Wednesday, October 25, 2017

CFP: History of International Law in Latin America

[We have the following call for papers from the Albrecht Mendelssohn Bartholdy Graduate School of Law at the University of Hamburg.]

We would like to invite everybody interested in the study of the history of international law in Latin America to participate in our call and to submit proposals for contributions on any of the listed subtopics (see below).  Please send your application in one single PDF file including     your proposal of around 300 - 500 words and a brief CV (indicating also your institutional affiliation) until December 3, 2017, to matthias.packeiser@uni-hamburg.de

The selection of speakers will be based on the quality of their abstracts and the abstract's suitability to the overall topic of the conference.  Selected candidates will be informed by December 8, 2017.

At the conference, each speaker will be granted 20 mins for his/her presentation. Each presentation will be followed by 10 min-discussions.  Unfortunately, we are not able to cover travel or accommodation costs.

List of subtopics after the jump.
1. International Law in the Americas before Independence
- The conquest of America and the formation of modern international law
- Spanish Derecho Indiano and natural rights
- International law and the colonisation of the Americas by other European Empires (Portuguese, Dutch, French, British, et al.)
- International law and resistance to imperialism (Las Casas, Suárez, Vieira, Guamán Poma, et al.)
- Etc.

2. International Law and the Independence in the Americas
- Decolonization under 19th century international law
- European and U.S. reactions to Latin America's independence
- Toussaint Louverture, Miranda, Bolívar, Santander, O'Higgings, et al.
- Etc.

3. International Law, United States' Imperialism and Latin America
- Hemispherism, inter-Americanism, and Pan-Americanism
- U.S. interventions and imperialism (e.g. the Mexican-American War)
- The Monroe Doctrine and the Roosevelt Corollary
- Etc.

4. The Particularity of Latin American International Law
- The discussion on the existence of an independent sphere of international law (Alejandro Álvarez, Amancio Alcorta, Rafael F. Seijas, Manuel de Sá Vianna, Jesús María Yepes, et al.)
- Latin American particularities in international law (uti possidetis, compulsory arbitration for the settlement of State to State disputes, norms limiting the right of foreign interventions, et al.)
- Etc.

5. International Law, Globalisation, and Latin America
- Latin America's role in international law in the 19th and early 20th century
- Trade as a motor of international integration? Law as a motor of peace?
- Legal equality (e.g. the Second Hague Peace Conference)
- Prohibition of the use of force to collect sovereign debt
- Etc.

6. New Latin American Approaches to International Law?
- Creole, Mestizo, Decolonial international law, etc.

7. Germany and the History of International Law in the Americas
- Karl V, Emperor of the Holy Roman Empire, the conquest of America, and the colonisation of Venezuela, New Granada, and the River Plate
- German colonial companies, El Dorado and colonial accumulation of capital: The Welser Bank in Klein Venedig
- German philosophy, international law, and the colonisation of America: Kant, Hegel, Marx, and Schmitt
- Etc