Pays-­Bas et son rapport à la mer à l’aube du Siècle d’or, afin de proposer au lecteur une nouvelle perspective qui renouvelle les cadres traditionnels des historiographies néerlandaises et belges.

Table of contents:

Avant-­‐propos
Introduction

Chapitre I. La formation des Pays-­‐Bas

Partie I Espaces : Ports, communications, façade maritime

Chapitre II. Le paradoxe de l’accès maritime : le rôle des avant-­‐ports
Chapitre III. L’île de Walcheren ou la clé des Pays-­‐Bas
Chapitre IV. La frontière maritime des Pays-­‐Bas et la défense côtière

Partie II Intérêts : Profit, protection, intervention

Chapitre V. Les Pays-­‐Bas et le commerce atlantique
Chapitre VI. La Hollande et la Hanse dans la mer Baltique
Chapitre VII. La notion de risque dans le transport maritime
Chapitre VIII. Le lobby pêcheur flamand
Chapitre IX. Les coûts de protection et la rentabilité de la pêche au hareng

Partie III : Pouvoirs : Rapports de force, représentations, révolte

Chapitre X. Les transports militaires par mer
Chapitre XI. La coopération navale entre Charles Quint et Henri VIII
Chapitre XII. Montrer la gloire maritime des souverains et amiraux des Pays-­‐Bas
Chapitre XIII. La Révolte des Pays-­‐Bas sur mer
Chapitre XIV. Les amirautés des Pays-­‐Bas
Chapitre XV. La naissance d’une thalassocratie

Annexes

On the author:

Louis Sicking est maître de conférences en histoire médiévale et moderne à l’université de Leyde et professeur d’histoire du droit international public à l’université libre d’Amsterdam.
Il a publié entre autres : Neptune and the Netherlands. State, Economy and War at Sea in the Renaissance (2004) ; Frontières d’Outre-­‐Mer. La France et les Pays-­Bas dans le monde atlantique au XIXe siècle (2006) et dirigé, avec Darlene Abreu-­‐Ferreira, la publication de Beyond the Catch. Fisheries of the North Atlantic, the North Sea and the Baltic, 900-­‐1850 (2009).

 More information on the PUPS website.