Month: February 2023

Welcoming Maisie Hopkins and Daesun Kim, Visiting Scholars at Georgia Law’s Dean Rusk International Law Center

We at the University of Georgia School of Law Dean Rusk International Law Center are pleased to welcome to two Visiting Research Scholars:

● Maisie Hopkins is a Ph.D. candidate at the Utrecht University School of Governance in the Netherlands. She works jointly at Utrecht and another Dutch university, Leiden, on a project entitled “Complex Global Regulation and Corporate Crime.” Within the overarching frame of how complexity within global governance influences corporate crime and corporate regulatory compliance, Hopkins’ research focuses on how international regime complexity theory applies to specific cases of corporate crime in both the United States and the European Union. Hopkins holds prior law degrees from the University of Amsterdam in the Netherlands and University of Nottingham, England. She worked for a year as a Global Legal Department Intern at Reckitt, a British multinational consumer goods company.

Serving as her Georgia Law faculty sponsor is Professor Melissa J. “MJ” Durkee, who is the law school’s Associate Dean for International Programs, Director of the Dean Rusk International Law Center, and Allen Post Professor.

● Daesun Kim is undertaking a comparative administrative law research relating to Vietnam, where he has practiced for several years, and the United States. Specifically, he plans to conduct a comparative analysis of changed circumstances in the two countries’ public-private-partnership projects during the Covid-19 pandemic period. Kim’s practice specialties include public-private partnerships, foreign investments, and cross-border mergers and acquisitions, with a focus on Southeast Asian countries. Holder of a J.D. degree from Handong Global University and a B.A. degree from Chonnam National University, both in Korea, Kim has practiced in Seoul, Korea, and Ho Chi Minh City, Vietnam, at several prestigious law firms, including Shin & Kim LLC and Yulchon LLC, and also was a legal counsel at a Korean construction and energy company, POSCO E&C.

Serving as Kim’s Georgia Law faculty sponsor will be Professor Kent Barnett, Associate Dean for Academic Affairs and J. Alton Professor of Law.

These visits continue our Center’s long tradition of hosting, for brief or extended stays, scholars and researchers whose work touches on issues of international, comparative, or transnational law. Details and an online application to become a visiting scholar here.

Georgia Law Prof Amann presents on children and peace agreements at California-Davis Law symposium

Georgia Law Professor Diane Marie Amann spoke on “Children, Armed Conflict, and Peace Agreements” Friday in a hybrid symposium at the University of California, Davis, School of Law.

Amann, who is Regents’ Professor of International Law, Emily & Ernest Woodruff Chair in International Law, and Faculty Co-Director of the Dean Rusk International Law Center here at the University of Georgia School of Law, gave an online presentation, as part of a panel on “Human Rights and Social Justice in the International Sphere,” which also featured Wadie E. Said, who is the Miles and Ann Loadholt Professor of Law at the University of South Carolina School of Law. Their talks were part of “Justice in War and Conflict: The Role of International and Humanitarian Law,” this year’s annual symposium of the University of California, Davis, Journal of International Law and Policy.

Professor’s Amann’s talk drew upon her research into children and peace settlement options. This research initially was conducted for a project at the Lauterpacht Centre for International Law, University of Cambridge, England, and subsequently was published as “International Child Law and the Settlement of Ukraine-Russia and Other Conflicts,” 99 International Law Studies 559 (2022). (prior posts available here)

The symposium took place on the one-year anniversary of the ongoing war which began with Russia’s invasion of Ukraine – a fact that Professor Amann noted even as she stressed that the findings of her research are applicable to settlement of any armed conflict or similar instance of extreme and protracted violence,

Georgia Law Professor Harlan G. Cohen presents paper on trade-security measures at Temple Law-ASIL workshop

Harlan Grant Cohen, who is Gabriel M. Wilner/UGA Foundation Professor in International Law and Faculty Co-Director of the Dean Rusk International Law Center here at the University of Georgia School of Law, took part earlier this month in a workshop at Temple University Beasley School of Law in Philadelphia.

Cohen presented “Toward Best Practices for Trade-Security Measures” at the workshop, which waswhich was organized by Temple Law Professor J. Benton Heath and hosted by Temple Law’s Institute for International Law and Public Policy, in coordination with the American Society of International Law International Legal Theory Interest Group.

Within the overall theme of “The Concept of Security in International Law,” the workshop brought together scholars from a range of fields in order to address shifting understandings of security in international law and foreign affairs, as well as how law can respond to these developments.

Late addition to Georgia Law’s Space Law Speaker Series: Cris van Eijk on “Space Law’s Past and Future,” tomorrow

Pleased to announce a late addition to the Space Law Speaker Series we’ve been hosting this semester here at the University of Georgia School of Law Dean Rusk International Law Center: Cris van Eijk, International Legal Researcher and Legal Advisor for Jus Ad Astra, will present at 12 noon this Friday, February 10, in Room J-347 Hirsch Hall.

Jus Ad Astra – a Latinism for “law (or rights) to the stars” – is, according to its website, “a legal project aimed at developing an authoritative international treatise clarifying the fundamental legal principles and human rights applicable to current and future human activities across outer space.”

In addition to advising for Jus Ad Astra, van Eijk is the author of thought-provoking publications on space law. He holds degrees from University of Cambridge, where he was a Senior Associate Editor for the Cambridge University Human Rights Law Journal, and Leiden University.

His presentation Friday substitutes for a scheduled speaker who was unable to take part. It will mark the third of four presentations in the Space Law Speaker Series, which, as detailed here, is part of a Spring Semester course led by our Center’s Director, Professor Melissa J. “MJ” Durkee, who is also Georgia Law’s Associate Dean for International Programs and Allen Post Professor.

Georgia Law Professor MJ Durkee presents at University of Pennsylvania symposium on “Commercial Space Age”

Professor Melissa J. “MJ” Durkee, the law school’s Associate Dean for International Programs, Director of the Dean Rusk International Law Center, and Allen Post Professor, presented her scholarship Friday at “The Emerging Commercial Space Age: Legal and Policy Implications,” a symposium co-hosted by the University of Pennsylvania Center for Technology, Innovation & Competition and its Journal of Law & Innovation.

Her talk, “Space Law as Twenty-first Century International Law,” will be published in that journal.

Host of the symposium in Philadelphia was the Center’s Founding Director, Christopher S. Yoo, who is the John H. Chestnut Professor of Law, Communication, and Computer & Information Science at the University of Pennsylvania. Commentator for Durkee’s presentation was Professor Rebecca Crootof, University of Richmond School of Law.

Georgia Law Professor Usha Rodrigues quoted in Agence France-Presse article on challenge to “empire of Indian tycoon”

Georgia Law Professor Usha Rodrigues was quoted in an Agence France-Presse article about claims levied against against the Adani Group, led by Gautam Adani of India.

Author of the article, entitled “A US corporate scourge deflates the empire of Indian tycoon Adani,” is AFP’s Thomas Urbain. Published on January 31, the item was reprinted in several global media.

Rodrigues, a corporate law expert who is University Professor and M.E. Kilpatrick Chair of Corporate Finance & Securities Law here at the University of Georgia School of Law, is also serving as our university’s Interim Vice Provost for Academic Affairs.

Georgia Law Professor Walter Hellerstein presents on tax obligations on digital platforms at conference in Vienna

Walter Hellerstein, Distinguished Research Professor & Shackelford Distinguished Professor in Taxation Law Emeritus here at the University of Georgia School of Law, recently presented in Vienna, Austria, as part of a panel entitled “Obligations Imposed on Digital Platforms Regarding VAT/GST,” concerning tax obligations imposed on digital platforms.

His presentation formed part of “Court of Justice of the European Union: Recent VAT Case Law,” a 3-day conference at the Institute for Austrian & International Tax Law, Vienna University of Economics & Business.

In addition to Austria and the United States, the conference included judges, academics, and practitioners from Australia, Belgium, Canada, Finland, Germany, Ireland, Italy, Luxembourg, Malta, the Netherlands, Spain, Sweden, and the United Kingdom.

Georgia Law Professor MJ Durkee presents “Pledging World Order” in Brooklyn Law School colloquium

Professor Melissa J. “MJ” Durkee, the law school’s Associate Dean for International Programs, Director of the Dean Rusk International Law Center, and Allen Post Professor, presented her scholarship online Monday as part of the Brooklyn Colloquium on International Economic Law sponsored by the Block Center for International Business Law at New York’s Brooklyn Law School. Hosts were Brooklyn Law faculty members Stephen Dean and Irene Ten Cate.

Durkee presented “Pledging World Order,” forthcoming soon in volume 48, issue 1, of the Yale Journal of International of Law.