by Disha Karnad Jani

In this latest episode of In Theory, Disha Karnad Jani interviews Umut Özsu, Professor in the Department of Law and Legalities at Carleton University, about his book Completing Humanity: The International Law of Decolonization, 1960-82 (Cambridge University Press, 2023). The book shows how jurists from the Third World transformed international law during post-1945 decolonization, and traces the legal dimensions of ideas of territorial sovereignty, resource extraction, justice, and freedom. 


Umut Özsu is a Professor of in the Department of Law and Legal Studies at Carleton University. He is the author of Completing Humanity: The International Law of Decolonization, 1960–82 (Cambridge University Press, 2023), and Formalizing Displacement: International Law and Population Transfers (Oxford University Press, 2015), as well as co-editor of Research Handbook on Law and Marxism (Edward Elgar, 2021) and The Extraterritoriality of Law: History, Theory, Politics (Routledge, 2019).

Disha Karnad Jani is a Postdoctoral Researcher in the Research Training Group (RTG) “World Politics” at Universität Bielefeld. Her current book project is an intellectual history of the League Against Imperialism, 1927-1937. She is the co-host of In Theory, the podcast of the JHI Blog.

Featured image: 14 November 1963 – Meeting of the Sixth Committee of the General Assembly on principles of international law concerning friendly relations and co-operation among States, United Nations Headquarters, New York (left to right): Mr. E.K. Dadzie (Ghana), Vice-Chairman; Dr. Jose Maria Ruda (Argentina), Chairman; and Mr. K.S. Zabigalio (Ukrainian S.S.R.), Rapporteur. Accessed 23 October 2024, via Audiovisual Library of International Law, United Nations.