The Dawn of a Discipline: International Criminal Justice and Its Early Exponents - Softcover

Softcover

ISBN 10: 1108738508 ISBN 13: 9781108738507

Publisher: Cambridge University Press, 2026

Synopsis

The history of international criminal justice is often recounted as a series of institutional innovations. But international criminal justice is also the product of intellectual developments made in its infancy. This book examines the contributions of a dozen key figures in the early phase of international criminal justice, focusing principally on the inter-war years up to Nuremberg. Where did these figures come from, what did they have in common, and what is left of their legacy? What did they leave out? How was international criminal justice framed by the concerns of their epoch and what intuitions have passed the test of time? What does it mean to reimagine international criminal justice as emanating from individual intellectual narratives? In interrogating this past in all its complexity one does not only do justice to it; one can recover a sense of the manifold trajectories that international criminal justice could have taken.

About this title

About the Authors

Frédéric Mégret is a Professor and Dawson Scholar at the Faculty of Law, McGill University. From 2006 to 2016 he held the Canada Research Chair on the Law of Human Rights and Legal Pluralism. His research focuses on the theory and history of international criminal justice.

Immi Tallgren is a Docent (Adjunct Professor) of International Law, University of Helsinki and a Senior Researcher at the Erik Castrén Institute. She has worked as a diplomat, legal advisor in international organisations, and researcher, e.g., at the MPI Luxembourg and LSE. She currently studies the history of international law and gender, international criminal justice, law and cinema.

Edition details

• Publisher: Cambridge University Press
• Publication date: 2026
• Language: English
• ISBN 10: 1108738508
• ISBN 13: 9781108738507
• Binding: Paperback
• Number of pages: 442
• Editor: Megret Frederic