European Journal of Legal Studies ‘New Voices’ Prize 2017

The Winner of the First EJLS ‘New Voices’ Prize

The EJLS Editorial Board is excited to announce the winner of the inaugural EJLS New Voices prize. The prize-winning New Voices article is ‘The Validity of Treaties Concluded under Coercion of the State: Sketching a TWAIL Critique’, written by Guilherme Del Negro, a Ph.D. candidate at the University of Brasília and Assistant Professor at the Instituto Rio Branco.

Guilherme Del Negro’s thought-provoking article explores one of the biggest unresolved problems of the law of treaties: the invalidity of treaties based on non-military coercion. By combining positive legal analysis with Third World Approaches to International Law (TWAIL), Guilherme Del Negro’s article argues that the way Article 52 of the 1969 Vienna Convention was drafted had the effect of undermining the concept of consent and entrenching power politics.

The article was reviewed and selected by a Selection Committee composed of Professors Deirdre Curtin, Gabor Halmai and Claire Kilpatrick. The Committee looked for originality of thought and clarity in arguments in innovative and critical approaches to topical issues.

Both the Selection Committee and the EJLS Editorial Board would like to express their most sincere congratulations to the author. The Editorial Board would also like to thank the EUI Law Department for generously sponsoring the prize.

Reread his article here:

The Validity of Treaties Concluded under Coercion of the State: Sketching a TWAIL Critique