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W&L Law Hosts Round-table on Justice after Conflict

On Sunday October 21 and Monday October 22, the law school at Washington and Lee hosted an exciting round-table on post-conflict justice.

The event was organized by Mark Drumbl, Class of 1975 Alumni Professor of Law and Director of the Transnational Law Institute, and funded by a generous grant by the Lewis Law Center with supplemental support from the Transnational Law Institute.

Six papers were presented, together with a lunch-time address delivered by Saira Mohamed, Professor of Law at University of California Berkeley School of Law, on ‘Criminal Punishment as a Human Right?’. The participants in the round-table were Bec Hamilton (American University), Olivera Simić (Griffith University, Australia), Nancy Combs (William & Mary), Rachel Lopez (Drexel), Linda Malone (William and Mary), Barbora Holá (Free University of Amsterdam), Henok Gabisa (Washington and Lee), Andy Spalding (Richmond), and Jo-Marie Burt (George Mason).

A broad variety of papers were presented, ranging from the use of social media and user-generated evidence to convict persons of international crimes; an assessment of the concept of gravity in international crimes; how contracts for major sporting events may protect human rights; the dissenting judgment at the Tokyo trial; empirical assessments of sentencing in Rwanda following the genocide; and the narration of a justice in Guatemala tracing one set of proceedings through multiple venues. In each case, a commentator (not the author) presented the paper and generated supportive and lively conversation.

On October 20, 2018, three of the participants (Mark Drumbl, Barbora Hola, and Olivera Simic) participated in a panel on “Legacies and Memories in International Criminal Law” at the American Branch of the International Law Association’s International Law Weekend in New York.

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