CONFERENCE: Société Internationale Fernand De Visscher pour l'Histoire des Droits de l'Antiquité (Bologna/Ravenna, 12-16 Sep 2017)

(image source: Wikimedia Commons)

The SIDHA has announced that its 71st session wil take place in the beautiful cities Bologna and Ravenna, from 12 to 16 September 2017.

More details on the conference website.

CALL FOR ABSTRACTS EXTENDED: European Forum of Young Legal Historians (Naples); 31 MAR 2017

(image source: AYLH)

The Call for Paper for the European Forum of Young Legal Historians in Naples has been extended to 31 March 2017.

More information on the AYLH's website.

(Source: Grama László)

BOOK: C.H. ALEXANDROWICZ (ed. David ARMITAGE & Jennifer PITTS), The Law of Nations in Global History. Oxford: OUP, 2017, 464 p. ISBN 9780198766070, £ 80

(image source: OUP)

Oxford University Press publishes an edition of the work of C.H. Alexandrowicz, edited by David Armitage and Jennifer Pitts (The Law of Nations in Global History).

Book summary: 

The history and theory of international law have been transformed in recent years by post-colonial and post-imperial critiques of the universalistic claims of Western international law. The origins of those critiques lie in the often overlooked work of the remarkable Polish-British lawyer-historian C. H. Alexandrowicz (1902-75). This volume collects Alexandrowicz's shorter historical writings, on subjects from the law of nations in pre-colonial India to the New International Economic Order of the 1970s, and presents them as a challenging portrait of early modern and modern world history seen through the lens of the law of nations. The book includes the first complete bibliography of Alexandrowicz's writings and the first biographical and critical introduction to his life and works. It reveals the formative influence of his Polish roots and early work on canon law for his later scholarship undertaken in Madras (1951-61) and Sydney (1961-67) and the development of his thought regarding sovereignty, statehood, self-determination, and legal personality, among many other topics still of urgent interest to international lawyers, political theorists, and global historians.

Table of contents:

1: 'This Modern Grotius': An Introduction to the Life and Thought of C.H. Alexandrowicz, David Armitage and Jennifer Pitts
PART ONE: THE EARLY HISTORY OF THE LAW OF NATIONS
2: Kautilyan Principles and the Law of Nations (1965-66)
3: Paulus Vladimiri and the Development of the Doctrine of the Coexistence of Christian and Non-Christian Countries (1963)
4: Mogul Sovereignty and the Law of Nations (1955)
PART TWO: ASIA AND THE LAW OF NATIONS
5: 'Jus Gentium' and the Law of Nature in Asia (1956)
6: Some Problems in the History of the Law of Nations in Asia (1963)
7: Le Droit des Nations aux Indes Orientales: Aux XVIe, XVIIe, XVIIIe siècles (1964)
8: Grotius and India (1954)
9: Freitas Versus Grotius (1959)
10: The Discriminatory Clause in South Asian Treaties in the Seventeenth and Eighteenth Centuries (1957)
11: A Persian-Dutch Treaty in the Seventeenth Century (1958)
12: Puffendorf-Crull and the Afro-Asian World (1968-69)
13: A Treatise by J. H. G. Justi on Asian Government (1960-61)
14: Doctrinal Aspects of the Universality of the Law of Nations (1961)
15: G. F. de Martens on Asian Treaty Practice (1964)
16: The Continuity of the Sovereign Status of China in International Law (1956)
17: The Legal Position of Tibet (1954)
18: Is India a Federation? (1954)
PART THREE: AFRICA AND THE LAW OF NATIONS
19: Le Rôle des Traités dans les Relations entre les Puissances Européennes et les Souverains Africains (Aspects historiques) (1970)
20: The Partition of Africa by Treaty (1974)
21: The Role of Treaties in the European-African Confrontation in the Nineteenth Century (1975)
22: The Role of German Treaty Making in the Partition of Africa (1980)
23: The Juridical Expression of the Sacred Trust of Civilization (1971)
PART FOUR: THE RECOGNITION OF NEW STATES IN INTERNATIONAL LAW
24: Empirical and Doctrinal Positivism in International Law (1974-75)
25: The Theory of Recognition in Fieri (1958)
26: The Quasi-Judicial Function in the Recognition of States and Governments (1952)
27: Israel in Fieri (1951)
28: New and Original States: The Issue of Reversion to Sovereignty (1969)
29: The New States and International Law (1974)
30: The Charter of Economic Rights and Duties of States (1975)
Bibliography of the Writings of C. H. Alexandrowicz

On the author and the editors:

Charles Henry Alexandrowicz (1902-1975) was a Polish scholar who pioneered research in the critical history of international law in the 1950s and 1960s. His works included World Economic Agencies, Law and Practice (1962); An Introduction to the History of the Law of Nations in the East Indies (1967); The Law of Global Communications (1971); and The Law-Making Functions of the Specialised Agencies of the United Nations (1973).
David Armitage is the Lloyd C. Blankfein Professor of History at Harvard University, where he teaches intellectual and international history. He is also an Affiliated Faculty member at Harvard Law School and an Affiliated Professor in Harvard's Department of Government. Among his publications are The Ideological Origins of the British Empire (2000), The Declaration of Independence: A Global History (2007), Foundations of Modern International Thought (2013), The History Manifesto (co-auth., 2014), and Civil Wars: A History in Ideas (2017).
Jennifer Pitts is Associate Professor of Political Science at the University of Chicago. She is author of A Turn to Empire: the rise of imperial liberalism in Britain and France (2005) and editor and translator of Alexis de Tocqueville: writings on empire and slavery (2001). She is currently completing a book,Boundaries of the International, that explores European debates over legal relations with extra-European societies during the eighteenth and nineteenth centuries. 

More information with OUP.

CONFERENCE: Training, ideas and practice. The Law of Nations in the Long Eighteenth Century (Paris, 18/19 May 2017)

COLLOQUE JUNIOR CIERA - Training, Ideas and Practice
The Law of Nations in the Long Eighteenth Century

Day 1: 18 May 2017 (Maison de la Recherche/CIERA)

12:45
Welcoming

13:20
Keynote lecture by Luigi Nuzzo (Università del Salento)

14:00

Session 1: Training (president: Luigi Nuzzo - Università del Salento)

Zülâl Muslu (Université Paris Ouest Nanterre), Language and Power: the Spread of European Diplomatic Cuture in the Ottoman Empire through the ‘Ecole de jeunes de langues’ 

Dante Fedele (KULeuven), La formation diplomatique dans la littérature sur l’ambassadeur et l’art de négocier (fin XVIIe-début XVIIIe siècle)  

Annika Haß (Université de la Sarre/EPHE), Librairie internationale et diplomatie (1789-1830)  

Raphael Cahen (VUB/FWO), Hauterive et l’École des diplomates

17:10-17:20

Coffee Break

17:20-18 :50  Session 2 : Circulation of Ideas and Diplomatic Networks (president: Christine Lebeau) 

Benjamin Durst (Universität Augsburg), Gedruckte Vertragssammlungen als Medien des Völkerrechts in Theorie und Praxis  

Stephan F. Mai (Universität Wien), Diplomatic Immunity between Theory and Practice: Abraham de Wicquefort (1606-1682) as a Case Study 

19:30  Conference dinner (presenters only)  

Day 2: 19 May 2017 (Fondation Biermans-Lapôtre/CIUP)

08:00-08:30

Welcome and coffee

08:30-10:00 Session 2 (part 2): Circulation of Ideas and Diplomatic Networks (president: Christine Lebeau, Université Paris I Panthéon-Sorbonne)  Frederik Dhondt (VUB/UAntwerpen/UGent-FWO), A Pragmatic Utopian ? Saint-Pierre’s vision on Perpetual Peace and its Practical Legal Background in Regency Diplomacy  
Alice Bairoch de Sainte-Marie (Université de Genève), La conception des devoirs du négociateur en Nouvelle-France: heritage métropolitain ou cas particulier ? 

10 :00-10 :10  Coffee Break 

10 :10-13 :20  Session 3 : Transformation of the Law of Nations (president: Miloš Vec, Universität Wien/IWM)  Patrick Milton (Freie Universität Berlin), The Guarantee of the Peace of Westphalia in the Law of Nations and its Impact on European Diplomacy  
Elisabetta Fiocchi Malaspina (Universität Zürich): Trans-forming the Law of Nations in Diplomacy: the Case of the 18th Century Italian Peninsula  
Omer Duran (Istanbul University): The Legal Status of the ‘Memleketeyn’ (Wallachia and Molodvia) according to the Ottoman-Islamic Law of Nations  Victor Simon (Université de Reims Champagne-Ardenne): La dignité impériale des rois de France en Orient: titulatures et traductions dans la diplomatie franco-ottomane

13:20-14:30
Lunch

14:30-15:15  Final debate - Conclusion
(Miloš Vec-Universität Wien/IWM)

Organising Committee

Raphael Cahen (Orléans/VUB-FWO)

Frederik Dhondt (VUB/UAntwerpen/UGent-FWO)

Elisabetta Fiocchi Malaspina (Zürich)

Scientific Committee

Jacques Bouineau (Université de La Rochelle)

Paul De Hert (VUB)

Dirk Heirbaut (UGent)

Christine Lebeau (Université Paris I Panthéon-Sorbonne)

Gabriella Silvestrini (Università del Piemonte Orientale)

Matthias Schmoeckel (Universität Bonn)

Antonio Trampus (Università di Venezia)

Miloš Vec (Universität Wien/IWM)

Venue  Day 1: Maison de la Recherche (28, Rue Serpente ; 75006 PARIS)  Day 2 : Fondation Biermans-Lapôtre (9A, Boulevard Jourdan ; 75014 PARIS) 

CONFERENCE & CFP: "Territorial Governance and State Representatives in the Long 19th Century. Circulation of Knowledge, Models and Men" (Brussels, December 7-8 2017)

WHAT Territorial Governance and State Representatives in the Long 19th Century. Circulation of Knowledge, Models and Men, Conference and Call for papers

WHEN December 7-8, 2017

WHERE Open Universiteit, Campus Vrije Universiteit Brussels

Throughout Europe, the 19th century saw the growth and modernisation of many levels of administration. The state-building process frequently led to the introduction or consolidation of sub-national, or territorial, representatives of the government such as governors and prefects. Many types of representatives of the state have existed in Europe, and many still do. Long, historical research into territorial administration and state representatives was nationally-orientated and disregarded the cultural dimension. As a result, European territorial administration and state officials are scarcely explored from a historical-comparative or cross-cultural viewpoint.

Recently, instigated by Pierre Karila-Cohen (Rennes 2/Institut Universitaire de France), an international group of researchers, inspired by developments in various disciplines, has taken up the challenge of filling this historiographical gap. Colloquiums were held in 2015 and 2016, in Rennes (see http://www.sites.univ-rennes2.fr/cerhio/spip.php?article1699 and https://www.univ-rennes2.fr/cerhio/actualites/colloque-international-civils-militaires-dans-administration-territoriale). The objective of this 3th colloquium, to be held in Brussels, is to further the understanding of territorial officials and administration from a transnational point-of-view.

Within the humanities, the past decades have seen the development of transnational approaches to problematize the nation-state as a unit of analysis. A striking paradox in the history of state-building is that nation-states frequently were shaped using foreign examples. Even though states underscored the national character of their institutions, reforms actually emerged from transnational communication. Both in the social sciences and humanities, the notion of ‘circulation’ has taken root to examine contemporary travelling concepts on good (public) governance, and the intermediaries that transgressed national borders, thus facilitating the exchange of ideas. Drawing on these strands in research, this colloquium proposes to investigate territorial governance and state representatives through the prism of ‘circulation’.

BOOK: "Granville Sharp's Cases on Slavery" by Andrew Lyall (March, 2017)

Andrew Lyall, Granville Sharp's Cases on Slavery

all information here

The purpose of Granville Sharpe's Cases on Slavery is twofold: first, to publish previously unpublished legal materials principally in three important cases in the 18th century on the issue of slavery in England, and specifically the status of black people who were slaves in the American colonies or the West Indies and who were taken to England by their masters. The unpublished materials are mostly verbatim transcripts made by shorthand writers commissioned by Granville Sharp, one of the first Englishmen to take up the cause of the abolition of the slave trade and slavery itself. Other related unpublished material is also made available for the first time, including an opinion of an attorney general and some minor cases from the library of York Minster.

The second purpose, outlined in the Introduction, is to give a social and legal background to the cases and an analysis of the position in England of black servants/slaves brought to England and the legal effects of the cases, taking into account the new information provided by the transcripts. There was a conflict in legal authorities as to whether black servants remained slaves, or became free on arrival in England. 

Lord Mansfield, the chief justice of the court of King's Bench, was a central figure in all the cases and clearly struggled to come to terms with slavery. The material provides a basis for tracing the evolution of his thought on the subject. On the one hand, the huge profits from slave production in the West Indies flooded into England, slave owners had penetrated the leading institutions in England and the pro-slavery lobby was influential. On the other hand, English law had over time established rights and liberties which in the 18th century were seen by many as national characteristics. That tradition was bolstered by the ideas of the Enlightenment. 

By about the 1760s it had become clear that there was no property in the person, and by the 1770s that such servants could not be sent abroad without their consent, but whether they owed an obligation of perpetual service remained unresolved. - See more at: http://www.bloomsburyprofessional.com/uk/granville-sharps-cases-on-slavery-9781509911219/#sthash.AY2eqVh2.dpuf 

Dr Andrew Lyall is a retired member of staff in Law at University College Dublin

Table of contents

Library guides on legal history at Oxford University (Legal History Blog)

The Legal History Blog provides a link to the Research Guides concerning Legal History at Oxford University:

Elizabeth Wells prepared guides on Ancient Law (Excluding Roman Law); Legal History: Western Europe; Legal History: England & Common Law Tradition; and International Law: Origins & History.  Margaret Watson prepared the guide on Roman Law.

More information here.

BOOK CHAPTER: Miriam KOENKLER & Tine STEIN, "State, Law, and Constitution: Ernst-Wolfgang Böckenförde's Political and Legal Thought in Context", in: Mirjam KUENKLER and Tine STEIN (eds.) Constitutional and Political Theory: Selected Writings by Ernst-Wolfgang Boeckenfoerde 1. Oxford: OUP, 2017

(image source: Wikimedia Commons)

The Law and Humanities Blog signals a forthcoming recueil of the writings of E.-W. Böckenförde, a seminal public law academic and judge in post-WWII Germany.

Abstract:

This is the introduction to Mirjam Künkler and Tine Stein (eds.): Constitutional and Political Theory. Selected Writings by Ernst-Wolfgang Böckenförde. Oxford University Press, January 2017. Ernst-Wolfgang Böckenförde (b. 1930) is one of Europe's foremost legal scholars and political thinkers. As a scholar of constitutional law and a judge on Germany's Federal Constitutional Court (December 1983-May 1996), Böckenförde has been a major contributor to contemporary debates in legal and political theory, to the conceptual framework of the modern state and its presuppositions, and to contested political issues ranging from emergency measures to the ethics of genetic engineering, citizenship rights, and challenges of European integration. His writings have shaped not only academic but also wider public debates from the 1950s to the present, to an extent that few European scholars can match. As a federal constitutional judge, Böckenförde has influenced the way in which academics and citizens think about law and politics. During his tenure as a member of the Second Senate of the Federal Constitutional Court, several path-breaking decisions for the Federal Republic of Germany were handed down, including decisions pertaining to the deployment of missiles, the law on political parties, the regulation of abortion, and the process of European integration. The volume is organized in four sections, focusing respectively on (I) the political theory of the state; (II) constitutional theory; (III) constitutional norms and fundamental rights; and (IV) the relation between state, citizenship, and political autonomy. Each of these feature introductions to the articles as well as a running editorial commentary to the work. A second volume will follow, comprising Böckenförde's writings on the relation between religion, law, and democracy.

See fulltext on SSRN.

CONFERENCE: "Aspects fiscaux du droit des successions sous l’Empire romain" (Paris, March 7, 2017)

WHAT Aspects fiscaux du droit des successions sous l’Empire romain, Conference

WHEN March 7, 2017, 17:30

WHERE Faculté de droit de l’Université Paris Descartes, salle des Actes, 10 avenue Pierre Larousse 92240 Malakoff (Métro ligne 13 Malakoff-Plateau de Vanves)

speaker

Prof. Ulrike Babusiaux, University of Zürich