Islamic Law expert Dr John Strawson from the University of East London spoke about ‘International Law and the Making of Palestine’ for this year’s fourth ‘Speaker Night’ organized by Kent’s Centre for Critical International Law (CeCIL).
The event, hosted on Tuesday 29 November at Kent’s centre in Brussels, was also live-streamed to staff and students unable to attend in person at the Brussels School of International Studies.
PhD student Eric Loefflad said: ‘As a leading expert on Islamic law, legal histories of the Middle East, and colonial/postcolonial legacies in law, John certainly did not disappoint when providing a rich and nuanced account of the tremendously difficult issue of Israel-Palestine. For John, a way out of the problematic ‘One State/Two State’ bind is to think in terms of ‘Two States, One Homeland’ whereby creative solutions that reflect both the unique experiences and shared destinies of both parties to this ongoing conflict can be pursued. Yet, despite this optimistic possibility, he is made it clear that any legal transformation towards this end will require concerted political effort that must contend with the many challenges facing the world today.
‘Given the Kent Law School community’s commitment to understanding legal phenomenon as inseparable from their social and political contexts, John’s approach certainly mirrors many of our own.’
A more detailed recap of Dr Strawson’s talk by Eric is available to read on Kent Law School’s Countercurrents blog.
Dr Strawson is the Chair of the Advisory Board for (and former co-Director of) the Centre on Human Rights in Conflict (CHRC) at UEL. He is a colonial legal historian with contemporary interests in International law, the Middle East and Islamic Law. He has written on the Palestinian-Israeli conflict, Islamic law in colonial India, Law and September 11 2011, the Iraq war and the Arab Spring. His interests include conflict resolution and the transitional process in the Middle East and the implications of colonial rule for current images of Islamic law.
The purpose of CeCIL Speaker Nights is to expose LLM and Phd students of international law to a wide spectrum of ideas and opinions on a variety of topics in order to complement their critical thinking and to foster research links between Law School staff with overlapping areas of interest.
CeCIL’s wider aim is to foster critical approaches to the field of international law, and other areas of law that touch upon global legal problems, through promoting collaboration and exchange at Kent Law School and within the broader scholarly community. In addition to Speaker Nights, the research group organizes films series, workshops, and an annual lecture addressing emerging themes in critical scholarship in the field of international law.