Norms and Ideas in International Law and Politics (with Prof. Keith Darden)
The Law and Technology of Cyber Conflict
Philosophy of International Law (informal seminar)
Oona A. Hathaway is the Gerard C. and Bernice Latrobe Smith Professor of International Law at Yale Law School, Professor of International Law and Area Studies at the Yale University MacMillan Center, Professor of the Yale University Department of Political Science, and Director of the Yale Law School Center for Global Legal Challenges. She has been a member of the Advisory Committee on International Law for the Legal Adviser at the United States Department of State since 2005. In 2014-15, she took leave to serve as Special Counsel to the General Counsel at the U.S. Department of Defense, where she was awarded the Office of the Secretary of Defense Award for Excellence. She is the Director of the annual Yale Cyber Leadership Forum and a member of the Council on Foreign Relations. She has published more than forty law review articles, and The Internationalists: How a Radical Plan to Outlaw War Remade the World1 (with Scott Shapiro, 2017). She is also Executive Editor of and regular author at Just Security, and she writes often for popular publications such as The Washington Post, New York Times, The Atlantic, and Foreign Affairs.
Professor Hathaway can also be found on social media on Twitter @oonahathaway and on Mastodon2.
The Yale Cyber Leadership Forum is a two-day program on March 30 and April 1, 2017, that will focus on bridging the divide between law, technology, and business in cybersecurity.
On November 12th, the Center for Global Legal Challenges and Yale Law Women hosted a conversation on European foreign and security challenges with Baroness Catherine Ashton, former High Representative of the Union for Foreign Affairs and Security Policy.
Michael Vickers visited Yale Law School on October 19 as a guest speaker at the Wartime Practice of National Security Law course with Professor Oona Hathaway and Stephen Preston. Vickers served as the Under Secretary of Defense for Intelligence at the United States Department of Defense and as United States Assistant Secretary of Defense for Special Operations and Low Intensity Conflict. Before that, Vickers served in the Army Special Forces as both a non-commissioned and commissioned officer, as well as a Central Intelligence Agency (CIA) paramilitary operations officer from their elite...
The Center for Global Legal Challenges hosted Caroline D. Krass (YLS ’93), General Counsel of the Central Intelligence Agency (CIA), for a series of discussions with students and faculty on October 7, 2015. Ms. Krass provided insight into pressing international and national security legal questions, as well as general perspectives from her sterling career as a government lawyer. Ms. Krass currently serves as the General Counsel of the Central Intelligence Agency. Her career in government spans roles at the Departments of State and Treasury, the National Security Council, and the Office of...
The Center for Global Legal Challenges and the Yale Law National Security Group hosted a lunchtime talk with Stephen Preston, former General Counsel of the Department of Defense on September 28, 2015. Mr. Preston spoke on a wide range of topics, including emerging threats to U.S. and global security interests, the crisis in Syria, the role of secrecy and transparency in national security law, and the mechanics of national security lawyering. Prior to his appointment to the Department of Defense in 2013, Mr. Preston served as General Counsel of the Central Intelligence Agency. He has also...
Students in Professors Harold Hongju Koh and Oona Hathaway’s National Security Lawyering class recently took a four-day trip to Washington, D.C., where they met with officials, policymakers, and lawyers in various executive and legislative bodies to present their findings from a semester’s worth of study into deep questions on pressing national security issues.
With a fervent debate raging over what actions should be taken against the Syrian government in the wake of a suspected chemical attack that killed more than 1,000 Syrians— including hundreds of children — Yale Law faculty offer their opinions and insights on a range of issues impacting the conversation. Below is a sampling of the most recent commentaries and interviews.
Yemen: Is the U.S. Breaking the Law13?, Harvard National Security Review (2019) (with Srinath Kethireddy, Alexandra Francis, Alyssa Yamamoto, and Aaron Haviland)
What is a War Crime14? Yale Journal of International Law (2019) (with Paul Strauch, Beatrice Walton, Zoe Weinberg)
Response to Critics, Global Constitutionalism15, Vol. 7, No. 3 (2018) (with Scott Shapiro) (responding to submissions to an Agora on The Internationalists, in Global Constitutionalism)
War Manifestos16, 85 Chicago Law Review 1139 (2018) (with William Holste, Scott Shapiro, Jacqueline Van De Velde, and Lisa Wang Lachowicz)
War Manifestos Database17, Yale Law School (with William Holste, Scott Shapiro, Jacqueline Van De Velde, and Lisa Wang Lachowicz)
International Law at Home29, YALE JOURNAL OF INTERNATIONAL LAW (2012) (with Sara Solow & Sabria McElroy) (examines the enforcement of international treaties in U.S. courts in light of the U.S. Supreme Court’s decision in Medellin v. Texas).
Limited War and the Constitution32, MICHIGAN LAW REVIEW (2011) (with Bruce Ackerman) (argues that a new legal framework is required to reassert congressional control over limited warmaking by the United States)
The Case for Promoting Democracy Through Export Control33, Harvard Journal of Law & Public Policy 17 (2010) (critiques the claim that the presidential system of separation of powers can be easily exported to developing countries)
Foundations of International Law and Politics40 (with Harold H. Koh) (Foundation Press 2004) (a reader intended for legal and political science audiences), reviewed in Christopher C. Joyner, International Law Is, as International Relations Theory Does?, 100 Am. J. Int’l L. 248 (2006)
Empirical Approaches to International Law, AM. J. INT’L L. (forthcoming 2004) (discusses the lessons that can be drawn from existing empirical research into human rights law and proposes promising avenues for future research)
The Cost of Commitment, 55 STAN. L. REV. 1821 (2003) (arguing that traditional understandings of the costs of treaty ratification are insufficiently nuanced and that the cost of compliance varies according to the product of a country’s divergence from the requirements of the treaty and the likelihood that the nation will actually change its practices to comply with those requirements and then tests the theory offered using empirical evidence)
Testing Conventional Wisdom, 13 E.J.I.L. 185 (2003) (peer review journal) (arguing that empirical analysis can be an important and powerful tool for testing assumptions regarding state behavior)
Do Human Rights Treaties Make a Difference?, 111 YALE L. J. 1935 (2002) (analyzes quantitative data on over 150 nations during a 40-year period to assess the impact of human rights treaties on countries’ human rights practices and the empirical validity of current theories of international law compliance).
The Case for Replacing Article II Treaties with Ex Post Congressional-Executive Agreements, American Constitution Society Issue Brief (Nov. 16, 2008)
Testimony on “The U.S.-Iraq Bilateral Agreement: Constitutional and other Legal Concerns,” House Foreign Affairs Committee, Subcommittee on Oversight, (Nov. 13, 2008)
Testimony on “Declaration and Principles: Future U.S. Commitments to Iraq,” House Foreign Affairs Committee, Subcommittee on Oversight (Mar. 4, 2008)
Testimony on “The November 26 Declaration of Principles: Implications for UN Resolutions on Iraq and for Congressional Oversight,” House Foreign Affairs Committee, Subcommittee on Oversight (February 2008)
What Bush Will Surrender in Iraq, TIME MAGAZINE (ONLINE), September 10, 2008 (with Bruce Ackerman) (arguing that the draft agreement with Iraq includes several unconstitutional provisions)
Into No-Man’s Land , THE L.A. TIMES, July 25, 2008 (with Bruce Ackerman) (arguing that the proposed memorandum of understanding with Iraq is unconstitutional and does not adequately protect the troops)
The War's Expiration Date, THE WASHINGTON POST ONLINE, Saturday, April 5, 2008 (with Bruce Ackerman) (arguing that the war in Iraq will become illegal on Jan. 1, 2009 unless new legislation is passed or the UN Mandate is extended)
An Agreement that Needs Agreement , THE WASHINGTON POST ONLINE, Saturday, February 15, 2008 (with Bruce Ackerman) (arguing that the proposed agreement between the United States and Iraq must be approved by Congress to be legal)
Why We Need International Law , THE NATION, November 19, 2007 (putting forth a case for international law on the ground that international law benefits the United States' national interest)
A Tortured Way to Run A War on Terror, NEWSDAY, October 26, 2005 (op-ed discussing the Administration's efforts to stop Congress from regulating the military's treatment of detainees)
Judge Roberts and International Law & other posts, Supreme Court Extra: Think Progress (blog)
Debate Club: Is International Law Really Useful? (Jan. 2005) (on-line written debate with Eric Posner, a prominent critic of international law)
Supreme Court Brings Bush Administration Back to Earth, THE HARTFORD COURANT, July 1, 2004 (op-ed discussing the Supreme Court’s cases on the rights of prisoners in the war on terror)
The Court Puts the White House in its Place, NEWSDAY, June 30, 2004 (op-ed discussing the Supreme Court’s cases on the rights of prisoners in the war on terror)
Making Human Rights Treaties Work: Global Legal Information and Human Rights in the 21st Century, 31 INT’L J. OF LEGAL INFO. 312 (2003) (discussing why human rights treaties have been ignored in discussions of the war against terrorism and how they can be made more effective)
Making Human Rights Treaties Work, 4 YALE POLITIC 28 (2003) (discussing why human rights treaties have been ignored in discussions of the war against terrorism and how they can be made more effective)
Book Note, The Politics of the Confirmation Process, 107 YALE L. J. 235 (1996) (reviews John Anthony Maltese, The Selling of Supreme Court Nominees)
Whither Biodiversity? The Global Debate over Biological Variety Continues, 15 HARV. INT’L REV. 58 (Winter 1992/93) (journalistic piece examining the international debate over a draft treaty designed to maintain biological diversity)
Lifting the Veil, 19 HARV. POL. REV. 16 (Mar. 1992) (journalistic piece examining the political and social status of women in Kuwait, based in part on observations made during a visit to Kuwait). Winner of the Kennedy School of Government Political Journalism Award.
