On the Annual Junior Faculty Forum for International Law

The papers presented in the following colloquium for the European Journal of International Law are the result of the inaugural Annual Junior Faculty Forum for International Law, held at NYU School of Law in May 2012. The second Forum will be held at the University of Nottingham this year, and plans are afoot for the third Forum to head to the University of Melbourne in May 2014. Our Forum is inspired by the Yale – Stanford Junior Faculty Forum established over a decade or so ago. The mission of that initiative was to give junior faculty selected through competitive process ‘experience in how scholarly inquiry is located’ and ‘to enhance the sense of community among legal scholars – particularly among new and veteran professors – by bringing them together for a formal paper submission, selection and presentation program’. While international law – a massive, bustling, amorphous and ever-changing field of legal enquiry – was allocated one of those slots from time to time, it seemed to us that the time had come for the discipline of international law to have a Forum all of its own. Accordingly, the Forum, which was launched by website (http://annualjuniorfacultyforumil.org/) in the summer of 2011, pairs senior and junior scholars in open colloquium with no restriction on topics and in a selection process open to all of those in the first six years of their academic career. Further details of the inaugural Forum, together with the annual application process, are available from the Forum website. * * * The initial call for submissions drew a large number of applications from young scholars across five continents, nine of whom were invited to the colloquium in New York. The final schedule comprised the following: – Christopher Warren (Carnegie Mellon University): Milton and the ‘Epochs’ of International Law Interlocutor: Anne Orford (University of Melbourne) – Michael Fakhri (University of Oregon): Sugar and the Making of An Early Modern Multilateral Institution: Explicating the 1902 Brussels Sugar Convention Interlocutor: Mark A. Mazower (Columbia University, New York) – Sergio Puig (Stanford University): The Dynamic Legitimacy of International Organizations: ICSID, Investor-State Arbitration and the Privatization of International Disputes Interlocutor: Damian Chalmers (London School of Economics & Political Science) – Martins Paparinskis (University of Oxford): Investment Treaty Arbitration and the (New) Law of State Responsibility Interlocutor: JHH Weiler (New York University) – Rose Sydney Parfitt (American University of Cairo): All Sovereigns Are Equal – But Are Some Sovereigns More Equal than Others? The Concept of ‘Peripheral Personality’ Interlocutor: Benedict Kingsbury (New York University) – Umut Özsu (University of Manitoba): Unilateral Decree, Bilateral Treaty: Fragments of A Proto-History of the ‘Non-Binding Agreement’ Interlocutor: Dino Kritsiotis (University of Nottingham) – René Urueña (Universidad de Los Andes): Global Governance through Comparative International Law? Rethinking the Role of Domestic Law in the International Legal System Interlocutor: Nico Krisch (Hertie School of Governance/Harvard University) – Evan J. Criddle (Syracuse University): Humanitarian Financial Intervention Interlocutor: Ryan Goodman (New York University) – Alejandro Chehtman (University Torcuato di Tella): Occupation Courts, jus ad bellum and Non-State Actors: Assessing the Morality of Military Occupation Interlocutor: Philip Alston (New York University) As convenors of the Forum, we would like to take this opportunity to thank that inaugural cohort of senior scholars who joined us as commentators for the very first Forum: Philip Alston (NYU), Damian Chalmers (LSE), Ryan Goodman (NYU), Benedict Kingsbury (NYU), Nico Krisch (Hertie School of Governance), and Mark Mazower (Columbia). Their participation ensured the great success of the first year of this venture, very much amplified by the feedback we received following our gathering in New York: ‘the sessions were dynamic, interesting, and unfailingly useful. It was also great in terms of creating or strengthening bonds and links between many of us,’ wrote one of our inaugural laureates. And from another: ‘those two days at NYU [were] incredibly interesting and productive – and I feel extremely lucky in having been able to participate. I am sure that all of the junior [faculty] are going to stay in touch with one another and I can say for certain that my work has benefited hugely from the feedback I received.’ And yet another: ‘thank you again for the delightful opportunity to be part of this amazing group. It was a rich and formative experience in my young life. The feedback will help me to focus on the main issues and weaknesses of [my] project.’ * * * The Annual Junior Faculty Forum for International Law differs from the Yale – Stanford Forum in one significant respect and that concerns expectations of publication – a matter on which all three convenors held the same, strong conviction. Participants were invited to revise their presentations in the light of the colloquium discussion and submit them for publication in the peer-reviewed Jean Monnet Working Paper Series of NYU (http://centers.law.nyu.edu/jeanmonnet/papers/) from which a selection was to be made for publication in EJIL – and it is these that are published in this issue. We hope to repeat this practice in future years. * * * In introducing this colloquium and in presenting it to a broader audience and readership, the three of us wish to extend our warmest personal appreciations to every one of the inaugural junior faculty for being part of this experiment – we really could have hoped for no finer set of laureates than they to help inaugurate and launch our first Forum. We hope that their work – recorded here and in the Jean Monnet Working Paper Series – will inspire other junior faculty to the same cause, and make the Forum a permanent a fixture of the international law calendar.

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