Asser at the 2019 ASIL Annual Meeting

Asser researcher Dr León Castellanos-Jankiewicz attended the 2019 American Society of International Law’s (ASIL) annual meeting to receive the inaugural David D. Caron Prize. He was awarded the prize for his paper entitled ‘Nationality, Alienage and Early International Rights’ at the ASIL 2018 Research Forum in Los Angeles, California.

The prize recognises the best paper submitted to the ASIL Research Forum by a current student or recent graduate. The paper presented by Dr Castellanos-Jankiewicz emphasises the role of private international law in the development of international rights and standards of individual protection during the nineteenth century, particularly as regards the treatment of aliens. According to Dr Castellanos-Jankiewicz its originality resides in accounting for the fluid disciplinary boundaries between public and private international lawyers at the time.

Joining Dr Castellanos-Jankiewicz at the meeting were Asser’s president Ernst Hirsch Ballin, Academic director Janne E. Nijman, and Asser Press publisher Frank Bakker. Prof Nijman presented a paper on 'The Urban Pushback: international law as an instrument of cities' on a panel titled ‘Federalism Strikes Back: Is the One-Voice Doctrine in Decline?’ Nijman also moderated the ASIL 2019 closing plenary on International Law as an Instrument for Development on Saturday. Co-sponsored by the Municipality of The Hague and Asser Institute, and in cooperation with the Dutch Embassy in Washington, the panel discussed the problems - such as global inequality and competition, rising protectionism and rapidly changing technology - that hinder the use of international law in promoting economic development, and what to do about it. Panelists were: Ulrik Vestergaard Knudson, Balakrishnan Rajagopal, Martijn Snoep, and Janne E. Nijman. You can watch the video here.

Also during the ASIL annual meeting, Saskia Bruines, The Hague’s deputy mayor (International affairs), positioned the city as the place for legal development and practical applications in the digital world. She emphasised the need for fair ethical and judicial rules that apply worldwide on matters of data and artificial intelligence.

This year’s ASIL annual meeting focused on ‘the distinctive ways international law serves as an instrument that national and international actors invoke and deploy, and by which they are constrained.’ The event brought together a group of renowned experts in the field of international law such as Prof. Martti Koskeniemmi, former UN High Commissioner for Human Rights Zeid Raád Al Hussein, and the president of the International Criminal Court (ICC) Chile Eboe-Osuji to name a few.

Dr Castellanos-Jankiewicz is part of Asser’s Memory Laws in European and Comparative Perspective (MELA) team. The MELA project is a four-nation, EU-sponsored consortium gathered to examine memory laws throughout Europe and the world.