JIB/JAB Podcast

A conversation with Mary Ellen O'Connell, of the University of Notre Dame Law School. We discuss her recent focus on that the concept of "imminence" and the doctrine of self-defense in international law, through the lens of the killing of Iranian General Qassim Soleimani. Starting with just war theory and the natural law foundations of international law, right through to the text and intent of the...

Guest host Jasmin Nessa of Liverpool University Law School interviews Craig Martin of Washburn University School of Law on how the climate change crisis is likely to implicate the laws of war. In particular, Martin argues that as the crisis deepens, and not only the consequences but the causes of climate change are viewed as threats to national security, there will be pressure to relax the jus ad...

A conversation with Prof. Terry Gill of the University of Amsterdam, Center for International Law, on the use of force in self-defense against non-state actors (NSAs), within the territory of states that exercise no control over the NSA but which do not consent to the use of force - a familiar but hot subject of debate. We discuss Terry's recent work, which places the principle of necessity at the...

A conversation with Prof. Michael Schmitt, Professor of Law at the University of Reading, the United States Military Academy at West Point, and the U.S. Naval War College, on the development of international law relating to cyber operations, and the recent state declarations on how the jus ad bellum and international humanitarian law apply to cyber ops. We discuss some of the problems and issues r...

A conversation with Prof. Federica Paddeu of Cambridge University in England, on how best to understand the operation of consent as a justification for the use of force in international law - is it part of or intrinsic to the prohibition on the use of force itself? Or is it extrinsic, a separate and independent exception or justification for the use of force? Consider how consent operates quite di...

A conversation with Prof. Douglas Guilfoyle of the University of New South Wales, Canberra, on the Inquiry of the Inspector-General of the Australian Defence Force into alleged war crimes committed by Australian Special Forces in Afghanistan, delving into the nature of the offenses, issues of command responsibility, structural and cultural causes of the misconduct, and the influence of the Rome St...

A conversation with Prof. Tom Ruys of Ghent University, in which we re-examine the positions he took in his famous book on armed attack and self-defense, and then discuss the debate he has recently sparked around the question of whether states may use force in self-defense to recover occupied territory, looking specifically at whether Azerbaijan could justify its recent seizure of Nagorno-Karabakh...

A conversation with Dr. Catherine O'Rourke of Ulster University School of Law in Northern Ireland, on her new book, "The Rights of Women in Armed Conflict Under International Law." We discuss how four distinct regimes, IHL, international criminal law, human rights law, and the UN Security Council, interact, in both theory and practice, in the protection of women's rights in armed conflict, assessi...

A conversation with Prof. Eliav Lieblich of Tel Aviv University, in which he takes a recent UN Human Rights Committee General Comment, as a point of departure for analyzing the relatively unexplored relationship between international human rights law and the legal regime that governs the state use of force. Does an act of aggression by a state infringe human rights law as well as violate the jus a...

A conversation with Prof. Oona Hathaway of Yale Law School on the theory and practice of the domestic law constraints on the use of force, including the different ways in which the War Powers Resolution in the U.S. could and should be amended, the relationship between war powers and international law, and how Congress could reassert its powers over decisions to engage in armed conflict. In additio...

A conversation with Prof. Craig Forcese of the University of Ottawa on his book "Destroying the Caroline," in which we discuss the history of the Caroline Incident, how and why it influenced the development of the doctrine of self-defense, what that says about international law itself, and how the Caroline Incident is used and abused in current debates around such issues as anticipatory self-defen...

A conversation with Prof. Alonso Gurmendi Dunkelberg of Universidad del Pacifico, on Latin American approaches to jus ad bellum and non-intervention - ranging from the origins and development of Latin American thinking in the 19th Century, through the under-appreciated importance of the Montevideo Convention, to how one should interpret Latin American responses to recent uses of force and interven...

A conversation with Prof. Monica Hakimi of the University of Michigan Law School, on how the U.N. Security Council's tacit support for state use of force that would otherwise be unlawful, should be understood as being an "informal regulation" that modifies the standard rules of the jus ad bellum regime. The conversation explores case studies, normative implications of the argument, and whether it...

A conversation with Prof. Eric Talbot Jensen of Brigham Young University Law School - Jensen argues that the law of armed conflict does not require human judgment in making targeting decisions, and thus fully autonomous weapons are not per se unlawful, and that research and development of such weapons should not be prohibited. We explore whether ethical considerations should nonetheless affect dec...

A conversation with Prof. Ashley Deeks of the University of Virginia School of Law - Deeks explains how AI and machine learning may implicate the laws of war, from assisting states in decisions on the use of force and self-defense, to increasing compliance with the law of armed conflict on the battlefield, and even the coding of the IHL rules and principles into the AI systems operating or interfa...

A conversation with Prof. Adil Haque of Rutgers Law School - Haque explains how a review of the negotiating history for the UN Charter suggests a relationship among the prohibition on the use of force, self-defense, and acts of aggression, that is quite different from current views, with important implications for a number of aspects of the doctrine of self-defense, including anticipatory self-def...

Craig Martin, the host of the podcast, explains the objectives, scope, and format of this podcast series, and then goes on to provide a brief overview of the main legal regimes that comprise the "laws of war," principally the jus ad bellum and the jus in bello regimes, and how they relate to one another. For more info on the episode and for links to the related material, visit http://jibjabpodcast...

A conversation with Prof. Kevin Heller of the University of Copenhagen about unilateral humanitarian intervention - Heller argues that it is not only unlawful, and should remain so, but that it may actually constitute an act of aggression as defined under the Rome Statute, and that its perpetrators could, theoretically, be charged for the crime of aggression. For more info on the episode and for l...