Lecture
Decolonising International Law: Entrapments in Praxis and Critical Thought
- Dr. Mohsen al Attar, University of Warwick
- Date
- Thursday 13 January 2022
- Time
- Location
- Online; on Zoom
Dr. Mohsen al Attar is an Associate Professor at the University of Warwick and a Visiting Scholar at UCL. Dr. al Attar is best known for his writings on Third World Approaches to International Law, a theory that guided his doctoral research and continues to inform his investigations into global political economy. In his forthcoming book with OUP, A Guerrilla At the Hague, he argues that many of the principles of international economic law preserve a Eurocentric epistemology that favours a parochial view of human development and human flourishing. He has published in journals as philosophically and geographically disparate as the McGill Law Review, the Third World Quarterly, the Palestine Yearbook of International Law, the Leiden Journal of International Law, and the Asian Journal of International Law. In his latest piece for Law & Critique, he argues that decolonisation is a paradoxical strategy in the struggle for Third World emancipation, insisting on cultural plurality in international lawmaking while reaffirming the Eurocentric foundations of the field.
This event is part of an ongoing lecture series organized by the Van Vollenhoven Institute, entitled “Reconsidering the Socio-Legal Gaze.” The lecture series aims to spark critical debates about the visions of justice and positions of power inform Law and Society scholarship at Leiden and beyond.
The first semester’s series “Dutch Colonial Foundations” reflected on the birth of socio-legal scholarship in the context of Dutch colonial administration. The second semester focuses on “Future Horizons” of socio-legal scholarship in the context of three key values that drive contemporary scholarship: decolonization, diversity, and development. The year-long lecture series is being organized by the Van Vollenhoven Institute Diversity and Inclusion Committee, the first of its kind at Leiden Law School.
The series is open to the public. Due to COVID measures, the lecture will be held via Zoom.
Please register for this lecture here.