6 June 2013
SHARES Lecture: ‘Allocation of human rights duties (and responsibilities) to multiple duty-bearers’, by Samantha Besson
On Thursday 6 June 2013, Professor Samantha Besson will give a lecture entitled: ‘Allocation of human rights duties (and responsibilities) to multiple duty-bearers’.
Professor Besson is Professor of public international law and European law, co-director of the European Law Institute, and head of the department of international and commercial law at the University of Fribourg (Switzerland). She is a visiting professor at the Universidade Católica Portuguesa (Lisbon) and has been a visiting professor at many universities, amongst others Duke Law School.
She has been coordinator of the seminar for practitioners for five years, and will be the Director of Studies for the French section of the Hague Academy of International Law this summer. Professor Besson has published extensively on public international law, e.g. on human rights law, treaty law, philosophy of law and EU law. She has been awarded numerous awards and grants, and currently conducts research in the context of the Swiss National Science Foundation research project Human Rights Restrictions (2012-2015) and the SNF Research Project ProDoc (2008-2015).
Relevant publications for the topic to be discussed include: ‘The Extraterritoriality of the European Convention on Human Rights: Why Human Rights Depend on Jurisdiction and what Jurisdiction Amounts to’, in Leiden Journal of International Law, 25(4) (2012), pp. 857-884; ‘Human Rights: Ethical, Political … or Legal?: First Step in a Legal Theory of Human Rights’, in Donald Earl Childress III (ed.) The Role of Ethics in International Law (CUP, 2012); ‘Sovereignty, International Law and Democracy’, in European Journal of International Law, 22(2) (2011), pp. 373-387; ‘Fundamental Rights and European Private Law’ in Mauro Bussani and Franz Werro (eds.) European Private Law: a Handbook (Carolina Academic Press, 2009); ‘The European Union and Human Rights: Towards a Post-national Human Rights Institution?’, in Human Rights Law Review, 6(2) (2006), pp. 323-360.
Her edited works include La Cour européenne des droits de l’homme après le Protocole 14 / The European Court of Human Rights after Protocol 14 (Schulthess, 2011); Des valeurs pour l’Europe? / Values for Europe? (ed., together with Francis Cheneval and Nicolas Levrat, Academia-Bruylant, 2008); The philosophy of international law (ed. together with John Tasioulas , OUP, 2010); Droit civil et Convention européenne des droits de l’homme / Zivilrecht und Europäische Menschenrechtskonvention, (ed., togeher with Franz Werro, Schulthess, 2006); Human Rights at the Center. Les droits de l’homme au Centre (ed. together with Michel Hottelier and Franz Werro, Schulthess, 2006)
She is co-editor with Nicolas Levrat of the book series Fondements du droit européen (Schulthess, together with LGDJ) and serves on editorial boards of several law journals and book series. Professor Besson has been and is an active member of various institutions and societies, such as being a member of the Direction of the Swiss Centre of Expertise in Human Rights; Human Rights Delegate of the Swiss Academies of Arts and Sciences; Member of the Scientific Board of the Institute for Advanced Studies (Nantes, France); and member of the Scientific Board of the International Institute for Children’s Rights in Switzerland.
As part of its Lecture Series, SHARES regularly invites scholars to give presentations on issues of shared responsibility. See here the overview of the SHARES Lecture Series.