Histories of International Law

Seminar description

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This seminar examines the origins and terms of international law since the early modern period, focusing on classical texts and secondary accounts until the present day. Relevant contexts are empire-building and international relations, including conquest, occupations and warfare. Insights will be drawn from the literature on the history of political thought and applied to international legal thought. Attention will be paid to the recent "turn to history" in international legal scholarship, and whether in fact specific theoretical and normative projects of international law are intertwined with its self-narration.

 

Programme

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14 January - Overview and Introductory readings

• Bardo Fassbender and Anne Peters, “Introduction: Towards a Global History of International Law” in Fassbender and Peters, ed, The Handbook of the History of International Law (Oxford, 2012) 1-24.
• Martti Koskenniemi, “A History of International Law Histories” in Fassbender and Peters, eds, The Handbook, pp.943-971.

 

21 January -  Histories of International Law

• B A Korff, “An Introduction to the History of International Law” (1924) 18 American Journal of Interna-tional Law 246-259.
• Arthur Nussbaum, A Concise History of the Law Nations (New York, 1954) 1-39, 61-84.
• Wilhelm Grewe, The Epochs of International Law (1944, 2000 trans. Byers),  1-32, 37-118.

 

28 January -  Scholastics

• Francisco de Vitoria, De Indis (On the American Indians) (c. 1538) (preceded by Anthony Pagden, Intro-duction, in Francisco de Vitoria, Political Writings (1991)
• Alberico Gentili, De Jure Belli (The Law of War) (1598), Book I, chs 1-3, 13-19, 25
• Richard Tuck, The Rights of War and Peace, pp. 16-50 [on Gentili] and 68-77 [on Vitoria and other Tho-mists]
• Grewe, The Epochs, pp.141-162, 187-200.
• Martti Koskenniemi, “Empire and International Law: The Real Spanish Contribution” (2011) 61 University of Toronto Law Journal 1-36
• Annabel Brett, “Francisco de Vitoria (1480-1546) and Francisco Suárez (1548-1617)”in Fassbender and Peters, The Handbook (Chapter 46).

 

4 February - Grotius

• Gerald Mattingly, Renaissance Diplomacy  (Jonathon Cape, 1955) 17-26, 191-197, 283-295.
• Stephen Toulmin, Cosmopolis: The Hidden Agenda of Modernity (The Free Press, 1990) 45-56, 89-98.
• Peter Haggenmacher, “Hugo Grotius” in Peters and Fassbender, eds, Handbook of the History of International Law (chapter 48).
• Grotius, Mare Liberum, Armitage, ed.  (1-63)
• Grotius, The Rights of War and Peace (1625), Prolegomena;  bk. 1, chs. 1-2; bk. 2, ch. 20, sects. 40-44; bk. 2, ch. 21, sects. 1-4

 

11 February - Grotius

• Richard Tuck, The Rights of War and Peace, 78-108
• Tadashi Tanaka, Grotius's Concept of Law, in Yasuaki Onuma (ed), A Normative Approach to War (1993), pp. 32-56.
• Benjamin Straumann, “ ‘Ancient Caesarian Lawyers’ in a State of Nature: Roman Tradition and Natural Rights in Hugo Grotius De iure praedae” Political Theory, 34, 3, 2006, 328-350
• Peter Stein, Roman Law in European History (Cambridge, 2000) 71-97.

 

18 February - Pufendorf and Vattel

• Knud Haakonssen, “Samuel Pufendorf” in Peters and Fassbender, eds, Handbook of the History of International Law (chapter 49).
• Emmanuel Jouannet, “Emer de Vattel” in Peters and Fassbender, eds, Handbook of the History of International Law (chapter 53).
• Richard Tuck, Rights of War and Peace, 140-165, 184-96
• Pufendorf, De Officio Hominis et Civis (On the Duty of Man and Citizen) (1673), Book II, chs 1-6, 12, and 16-17
• Pufendorf, De Jure Naturae et Gentium (The Law of Nature and of Nations) (1672), Book I, ch 1 & ch. 6; Book II, ch. 3; Book III, ch. 3, ss. 9-10; Book IV, ch. 5, ss. 6-10
• Vattel, The Law of Nations (Liberty Fund edition), Preface (vii-xvii), Preliminaries, Book I chapters 1-6, Book 2 chapters 1, 3, 4, 5, Book 3 chapters 1, 3,

 

25 February - International Law and Empire

• Edward Keene, Beyond the Anarchical Society: Grotius, Colonialism and Order in World Politics (Cam-bridge, 2002) chapters 3 and 4
• Anthony Pagden, Lords of All the World: Ideologies of Empire in Spain, Britain and France (Yale, 1998) Chapters 3-4
• Anthony Anghie, Imperialism, Sovereignty and the Making of International Law (Cambridge, 2005) Chapters 1-2
• Carl Schmitt, The Nomos of the Earth (Telos, 2009) 101-147.

 

4 March - The Gift of Civilization 

• James Lorimer, The Institutes of the Law of Nations, vol. 1 (1883), pp. 93-113
• Martti Koskenniemi, “The Gift of Civilization” in the The Gentle Civilizer of Nations (Cambridge, 2002) Chapter 2.
• Brett Bowden, “The Colonial Origins of International Law: European Expansion and the Classical Stand-ard of Civilization” Journal of the History of International Law, 7, 2005 pp.1-25.
• Lauren Benton, “From International Law to Imperial Constitutions: The Problem of Quasi-Sovereignty, 1870-1900” Law and History Review 595-619

 

11 March - International Law in the Peripheries

• Lauren Benton, A Search for Sovereignty: Law and Geography in European Empires 1400-1900 (Cam-bridge, 2009) [extracts tbc].
• Lauren Benton and Benjamin Straumann, “Acquiring Empire by Law: From Roman Doctrine to Early Modern European Practice” Law and History Review 28, 2010, 1-38
• Tong Lam, “Policing the Imperial Nation: Sovereignty, International Law, and the Civilizing Mission in Late Qing China” Comparative Studies in History and Society 52, 2010, 881-908.
• Peter Holquist, “Were the Boxers “Legitimate Combatants”? Imperial Russia’s Role in Codifying the Hague Conventions on Land Warfare and the Conduct of its Army during the Boxer Rebellion, 1900-1901.” Manuscript.

 

18 March -  Twentieth Century, 1914-1950

• Benedict Kingsbury, “Positivism as Normative Politics: International Society, Balance of Power and Lassa Oppenheim’s Positive International Law” European Journal of International Law 13, 2002, 401-436,
• Martti Koskenniemi, The Gentle Civilizer of Nations, 213-249, 291-338, 422-465