Selden v. Grotius, a sequel

There's something about the law of the sea.
Teaching Public International Law has taught that although the law of the sea is among those furthest from the experience of the average student, the average student nonetheless finds in the law of the sea a kind of romance. Perhaps we all still long for our own turn on Treasure Island, our own Two Years Before the Mast.
Especially gripping is the battle of words between John Selden and Hugo Grotius (prior IntLawGrrls posts). Theirs was a prime politicolegal-philosophical struggle of the middle of the last millennium -- a battle over whether the sea/mare was clausum/closed, as England's Selden maintained, or liberum/free, as Holland's Grotius posited. It is, moreover, a struggle that many an intlaw casebook renders epic. (Caveat: Our colleague Edward Gordon has published a must-read study that adds considerable complexity to this binary account of the debate respecting law and oceans.)
That struggle undergirds the newest ASIL Insight, entitled "Climate Change and Guidelines for Argo Profiling Float." The authors -- oceans experts Aurora Mateos (below left) and Dr. Montserrat Gorina-Ysern -- thus open with the reminder that

the law of the sea remains affected by an ago-old controversy among scientists and diplomats over the dichotomy between 'freedom and regulation.'

The authors proceed to detail, 1st, how the Argo float, which promises to provide data on inter alia climate change is among the "oceanic research activities with new technologies, instruments, and equipment" that engenders "a fierce resistance to legal regulation of the high seas," and 2d, how that resistance "coexists in an uneasy compromise with a fierce protection of coastal States' sovereign rights to explore and exploit the natural resources of the continental shelf and the Exclusive Economic Zone (EEC)." (image credits here and here)
Bottom line:
► In Grotian fashion, coastal states near whose waters such research might be conducted by other states -- the Insight mentions Peru and Argentina -- maintain that the Argo float and similar research activities fall within the United Nations' regulatory structure established by the 1982 U.N. Convention on the Law of the Sea.
► But research-resource-rich countries like the United States (a nonparty to the 1982 Convention, as we've posted) lean toward considering such research activities the unregulable beneficiaries of Seldenian freedom of the high seas.
The Insight authors thus expose a politicolegal-philosophical struggle that offers intlaw profs -- at least those able to navigate the viral soup of acronyms epidemic in environmental law -- a contemporary application of the old Selden-Grotius standoff.

Go On! International Law Weekend-West

(Go on! is an occasional item on symposia of interest) For a decade now we intlawyers on the West Coast having been making a biennial treak to International Law Weekend-West, a free 2-day conference on all aspects of law organized by American Branch of the International Law Association. Time to put the next one on our schedule:
The 5th biennial ILW-W is set for March 6 and 7, 2009, at Willamette University College of Law in Salem, Oregon.
Featured are addresses on “International Criminal Justice: Does It Work?”, by Judge Theodor Meron of the International Criminal Tribunal for the Former Yugoslavia, and on “The American Law Institute Goes Global,” by Columbia Law Professor George Bermann. Topics for panels include:
► Prosecution of international war crimes in the United States
► Taming capital markets
► Water resources
► Detention and other treatment of refugees
► NAFTA
► Life cycle of an international technology transaction
► Empirical approaches to developments in international humanitarian law
► Law of the sea and the environment
► Intellectual property rights
► International and foreign law in immigration law practice
Special features of the conference will be a:
► Commemoration of the 400th anniversary of Mare Liberum (Freedom of the Seas), a masterwork by Hugo Grotius, the Dutch legal theorist whose 425th birthday IntLawGrrls marked last year; and a
► Tribute to the late international law scholar Louis Sohn.
Details are available here or by contacting our colleague James A.R. Nafziger at jnafziger@willamette.edu.

Professional Puzzler Reply

Answers to Professional Puzzler above:

(a) Hugo Grotius (left).
(b) In his De Jure Belli ac Pacis, translated as On the Law of War and Peace.
(c) 1625. Not in 2008, though the quote embodies an amazingly contemporary critique of our profession.

On April 10

On this day in ...
... 1583 (425 years ago today), in Delft, Netherlands, Hugo Grotius was born, on an Easter Sunday, into a family that "was moderately prosperous, well-educated and ambitious." At age 8, "he began writing skilful elegies in Latin," at 11 "he was a student in the Faculty of Letters at the University of Leiden," and at 15, he took part in his 1st diplomatic mission, as part of a delegation to France. There, about the time of the 1599 portrait at right, he "earned (or possibly just bought) a law degree from the University of Orléans." Before his death in 1645 Grotius would write an immense body of work -- including Mare Liberum/Freedom of the Seas (1608) and De iure belli ac pacis/On the Law of War and Peace (1625) -- that established him as, among many other things, a foreparent of international law. As we've posted, ASIL-West will be celebrating his birthday this evening; if you're in D.C., join us. (portrait credit)
... 1972, at London, Moscow, and Washington, the Convention on the Prohibition of the Development, Production and Stockpiling of Bacteriological (Biological) and Toxin Weapons and on Their Destruction was opened for signature. The Biological and Toxin Weapons Convention, as it's known, entered into force on March 26, 1975, also the date of U.S. ratification of the treaty. It has 158 states parties.

ASIL annual meeting alert: Celebrate Hugo Grotius' 425th birthday with ASIL-West

Students competing in the Jessup Moot Court finals, American Society of International Law members, and loyal blogreaders know that this is the week of the Society's annual meeting in Washington, D.C. Several days ago IntLawGrrls provided a head's up on women who'll be presenting during the meeting. In annual meeting alerts today and to come, we offer news of 2 additional events you won't want to miss.
1st: Turns out this Thursday's the birthday of Hugo Grotius (1583-1645), the Dutch legal philosopher at left who lays rightful claim as a foreparent of international law. It's also the day of the next event for ASIL-West, the Society's pilot project aimed at building community and membership in the Western states, of which David D. Caron, Kirk Boyd, and I are co-chairs. And so ASIL-West's reception at the annual meeting will be a Happy 425th Birthday to Hugo Grotius Party -- from 7:30 to 9 p.m. Thursday, April 10, in the Latrobe Room at the Fairmont Hotel.
In addition to good refreshments, good fun, and project news, we'll be honored with a few words on Grotius' life, work, and relevance to contemporary international law by the eminent international law historian, Mark W. Janis of the University of Connecticut.
Please join us for this serendipitous celebration.

And stay tuned for news of another event, the Bloggers' Reception 6-7 p.m. Friday, April 11, of which IntLawGrrls is a cosponsor.