Centre for European Law and Internationalisation
News and events
The latest activities from CELI
CELI Annual Series 2024/25, Climate Change, Energy Transition and Sustainability
For the 2024-25 Annual Series, convened by Dr Olalekan Bello, the Centre for European Law and Internationalisation (CELI) is teaming up with the Institute for Environmental Futures (IEF). Join us for an engaging and thought-provoking series of talks at the cutting edge of global climate action, energy transition, and sustainable development.
International Investment and Arbitration, Climate Change Mitigation and Adaptation and the Emergent African Continental Free Trade Agreement
- Date and time: Wednesday 23 October 2024, 12.00pm (BST)
- Speakers: Dr Okechukwu Ejims, University of Bedfordshire and Dr Patience Okala, African Continental Free Trade Area Unit, African Union
- Leicester Law School, Fielding Johnson, Jan Grodecki Room (FJ 164). Join via Microsoft Teams.
The Impact of the Global Gas Crisis: Lessons for the UK and Implications for Its Net-Zero Pathway
- Date and time: Thursday 28 November 2024, 12.00pm (GMT)
- Speakers: Professor Mike Bradshaw, Professor of Global Energy, Warwick Business School and Professor Amelia Hadfield, Dean International, Head of Department of Politics, University of Surrey
- Leicester Law School, Fielding Johnson, Jan Grodecki Room (FJ 164). Join via Microsoft Teams.
Advances in Climate Litigation and Environmental Justice
- Date and time: Wednesday 11 December 2024, 12.00pm (GMT)
- Speakers: Professor Christina Eckes, University of Amsterdam and Dr Kim Bouwer, University of Durham
- Leicester Law School, Fielding Johnson, Jan Grodecki Room (FJ 164). Join via Microsoft Teams.
The London Conference on International Law
CELI’s Professor Katja Ziegler has been invited to the Steering Committee of the 2024 London Conference on International Law. The University of Leicester is delighted to be one of the convening organisations this year, to have contributed to curating the conference and to feature on a number of panels.
Professor Katja Ziegler is convenor of two panels at the conference (Accounting for War and Domestic Courts and International Law: Human Rights and Customary International Law). CELI’s Professor Rossana Deplano is invited to speak on the panel on Space Law.
The London Conference on International Law is a biennial event under the aegis of the Foreign, Commonwealth and Development Office’s Legal Advisor & Director General Sally Langrish, dedicated to exploring the latest developments in international law and providing participants with the highest-level insights from leading experts in the field.
International judges, world-class academics, researchers and practitioners will address topical legal issues, exploring the effectiveness and limitations of existing legal principles and the ability of international law to address contemporary and future challenges.
Taking place at the QEII Centre on the 17th and 18th of October, with the option to join in person or stream online, the London Conference 2024 will examine the defining content of public international law as we understand it today, questioning whether recent international events have exposed fault lines or whether it remains adequate to address the issues at hand. The Conference will also seek to challenge preconceptions and assess whether the reach of international law extends further than commonly believed.
The Attorney General, Lord Richard Hermer KC, will provide introductory remarks and plenary sessions will feature Members of the International Law Commission; Women in International Law; A View from the International Bench; Members of the UK Supreme Court, and a discussion on the Future of International Law. There will also be a session on Careers in International Law, which aims to highlight where future opportunities might emerge as geopolitical landscapes shift and new legal challenges arise.
Sixteen panels with eminent speakers from across the world of International Law will discuss current topics including:
- Accounting for War
- Domestic Courts and International Law
- Sanctions
- Artificial Intelligence
- Space Law
- Climate and Environment
- Migration
- Law of the Sea
- Energy Security
- The Colonial Legacy of International Law
- International Settlement of Disputes and lots more.
Full speaker, panel and registration details are available on the London Conference on International Law website,
A drinks reception, included in ticket pricing, will take place following talks on Day One of the Conference, and guests are warmly invited to continue conversations at the Conference dinner, taking place at 1 Great George Street, a two-minute walk from the Conference venue, on the evening of 17 October. Dinner tickets and pricing information is also available on the London Conference on International Law website,.
We hope to see you there!
CELI Director appointed to Advisory Board of Leading Journal in European Law
Professor Katja Ziegler was invited and accepted to join the Advisory Board of the journal European Public Law, published by Kluwer.
CELI Annual Lecture 2024
Tom de la Mare KC on 'Taking back Executive Control: the post-Brexit Democratic Deficit of the UK'
Tom de la Mare KC is a leading barrister in the field of EU law, public law and regulatory law. He has been involved in some of the most prominent recent cases involving EU Fundamental Rights and EU Treaty rights issues. He is an acclaimed expert on the UK’s post-Brexit constitutional landscape (in particular, the implementation and effect of the Withdrawal Agreement and the Trade and Cooperation Agreement) and its implementation in the UK (in particular, through the EU Withdrawal Act 2018 and the EU Future Relationship Act 2020). He acted for the Public Law Project in the Miller 2 litigation and for the UK in CJEU Grand Chamber hearing in Wightman, as well as in the two last references from UK Courts (London Steam-Ship Owners Mutual Insurance Association and CG), both of which have spawned significant post-IP Completion Day litigation.
His lecture he will illuminate the continued effect and relevance of EU law in the UK (through “retained EU law”, now “assimilated law”), drawing on his case practice in recent years. It will discuss how the conferral of extensive and largely untrammelled powers of delegated legislative powers, including unparalleled Henry VIII powers to amend primary legislation have unbalanced our domestic order, leaving the UK with its own democratic deficit in the form of largely unaccountable executive powers.
Details:
Open to: all
Date: 8 May 2024, 16:00 (UK Time)
Venue: University of Leicester, David Wilson Library - Meeting Room (ground floor)
Organiser: Professor Katja Ziegler
Are we becoming more tolerant of immigration?
Professor Lauren McLaren, School of History, Politics and International Relations of the University of Leicester.
After decades of large-scale immigration to European democracies, are mass publics becoming more accepting of immigrants and immigration? If so, what explains these trends? Do policies regarding the treatment of immigrants have any bearing on public opinion about immigration? And what are the potential implications of trends in public attitudes to immigration for governments that continue to ‘talk tough’ on immigration (and vice versa)? This lecture addresses some of these pressing questions using decades of public opinion data from Britain and other European democracies and ultimately argues that gradual but significant change may be underway in many countries.
Details
Date and time: 12 March 2024, 13:00-14:15 UK Time
Venue: hybrid JGR Room, Fielding Johnson Building
Organiser: Dr Konstantina Sampani
“White Supremacy, Racial Segregation and Contested Ideas of Freedom in the USA”
Professor George Lewis, School of History, Politics and International Relations of the University of Leicester.
Many commentators have framed the rise of an authoritarian political right and “Trumpism” in the United States as a Twenty-First Century aberration, variously located as a reaction to the first African American President or, for example, as an indicator of the decay of traditional party structures. This lecture seeks to place that rise in the context of a long historical arc, and argues that the modern US right reflects strong continuities rather than sudden fractures. In particular, it will look to the ways in which segregationists from the 1950s and 1960s tried to formulate ideas of freedom which conformed to their deeply conservative world view – one in which that freedom was routinely denied to whole sections of the nation’s citizenry. The long civil rights movement, it will be argued, is as much about ideas as about protest, and the battle over those ideas continues to rage in the modern USA.
Details
Open to: all
Date and time: 21 February 2024, 12:00 - 13:00 UK Time
Venue: hybrid JGR Room, Fielding Johnson Building, Leicester School of Law and on Teams (Link here)
Organiser: Dr Konstantina Sampani
'The role of the ECOWAS Court in subregional efforts to address the challenge of unconstitutional changes of government in West Africa'
Justice Edward Amoako Asante, President of the Community Court of Justice, ECOWAS
Justice Edward Amoako Asante is a Ghanaian jurist, judicial administrator, and judge of the ECOWAS Court of Justice, the principal judicial organ of the Economic Community of West African States, the 15-member West African political and economic bloc. Appointed to the ECOWAS Court in July 2018, Justice Asante was elected by his peers as the 6th President of the Court for a two-year term. He has since served as the President of the Court, having been re-elected for a second term in August 2020 and a third term in October 2022.
Justice Asante received his legal education at the University of Ghana and the Ghana School of Law and was admitted to the Ghana Bar in 1991. After about a decade of legal practice, including as a Legal Officer of the Ghana Legal Aid Commission, Justice Asante was appointed as a Circuit Court Judge in Ghana. He was elevated to the superior court bench as Justice of the High Court of Ghana in 2008 and served as the Supervising High Court Judge in the Western Region of Ghana, where he managed the administrative functions and staff of over 30 courts.
Following his stellar legal and judicial career, including his tenure as the President of the ECOWAS Court, the President of the Republic of Ghana, in August 2020, appointed Justice Asante to Ghana’s Court of Appeal, the second-highest court after the Supreme Court.
Justice Asante has over 30 years of experience as a lawyer and judge, with expertise in many areas of law, including public international law, international human rights law, mediation, and arbitration. He has acted as a resource person in these areas at various conferences and seminars and has been invited to deliver lectures and presentations at reputable institutions around the world.
Details
Date and time: 18 January 2024
Venue: Online
Organiser: Dr Joycelin Eze-Okubuiro