Georgia Law

Georgia Law professors, alumna, students take part in annual meeting of American Society of International Law

Many members of the University of Georgia School of Law community – professors, alumna, and students – took part in last week’s 117th Annual Meeting of the American Society of International Law, the theme of which was “The Reach and Limits of International Law to Solve Today’s Challenges.”

The annual meeting took place Wednesday-Saturday at several venues in Washington, D.C.

Representatives of Georgia Law, an ASIL Academic Partner, included three scholars affiliated with the law school’s Dean Rusk International Law Center:

→ The Center’s Director, Melissa J. “MJ” Durkee, who is also Associate Dean for International Programs and Allen Post Professor, moderated a panel entitled “How Does International Law Change? Theories and Concepts of Legal Change.” (photo top row left) It was sponsored by ASIL’s International Legal Theory Interest Group, for which Durkee serves as Chair. Panelists were: Benedict Kingsbury, New York University; Nico Krisch, Graduate Institute of International and Development Studies in Geneva; and Sivan Shlomo Agon, Bar-Ilan University.

Durkee additionally serves on the ASIL Executive Council and the Board of Editors of the American Journal of International Law, and took part in the meetings of both those groups.

→ Diane Marie Amann, Regents’ Professor of International Law, Emily & Ernest Woodruff Chair in International Law, and one of our Center’s Faculty Co-Directors (above second from left), took part in a late-breaking panel, “ICC Arrest Warrant Against Putin: Impunity in Check?” (photo above left) Amann, an international child law expert and former Special Adviser to the International Criminal Court Prosecutor on Children in & affected by Armed Conflict, spoke on the significance of the fact that crimes against children form the basis of the international arrest warrant issued March 17 against the President and the Children’s Rights Commissioner of Russia. Additional panel participants were: Javier Eskauriatza, University of Nottingham; Marko Milanovic, University of Reading; Saira Mohamed, University of California-Berkeley; and moderator Katherine Gallagher, Center for Constitutional Rights. Panel video here.

Amann also attended the ASIL Executive Council meeting, completing her term as an ASIL Counsellor.

→ Harlan G. Cohen, Gabriel M. Wilner/UGA Foundation Professor in International Law and Faculty Co-Director of the Dean Rusk International Law Center, took the ASIL General Assembly stage: in his capacity as Chair of the 2023 Book Awards Committee, he co-presented those honors to numerous authors. (photo top row right, from left to right: ASIL President Greg Shaffer, honoree Damilola Olawuyi, ASIL Executive Director Michael Cooper, and Cohen; video 27:09)

Like Durkee, Cohen is a member of the AJIL Board of Editors and took part in the journal’s meeting. The annual meeting completed his service as Chair of ASIL’s International Legal Theory Interest Group.

A distinguished Georgia Law graduate also was featured:

→ Tess Davis (JD 2009), who is the Executive Director of the D.C.-based Antiquities Coalition and Dean Rusk International Law Center Council member, served as moderator for a session at the Smithsonian National Museum of Asian Art. (photo above right) Entitled “Protecting Cultural Heritage in Conflict Zones: Multi-Disciplinary Approaches,” the discussion also included: Patty Gerstenblith, DePaul University; Brooke Cuven, Cerberus Capital Management; Richard Kurin, Smithsonian Institution; and Zaydoon Zaid, American Foundation for Cultural Research.

Rounding out the contingent were four Georgia Law students, who received Louis B. Sohn Professional Development grants to serve as volunteers at the meeting: 2L Hao Chen “Bobby” Dong, 3L Collin Douglas, LLM candidate Alexandra Lampe, and 1L Mahi Patel.

Georgia Law LL.M. students win top honors at 10th International Commercial and Investment Arbitration Moot

Members of the University of Georgia School of Law LL.M. Class of 2023 won top honors at last weekend’s 10th International Commercial & Investment Arbitration Moot Competition.

Forming the champion team at the competition were the three students pictured above, from left: Tatiana Popovkina, Alexandra F. Lampe, and John A. Omotunde, The competition’s best oralist, meanwhile, was Olha Kaliuzhna, pictured above right; Lampe was the third runner-up. Kaliuzhna, along with Oleksandra Iordanova and Vladyslav Rudzinskyi, formed the second Georgia Law team, which also competed in advance rounds.

Coaching the teams were another LL.M. student, Gloria María Correa, as well as Georgia Law’s Dean, Peter B. “Bo” Rutledge, whose specialty is international arbitration.

The competition took place at American University Washington College of Law in Washington, D.C. (prior post)

Georgia Law’s Master of Laws (LL.M.) curriculum offers U.S. legal education to lawyers trained overseas. The participants and coach in the D.C. competition, for instance, were trained in Germany, Nigeria, Panama, Ukraine, and Uzbekistan.

For more information about the curriculum, which is administered by the law school’s Dean Rusk International Law Center, is available here.

Georgia Law LL.M. teams headed to Washington for International Commercial and Investment Arbitration Moot

Six members of the LL.M. Class of 2023 at the University of Georgia School of Law will travel to Washington, D.C., this weekend to take part in the 10th International Commercial & Investment Arbitration Moot Competition.

The students, who comprise two teams, earned their initial training as lawyers in 4 different countries. They are, left to right above: John Omotunde, Nigeria; Oleksandra Iordanova, Ukraine; Vladyslav Rudzinskyi, Ukraine; Tatyana Popovkina, Uzbekistan; Olha Kaliuzhna, Ukraine; and Alexandra Lampe, Germany. Their coach is Georgia Law Dean, Peter B. “Bo” Rutledge, an expert in international arbitration law.

The competition – which will take place March 24 and 25 at American University Washington College of Law – involves a commercial dispute to be resolved under the rules of the Japan Commercial Arbitration Association.

Georgia Law’s Dean Rusk International Law Center administers the Master of Laws (LL.M.) curriculum. Details here.

Georgia Law Professor Harlan Cohen publishes in Temple Law symposium issue exploring book by Anne Orford

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, has contributed to a special symposium issue containing essays on International Law and the Politics of History, a book published in 2021 by Cambridge University Press and written by Melbourne Law School Professor Anne Orford.

Cohen’s essay, “Journeys through Space and Time While Reading International Law and the Politics of History, Found on a Palimpsest, Translated for You, the Reader,” appears at 36 Temple International & Comparative Law Journal 129 (2022) (SSRN).

The issue developed out of a spring 2022 workshop at Temple University Beasley School of Law in Philadelphia, organized by Temple Law Professor Jeffrey L. Dunoff. As described by Dunoff, Cohen’s essay appears in the issue’s “final cluster of papers,” which consider “disciplinary identities and the politics of the encounter between law and history. ” Dunoff continued:

“Cohen’s highly creative contribution takes the form of a dialogue between study partners attempting to understand a fragmentary portion of a text that purports to describe a conflict between a historian and a legal scholar. This dialogue — which both expressly refers to and is reminiscent of a hevrutah, or partner-based form of studying religious texts common in Jewish communities — defies efforts at summary.

“Suffice to say that it touches on a dazzlingly wide range of issues, including disciplinary identity, different forms of knowledge, competing theories of meaning, the limits of language, and the possibility of plural truths, among other topics.”

Contributing to the special symposium issue — in addition to Cohen, Dunoff, and Orford — were Natasha Wheatley, Afroditi Giovanopoulou, Kunal M. Parker, Morten Rasmussen, Megan Donaldson, Francisco-José Quintana and Sarah M.H. Nouwen, David Schneiderman, Karen J. Alter, Lauri Mälksoo, Oliver Diggelmann, and Steven Ratner.

“Intersection of Law and Technology,” 2023 symposium of Georgia Law Review, to take place on March 24

“The Intersection of Law and Technology,” the annual Georgia Law Review conference, will be held Friday, March 24, 2023, here at the University of Georgia School of Law.

According to organizers, the symposium will explore “cybersecurity, regulations affecting new technology, and much more.” Sessions include:

9:30-10:30 a.m.: “Cyber Regulations” with Professors Asaf Lubin, Indiana-Bloomington Law, and Gregory Dickinson, St. Thomas Law. Moderated by Georgia Law Professor Thomas Kadri.

10:45-11:45 a.m.: “Innovations in Space and War” with Professors Rebecca Hamilton, American University Law, and Monika Ehrman, SMU Law. Moderated by Georgia Law Professor Melissa J. “MJ” Durkee, who is also the law school’s Associate Dean for International Programs and Director of its Dean Rusk International Law Center.

1-2 p.m. “Regulatory Problems with New Technology” with Professors Amanda Reid, University of North Carolina Law, Dan Burk, University of California-Irvine Law, and Sharon Cop, University of Haifa Law. Moderated by Georgia Law Professor Adam Orford.

3:15-4:15 p.m. Keynote address by two distinguished Georgia Law alumni, Roy E. Hadley Jr., whose many positions include Independent Counsel, Adams and Reese LLP, Atlanta, and Matthew Grocoff, whose many positions include founding principal of THRIVE Collaborative, Ann Arbor, Michigan.

CLE credit will be available. Details, including in-person and online registration, here.

Georgia Law LL.M. students visit U.S. Court of Appeals for 11th Circuit and Baker Donelson law firm in Atlanta

University of Georgia School of Law Master of Laws (LL.M.) candidates participated this month in a professional development trip to Atlanta, where they observed judicial proceedings and received legal briefings.

The first stop was the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Eleventh Circuit (above), where the students observed oral arguments in two cases. The group then met with Eleventh Circuit Judge Julie E. Carnes, at Georgia Law alumna. In addition to touring her chambers, they learned about the rich history of the Elbert Parr Tuttle Federal Courthouse, including the judge’s personal connection with the building: her father worked there when the building housed a post office, before he himself became an attorney and judge.  She also spoke about her career path, and answered questions from the students. 

The next stop was the Atlanta office of the Baker Donelson law firm. There, students had lunch and listened to presentations from a panel of  attorneys – among them Georgia Law alumni Maximilian Hans-Walter Werner Oehlschlaegel (LL.M. 2021) and Emmanuel Kyei (LL.M. 2020, J.D. 2022), both of whom practice corporate law.  Other lawyers on the panel included Gary A. Barnes, Sebastian Meis, Robert N. Johnson, Clint Crosby, Vivien F. Peaden, and Felix Faerber. Discussions ranged from the nature of various practice areas to ways to prepare for law firm practice. 

This year’s LL.M. class is profiled here. More information on the Georgia Law LL.M. curriculum, which is administered by our Dean Rusk International Law Center, is available here.

Georgia Law Professor Amann presents in Geneva conference on children and International Criminal Court

Georgia Law Professor Diane Marie Amann presented Thursday in a 2-day global conference entitled “A New Path towards Accountability for Crimes and Violations affecting Children in Armed Conflict.” Sponsor of the event, which took place in Geneva, Switzerland, in a hybrid format, was the nongovernmental organization Save the Children.

Amann’s online presentation at last week’s conference concerned the ICC Office of the Prosecutor Policy on Children (2016) (left), which she helped research and draft. She recapped the 4-year process leading to publication of the 2016 Policy, surveyed key points in its content, and suggested areas in which the policy and its implementation could be enhanced.

Amann 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. By appointment of ICC Prosecutor Fatou Bensouda, Amann served from 2012 to 2021 as the first Special Adviser to the ICC Prosecutor on Children in & affected by Armed Conflict. She continues to publish and present on issues relation to international child law. (prior posts)

Indeed, such an enhancement effort began at Thursday’s event: ICC Prosecutor Karim Khan QC, who took office in mid-2021, announced the launch of a process “to build upon, and renew,” the 2016 Policy. He issued a public call for submission of suggestions, as part of a consultation process set to unfold in the new few months.

Assisting in this Policy-renewal process will be Amann’s successor as Special Adviser in this area: Véronique Aubert, who is also the Lead on Children & Armed Conflict at Save the Children. Aubert spearheaded the organization of last week’s conference in Geneva.

Georgia Law Professor Christopher Bruner presents on corporate sustainability disclosure in joint Minnesota-Dublin seminar

Christopher M. Bruner, the Stembler Family Distinguished Professor in Business Law here at the University of Georgia School of Law, recently took part in a seminar session on corporate sustainability disclosures, presented online for students at the University of Minnesota Law School and University College Dublin Sutherland School of Law.

“Sustainability Disclosure Around the World” was the title of the presentation by Bruner, a scholar of corporate law, corporate governance, comparative law, and sustainability, whose most recent book is The Corporation as Technology: Re-Calibrating Corporate Governance for a Sustainable Future (OUP 2022) (prior posts).

Joining Bruner in presenting the seminar were Professor Brett McDonnell, Dorsey & Whitney Chair in Law at Minnesota Law, and Xiaoyu Gu, who is a Managing Director at AB CarVal, a global alternative investment management firm. Professor Claire Hill, who is James L. Krusemark Chair in Law at Minnesota Law, and Professor Joe McGrath, of University College Dublin Law, convened the event.

In day-long event capping Georgia Law course, international law students hack global problem of space debris

Five teams of J.D., LL.M., M.S.L., and Graduate Certificate in International Law students spent Saturday endeavoring to solve the global problem of what to do about the debris – that is, junk – which litters outer space. The day-long “Space Junk Hackathon” was hosted by the University of Georgia School of Law Dean Rusk International Law Center. It brought to a close an innovative Spring 2023 international law course taught by 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.

As detailed in prior posts here and here, this course began with a Space Law Speaker Series featuring, over the course of January and February, presentations by four expert academics and practitioners: Christopher Johnson, Tanja Masson-Zwaan, Cris van Eijk, and Kathleen Doty.

At Saturday’s hackathon, Professor Durkee reviewed with students aspects of the space junk problem, as described by the series of speakers. She noted the inadequacy of existing international and domestic regulations – among them, the 1967 Outer Space Treaty, which was signed on behalf of the United States by then-Secretary of State Dean Rusk, our Center’s namesake.

Having recapped the problem, Durkee told students, “Your task is to solve it!”, by devising law or policy interventions. The star-named student teams, Antares, Polaris, Rigel, Sirius, and Vega, then decamped to breakout rooms and went to work.

At day’s end, the teams presented their proposals before three judges: Professor Durkee, Georgia Law Professor Christian Turner, and Jackson Tilley, Ph.D. candidate at our university’s School of Public & International Affairs. All students were praised for their creative interventions. Team Polaris, comprising Alma Bajramović, Kyle Renner, Bobby Dong, and Nishka Malik, was named the strongest.

Assisting with administration as part of their work on Georgia Law’s Graduate Certificate in International Law – for which this was a required course – were the staff members of our Center’s Global Practice Preparation portfolio, Sarah Quinn and Catrina Martin.

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.