BOOK: Jost DÜLFFER, Frieden und Menschenrechte. Studien zur Internationalen Geschichte (Köln: Böhlau, 2023), 318 p., ISBN 978-3-412-52739-6

 

ABOUT THE BOOK:

Frieden ist nie selbstverständlich, er muss immer wieder gestiftet werden. So heißt es schon bei Immanuel Kant. Die internationalen Beziehungen der letzten beiden Jahrhunderte veranschaulichen dies besonders eindrücklich. Jost Dülffer forscht seit Jahrzehnten zur internationalen Friedenspolitik. Die hier versammelten Studien umreißen exemplarisch die Bemühungen um Frieden in unterschiedlichen Spannungsverhältnissen. Dazu gehören Machtpolitik und Völkerrecht, Menschenrechte und Friedensbewegungen, transnationale Organisationen und Vereinte Nationen, Friedensschlüsse und Umwelt. Darüber hinaus geht es um den wechselnden historiographischen Umgang in markanten Fallstudien. Dieser Band bündelt bislang teils unveröffentlichte Beiträge des bekannten Kölner Historikers aus den letzten 20 Jahren.

ABOUT THE AUTHOR:

Jost Dülffer ist emeritierter Professor für Neuere Geschichte am Historischen Seminar der Universität zu Köln mit dem Forschungsschwerpunkt Internationale Beziehungen.  

Find more here. 

EUTOPIA CONNECTED LEARNING COMMUNITY LEGAL HISTORY 25-26 OPENING LECTURE: Prof. dr. Miloš VEC (Universität Wien), "After 1919 and after 1945: How two World Wars shaped German Thinking on International Law" (ONLINE, 14 NOV 2025, 15:00 Brussels Time)

 

(image source: University of Vienna)

The EUTopia Connected Learning Community Legal History is delighted to welcome Prof. dr. Miloš Vec (Universität Wien) for its annual opening lecture on Friday 14 November 2025.

Within the framework of this year's theme The End of War, Prof. Vec will address the following topic:

After 1919 and after 1945: How two World Wars shaped German Thinking on International Law

On the Speaker

Prof. Vec is currently at the Universität zu Köln as the Second Hans Kelsen Visiting Professor. Prior to being appointed at the Universität Wien in 2012, he taught and carried out research in Frankfurt, Hamburg, Bonn, Konstanz, Tübingen, Lyon II, Vilnius and at the Humboldt University in Berlin. He is a renowned legal historian. 

His publications include the monographs Zeremonialwissenschaft im Fürstenstaat. Studien zur juristischen und politischen Theorie absolutistischer Herrschaftsrepräsentation (Klostermann, 1998), Recht und Normierung in der Industriellen Revolution. Neue Strukturen der Normsetzung im Völkerrecht, staatlicher Gesetzgebung und gesellfschaftlicher Selbstnormierung (Klostermann, 2006) and -recently- Wolfgang Preiser (1903-1997) und sein "Institut für Geschichte des Völkerrechts" an der Universität Frankfurt Denkräume und Sozialwelten eines Völkerrechtshistorikers im 20. Jahrhundert (Nomos, 2025). He obtained the prestigious Otto Hahn Medal of the Max Planck Society in 1997, the Academy Prize of the Berlin-Brandenburg Academy of Sciences in 2008 and has been a senior Global Hauser Fellow at New York University in 2017. Between 2016 and 2020, he wass a permanent fellow at the Institut für die Wissenschaften vom Menschen in Vienna. 

Prof. Vec is co-editor of Constructing International Law – The Birth of a Discipline (with Luigi Nuzzo, Klostermann, 2012), Paradoxes of Peace in Nineteenth Century Europe (with Thomas Hippler, Oxford, 2015), The Transformation of Foreign Policy (with Andreas Fahrmeir and Gunther Hellmann, Oxford, 2015), Western International Law, 1776-1870 (vol. VII of The Cambridge History of International Law, ed. Randall Lesaffer; with Paulina Starski, Cambridge, forthcoming) and The Congress of Vienna and the Transformation of International Law (with Matthias Schmoeckel, Brill, forthcoming). Prof. Vec equally is a member of the editorial board of the book series Studien zur Geschichte des Völkerrechts (Nomos) as well as of the Journal of the History of International Law/Revue d'histoire du droit international (Brill).

Prof. Vec contributes regularily to the leading German newspaper Frankfurter Allgemeine Zeitung, since 1989.

Practicalities

This lecture (with Q&A) takes place on Friday 14 November 2025 at 15:00 (Brussels/Paris Time), on Microsoft Teams. 

Target audience are lecturers/professors, researchers and students of the associated institutions (Vrije Universiteit Brussel - Prof. Frederik Dhondt; CY Cergy Paris Université - Prof. Caroula Argyriadis-Kervégan; University of Warwick, dr. Rosie Doyle; Univerza v Ljubljani, prof. dr. Katja Škrubej; Universitat Pompeu Fabra Barcelona, Prof. dr. Alfons Aragoneses). Yet, the meeting is also open to external particpants.

Interested listeners or auditors can contact Frederik dot Dhondt at vub dot be for registration.

More information is available on the website of the EUTopia learning community.

BOOK: Maike KRÜGER, Security Discourses. Juridification of international relations in the 19th and early 20th century [Schriften zum Völkerrecht; 264] (Berlin: Duncker & Humblot, 2025), 277 p., ISBN: 978-3-428-19268-7

 

About the book:

Die Arbeit analysiert die zwischenstaatlichen Verrechtlichungsprozesse des 19. und frühen 20. Jahrhunderts. Nach einem historischen Überblick werden drei zentrale Themenkomplexe untersucht: Verrechtlichung als Reaktion auf kollektive Sicherheitswahrnehmungen, Verrechtlichung als Voraussetzung für Institutionalisierung und Verrechtlichung als diskursiver Prozess. Die Analyse stützt sich auf die politikwissenschaftliche Theorie der »Securitization«, welche die diskursive Darstellung sicherheitsrelevanter Sachverhalte beschreibt. Die Untersuchung zeigt, dass das Völkerrecht einem dynamischen Wandel unterliegt, der die Komplexität internationaler Beziehungen und Diversität nationaler Interessen widerspiegelt. Dennoch bieten rechtliche Strukturen Stabilität: Sie schaffen einen Rahmen, der es Staaten ermöglicht, Konflikte friedlich zu lösen und Herausforderungen gemeinsam zu bewältigen.

Table of contents:

Introduction
Securitization – Juridification – Infrastructures – Conclusion

A. Justifying Interstate Violence – A Brief History
Bellum Justum: War as Divine Justice – Bellum Legale: Sovereignty and Procedural Law – Conclusion: From Just to Legal Wars

B. Juridification as a Reaction to Collective Perceptions of Security
The Rise of Collective Security – Arbitration: Response to Forceful Self-help – Conclusion: Co-ordination and Co-operation – A Growing Need

C. Juridification as a Necessary Requirement for Institutionalization
The Sovereignty of States and International Law – The Century of Conferences and Congresses – The League of Nations: Institutionalization of the Maintenance of Peace? – Conclusion: Consensus – The Need to Understand Each Other

D. Successful Juridification as a Discursive Process
War and Measures Short of War – Arbitration: Questions of Law or Questions of Politics – Administrative Unions: Unpolitical Multilateralism? – The League of Nations: The Political Relations Between States – Conclusion: The Power of Narratives

E. Legal Infrastructures – Co-Ordination of International Relations
Multitude of Inter-state Relations – Legal Infrastructures – Conclusion: Normative Networks

Find more here.

CFP: International Conference "Historicities of Peace and Security" (Marburg: Philipps University Marburg, 9 - 11 OCT 2024) [DEADLINE 27 MAY 2024 for individual paper]

 

(Source: Uni Marburg)

Venue: Philipps University Marburg (Germany)

Date: October 9–11, 2024

Deadline for submission: May 1, 2024

Historicities of Peace and Security

Peace and security are key concepts informing the conduct of politics on both the global level and in domestic and transnational dynamics across different epochs. Yet, concepts of peace and security have been contested throughout history and still cause controversy today. While peace is a fundamental human value and at the heart of the Charter of the United Nations, it has been instrumentalized by imperial powers as well as authoritarian regimes and subsumed under agendas of civilization, social control, development and conquest. At the same time, the very idea of peace, just like scholarship and movements dedicated to it, has faced scrutiny and outright rejection in situations of unprovoked aggression and terrorism. This can currently be seen in the light of the war of aggression against Ukraine and the Israel-Gaza war. In contrast, security research has been epistemically dominated by military, strategic and adjacent fields of scholarship and policy for a long time. Only in recent years, has it been reclaimed by critical and feminist perspectives challenging long-standing ideas and concepts. As both interpretation scheme and repertoire, security is employed to determine relevant threats as well as to shape reactions to them. Such interpretations and practices of security are often contested and change over time. The – at times paradoxical – affinity between peace and security (e.g. they are mentioned together in Art. 1 of the UN Charter), their contested character, their contextuality and, not least, their historicity connects both concepts.

This conference, jointly organized by the Collaborative Research Center “Dynamics of Security” and the Center for Conflict Studies at Philipps University Marburg, Germany, invites contributions that critically engage with the rich and complicated legacies, epistemic ecologies and practical repertoires of peace and security in either historical perspectives or with a view to present and future challenges and potentials.

We particularly welcome contributions addressing the following topics:

• the relationship of security and peace in a historical and/or historicizing perspective
• understandings of security and peace coexisting in mutually exclusive and contradictive facets of conflict processes (i.e., more security means less peace)
• conceptual understandings of peace and security in conflicts (i.e., first security then peace or vice versa)
• the performativity of peace and security (and their relationship)
• ideas, understandings and concepts of peace and security in varying or different political/social contexts (e.g. in democracies, in authoritarian regimes or between them)
• changing perceptions of global-historical or planetary security frameworks, such as environmental and geopolitical security
• methodological and disciplinary aspects of researching security, peace and order

Submission of Panel Proposals

Please send your panel abstracts of up to 250 words (including names, institutional affiliation and contacts of panel convenors) to sfbevent@uni-marburg.de

Full panel proposals are possible. However, a subsequent Call for Papers will follow, enabling convenors to select up to four papers to their respective panel. If desired, organizers will assist in this process.

Selection Criteria

The selection of panels and the subsequent allocation of papers will be made in accordance with the following criteria while maintaining high academic standards:

• Interdisciplinary composition: bringing together of scholars and approaches from different disciplinary backgrounds
• Scientific contribution: drawing on and advancing of debates and efforts to conceptually capture and understand historical and present-day phenomena, with a particular emphasis on the core concept of historicity and historicization
• Diversity: bringing together scholars from various backgrounds and affiliations both globally (i.e. from the global South and East) and within the context of European academia.

Funding

In order to enable as many presenters as possible to participate in the conference, there is (limited) funding available to scholars without their own funding. Funding will be granted upon prior request to the organizers and on a reimbursement of real costs basis.

Conference schedule

May 1, 2024: Submission Deadline for Panel Proposals

May 15, 2024: Notification of Selected Panels

May 27, 2024: Submission Deadline Call for Papers

June 16, 2024: Submission Deadline Call for Papers

July 1, 2024: Notification of Paper Selection (based on selection by panel convenors, coordinated by organizing team)

July 15, 2024: Confirmation of participation

Dowload Call for Panels