It's International Law Weekend in New York City!

International Law Weekend 2012 began on Thursday evening in New York. International Law Weekend ("ILW") is sponsored and organized by the American Branch of the International Law Association (“ABILA” or "AmBranch") and the International Law Students Association (“ILSA”).  And for those of you who really like acronyms, the opening session is being held at the Association of the Bar of the City of New York ("ABCNY"). 

The theme for this year’s meeting is  "Ideas, Institutions, and Interests: Dynamics of Change in International Law." Panels may focus on key regions undergoing particularly dramatic change, for instance in the Middle East or China, and subject matter areas undergoing rapid change, such as tariffs and trade, human rights and humanitarian intervention, immigration, labor, public health, sustainable development and the environment.

The progams and speakers are again outstanding.  On Friday, for example, Judge Theodor Meron, President of the International Criminal Tribunal for the Former Yugoslavia, will give a keynote address on ad hoc criminal tribunals.  And right after that, Meg Kinnear, the Secretary-General of ICSID, will be on two panels on international investment law and dispute settlement.

Here's a random list of some of the speakers during International Law Weekend:

• Ruth Wedgwood, President of the American Branch of the International Law Association
• Jerome Cohen, Professor of Law, New York University School of Law
• John G. Crowley, Partner, Davis, Polk & Wardwell LLP
• Elizabeth Economy, C.V. Starr Senior Fellow and Director for Asia Studies, Council on Foreign Relations
• Winston Lord, former U.S. Ambassador to China; former U.S. Assistant Secretary of State for East Asian
• Darren Rosenblum, Professor of Law, Pace Law School
• Arnold Pronto, Senior Legal Officer in the Codification Division of the Office of LegalAffairs of the United Nations; Member, Secretariat of the International Law Commission
• Elizabeth Burleson, Associate Professor of Law, Pace Law School; Member, Legal Principles relating to Climate Change Committee, International Law Association
• Bruce W. Bean, Lecturer of Global Corporate Law, Michigan State University Law School; Member, ABILA
• Michael Koehler, Assistant Professor, Southern Illinois School of Law
• Mark R. Shulman, Assistant Dean for Graduate Programs and International Affairs, Pace Law School
• Deepa Badrinarayana, Associate Professor, Chapman Law School
• Anna Dolidze, Visiting Professor, Western University
• Karen Bravo, Professor of Law, John S. Grimes Fellow, Dean’s Fellow, Associate Dean for International Affairs, Indiana University Robert H. McKinney School of Law
• Mathias W. Reimann, Hessel E. Yntema Professor of Law, University of Michigan Law School
• Richard Alderman, Former Director, United Kingdom Serious Fraud Office
• Michael J. Madigan, Senior Counsel, Orrick, Herrington & Sutcliffe LLP
• Kathleen Harris, Partner, Arnold & Porter LLP
• Daniel C. K. Chow, Joseph S. Platt-Porter Wright Morris & Arthur Professor of Law, Moritz College of Law, The Ohio State University
• Mark Weston Janis, William F. Starr Professor of Law, University of Connecticut School of Law
• Aaron Fellmeth, Professor of Law, Arizona State University College of Law; Member,Intellectual Property and Private International Law Committee, International Law Association
• Joel Trachtman, Professor of International Law, Fletcher School of Law & Diplomacy,Tufts University; Member, International Trade Law Committee, International Law Association
• Jacob Katz Cogan, Professor of Law, University of Cincinnati College of Law
• Christiana Ochoa, Professor of Law, Indiana University (Bloomington) Maurer School of Law; Co-Chair, Feminism and International Law Committee, ABILA
• Tai-Heng Cheng, Partner, Quinn Emanuel Urquhart & Sullivan LLP
• Thomas H. Lee, Leitner Family Professor of Law, Fordham University School of Law
• Martin Gelter, Associate Professor of Law, Fordham University School of Law
• James Fanto, Professor of Law, Brooklyn Law School
• Mary R. “Nina” Henderson, Director, CNO Financial Group
• John F. Murphy, Professor of Law, Villanova University School of Law; Honorary Vice-President, ABILA
• Katherine M. Gorove, Attorney, Office of the Legal Adviser, U.S. Department of State
• Edward J. Flynn, Senior Human Rights Officer, United Nations Counter-Terrorism-Committee
• Milena Sterio, Associate Professor of Law, Cleveland State University Marshall College of Law
• The Honorable Duncan Gaswaga, Judge, Seychelles Supreme Court
• Stephen Rapp, U.S. Ambassador at Large for War Crimes Issues; former Chief Prosecutor, Special Court for Sierra Leone
• Sandy L. Hodgkinson, former Assistant Secretary of Defense< Michael Scharf, Professor of Law & Associate Dean for Global Legal Studies, Case Western Reserve University School of Law; Member, ABILA Executive Committee
• Paul Williams, President, Public International Law and Policy Group
• Brian Wilson, Legal and Sanctions Expert, United Nations Security Council
• John Carey, former Chair, International League for Human Rights; former Alternate U.S.Member, UN Human Rights Sub-Commission; former Justice; New York State Supreme Court; Member, ABILA Executive Committee; Chair, United Nations Law Committee, ABILA
• Andrew Strauss, Associate Dean for Faculty Research and Development & Professor of Law, Widener University School of Law
• Wil Burns, Associate Director & Professor, Energy Policy & Climate program, Johns Hopkins University; Member, Legal Principles Relating to Climate Change Committee, International Law Association
• Scott Barrett, Lenfest-Earth Institute Professor of Natural Resource Economics, School of International & Public Affairs, Columbia University
• Dale Jamieson, Director of Environmental Studies, New York University
• Norman Gregory Young, Professor of Law for International Business, California State Polytechnic University College of Business
• Roberto Aguirre Luzi, Partner, King & Spalding; Co-Chair, Bilateral Investment Treaty and Development Committee, ABILA
• Lawrence Newman, Of Counsel, Baker & McKenzie LLP; Chair, International Judicial
  Integrity Committee, ABILA
• Mark E. Wojcik, Professor, The John Marshall Law School; Chair, Teaching of International Law Committee, ABILA
• Liyan Yang, Professor of International Economic Law, GuangXi Normal University School of Law (Guilin, China); Adjunct Professor of Law, South West University of Politics and Law
  (Chongqing, China)
• Meg Kinnear, ICSID Secretary-General, World Bank
• Andrea Bjorklund, Professor of Law, University of California, Davis School of Law; Visiting
  Professor of Law, McGill University School of Law; Director of Studies, ABILA; Member,
  ABILA Executive Committee
• Christina Cerna, Adjunct Professor of Law, Georgetown Law; Member, ABILA Executive Committee; Chair, International Human Rights Law Committee, International Law
  Association 
• Jamie Fellner, Senior Advisor, U.S. Program, Human Rights Watch
• Juan Méndez, United Nations Special Rapporteur on Torture and Other Cruel, Inhuman or Degrading Treatment or Punishment
• Taylor Pendergrass, Senior Staff Attorney, New York Civil Liberties Union
• Alexis Agathocleous, Staff Attorney, Center for Constitutional Rights
• William S. Dodge, Associate Academic Dean for Research and Professor of Law, University of California, Hastings College of the Law; former Counselor on International Law, U.S. Department of State, Office of the Legal Adviser
• Malvina Halberstam, Professor of Law, Benjamin N. Cardozo School of Law; former
  Counselor on International Law, U.S. Department of State, Office of the Legal Adviser;
  Member, ABILA Executive Committee
• Nathan Lewin, Partner, Lewin & Lewin, LLP, Washington, D.C.; attorney for Menachem
  Zivotofsky
• Paul B. Stephan, John C. Jeffries, Jr., Distinguished Professor of Law; David H. Ibbeken ’71 Research Professor; Director, Graduate Studies Program, University of Virginia School of Law; former Counselor on International Law, U.S. Department of State, Office of the Legal
  Adviser
• George Walker, Dean's Research Professor of Admiralty and International Law, Wake Forest University School of Law; Member, ABILA Executive Committee; Chair, Law of the Sea Committee, ABILA; Member, Baselines Under the International Law of the Sea Committee, International Law Association
• John E. Noyes, Roger J. Traynor Professor of Law, California Western School of Law;
  Chair, ABILA Executive Committee; Member, Baselines Under the International Law of
  the Sea Committee, International Law Association
• Matthew Schaefer, Law Alumni Professor of Law and Director of Space, Cyber, and
  Telecom Law Program, University of Nebraska College of Law
• Frans von der Dunk, Harvey & Susan Perlman Alumni and Othmer Professor of Space Law, University of Nebraska College of Law. Benjamin L. Liebman, Robert L. Lieff Professor of Law and Director of the Center for Chinese Legal Studies, Columbia University School of Law, . . . .

And many, many more.  Click here to see the program. 

ILW opens tonigh at ABCNY at 42 West 44th Street.  On Friday and Saturday, events will be held at Fordham Law School at Lincoln Center.  More than a thousand practitioners, academics, diplomats, members of the governmental and nongovernmental sectors, and foreign policy and law students are expected to attend.

Congratulations to the members of the 2012 Organizing Committee:

• Steven A. Hammond, Hughes Hubbard & Reed LLP
• Nikolai B. Krylov, Winston & Strawn LLP
• Mark R. Shulman, Pace Law School
• Michael Shewchuk, United Nations Office of Legal Affairs
• Vivian Shen, International Law Students Association
• Ruth Wedgwood, President of the American Branch of the International Law Association

Mark E. Wojcik (mew), Chair, ABILA Committee on the Teaching of International Law