Earlier this year, the School of Law was counted among the top 22 international law programs in the country by U.S. News & World Report. The school’s influence in international law stems from the Dean Rusk International Law Center’s leadership team of faculty co-directors Diane Marie Amann (Regents’ Professor of International Law & Woodruff Chair), Christopher Bruner (Stembler Family Distinguished Professor in Business Law) and Desirée LeClercq (Assistant Professor) as well as Director Sarah Quinn.
Chief among the center’s activities this past academic year was the “Defending Democracy: A Comparative Perspective” conference held in partnership with the Georgia Journal of International and Comparative Law. Organized by Hosch Professor & Meigs Distinguished Teaching Professor Lori Ringhand, this full-day symposium brought together comparative law scholars from across the country to discuss a range of issues involving democracy, democratic backsliding and comparative constitutional protections of democratic norms and institutions.
The International Law Colloquium, overseen by LeClercq, focused on international economic law and featured Harlan Cohen (Fordham Law), Luwam Dirar (Western New England University School of Law), Katrin Kuhlmann (Georgetown Law), Olabisi Akinkugbe (Schulich Law), Ben Heath (Temple Law), Julian Arato (Michigan Law), Trang (Mae) Nguyen (Temple Law), Rachel Brewster (Duke Law), Sarah Dadush (Rutgers Law) as well as UGA Law’s Amann and Bruner.
To strengthen the school’s academic partnerships abroad, four faculty were selected to serve as Rusk Scholars-in-Residence. Amann, Associate Dean Nathan Chapman, Associate Professor Thomas Kadri and LeClercq travelled to and spoke at leading academic institutions and organizations like Oxford University, the European University Institute, the University of Queensland, the International Labor Organization and the World Trade Organization, among others.
The school furthered its partnerships with the Atlanta International Arbitration Society, the American Society of International Law and the American Branch of the International Law Association. A total of 22 students received Sohn Professional Development Fellowships to attend conferences sponsored by these groups in Atlanta, New York City, Chicago and Washington, D.C. In conjunction with the Washington International Trade Association, the center organized a webinar about careers in international trade and law.
Other featured speakers throughout the year included representatives from the Permanent Mission of the Arab Republic of Egypt to the African Union in Ethiopia, the International Court of Justice, the UN Working Group on Business and Human Rights and USAID’s Bureau for Democracy, Human Rights, and Governance.
Eighteen foreign-trained lawyers came to Athens for the 2024–25 academic year to earn a Master of Laws. They hailed from 13 countries in Africa, Asia, Europe and the Americas. Six LL.M. students were selected as graduate editors of the Georgia Journal of International and Comparative Law, and four won the LL.M. International Commercial and Investment Arbitration Moot Competition.
Approximately 20 UGA students participated in the Global Governance Summer School earlier this year. A trip to the European Parliament in Brussels was part of the for-credit program.
UGA Law students remain excited about international experiences. Four students opted for semester-long externships, including the first two recipients of a grant from the Halle Foundation supporting externships in Germany. This past summer, 16 students secured Global Externships in public and private law placements in Belgium, Bermuda, Cambodia, Germany, Italy, Latvia, Malta, New Zealand, Spain and Vietnam. One student received the Asia-Georgia Internship Connection Scholarship for his externship with KPMG in Vietnam. Eleven law students and two Graduate Certificate in International Law students participated in the Global Governance Summer School, which is conducted in partnership with the KU Leuven Centre for Global Governance Studies. Additionally, one student enrolled in the 2024 University of Liverpool School of Law & Social Justice Summer School in partnership with the Council of Europe.
—Sarah Quinn
