A new series of Guest Speaker Nights, hosted by Kent Law School’s Centre for Critical International Law (CeCIL), will be launched on Tuesday 7 December with a lecture on ‘The law of the land: land concentration, violence and racism in the Andes’ by Dr Natalia Torres Zuñiga.
The lecture will be delivered in person (Room CNWsr5, Canterbury campus) and online via Zoom (using this link), from 18.00 – 19.00 GMT.
In the “Law of the Land” project, Dr Torres explores how the constitutions of Andean States (in particular, Perú, Colombia and Chile) have legally created and sustained an agribusiness-friendly market economy. Dr Torres will discuss how host states, local elites and transnational powers have contributed to the structuring of this neoliberal setting. Paying attention to the consequences of this reality in terms of land concentration, displacement, violence, and the perpetuation of racism in the region, she will highlight how, as an “ideal” model of development, agribusiness continue to be a highly contested idea in the Andes.
Dr Torres is a Postdoctoral Fellow at the University of Oslo, Norwegian Centre for Human Rights and a Visiting Research Fellow at Kent Law School (2021-2023). She holds a PhD from the University of Oslo, an LLB from the Pontifical Catholic University of Peru, and a Master in Constitutional Law from the Menéndez Pelayo International University and the Centre for Political and Constitutional Studies (Spain). In her home country Peru, Natalia has worked as a legal advisor at the National Congress, the Constitutional Court and NGOs.
During a two-month visit to the Law School in 2018 (as part of her doctoral studies), Dr Torres found the exposure to critical theory and socio-legal studies at Kent to be pivotal for the development of her thesis.
Image credit: The Andes by Smallest Forest, CC BY-NC 2.0
The Centre for Critical International Law
CeCIL is an innovative research centre which aims to foster critical approaches to the field of international law, and other areas of law that touch upon global legal problems. In addition to an annual lecture, CeCIL offers a busy programme of activities for Kent Law School students, including a speaker and films series and workshops for students keen to develop their employability and international law skills. CeCIL also strives to engage students, scholars and practitioners interested in the critical study of international law around the world through developing collaborations and joint research efforts.
