How to Contribute

The International Law Association (ILA) Study Group on 'The Role of Cities in International Law', the T.M.C. Asser Instituut and the Freie Universität Berlin invite researchers to submit abstracts for reports on city practices in relation to international law. The city reports are loosely based on the well-established format of country reports which have been used to explicate the performance of states in a given field of international law. Alternatively, the city reports are intended as a way to describe and analyse the practices of cities: actors that are often overlooked in international law, and that engage with international law in ways that may not always fit traditional legal frameworks.

The Study Group is collecting these so called ‘city reports’ with the aim to make them available for the deliberations of the Study Group. In a second step, the chairs of the Study Group will be curating a collection of city reports based on the ILA reporting process with a view to publication with a leading university press.

Topics
The city reports should engage with cities’ interactions with other cities, international organisations and/or global governance mechanisms. They can relate to cities invoking well-established norms of international law, as well as practices that connect to emerging and aspirational norms like the 'right to the city'.

With regard to city practices one could think of the activities of self-declared ‘human rights cities’, the role of Sustainable Development Goals in city-to-city cooperation, the participation of cities in UN processes such as the New Urban Agenda, or the incorporation of international law in local legislation and institutional arrangements, such as a local human rights department or sustainability office. 

The reports should primarily focus on the practices of local governments, but the structure of the reports could take various forms. The Study Group is interested in descriptive documents detailing various forms of engagement with international norms, as well as more playful forms of analysis such as critical essays on a specific city practice. 

Abstract
Please send your abstract of 500-700 words to L.roodenburg@asser.nl. For more information click here.