After the Second World War, the dissolution of European empires and the emergence of ‘new states’ in Asia, Africa, Oceania, and elsewhere necessitated major structural changes in international law. In a new book titled Completing Humanity: The International Law of Decolonization (Cambridge University Press, 2024), Umut Özsu (Professor, Department of Law and Legal Studies, Carleton University, Canada) examines the struggle to transform international law during this period, commencing with the 1960 General Assembly’s landmark decolonization resolution, and concluding in 1982, with the close of the third UN Conference on the Law of the Sea and the onset of the Latin American debt crisis. The book examines the work of elite international lawyers from newly independent states and reassesses decolonization from the standpoint of the ‘Third World’.
Join the International History Institute (IHI) for the next book talk in its “History of International Law” speaker series on Monday, November 11, 2024 from 5:00-6:30 pm at SAR 101, 635 Commonwealth Ave. The event is open to the public.
