The knowledge economy, a seeming wonder for the world, has caused unintended harms that threaten peace and prosperity and undo international cooperation and the international rule of law. The world faces threats of war, pandemics, growing domestic political discord, climate change, disruption of international trade and investment, immigration, and the pollution of cyberspace, just as international law increasingly falls short as a tool for managing these challenges. Prosperity dependent on meritocracy, open borders, international economic freedom, and a wide-open Internet has met its limits, with international law one of the first casualties. Any effective response to these threats must reflect the pathway by which these perils arrive. Part of the answer to these challenges, Paul B. Stephan argues, must include a re-conception of international law as arising out of pragmatic and limited experiments by states, rather than as grand projects to remake and redeem the world.

Paul Stephan is the John C. Jeffries, Jr., Distinguished Professor of Law and the David H. Ibbeken ’71 Research Professor of Law at the University of Virginia, and a senior fellow at UVA’s Miller Center. He worked on behalf of the Department of Treasury to assist Russia in the creation of its tax system from 1993 to 1998. He served as Counselor for International Law to the Legal Adviser of the Department of State in 2006-2007, and as Special Counsel to the General Counsel of the Department of Defense in 2020-21. He was coordinating reporter for the American Law Institute’s Restatement (Fourth) of the Foreign Relations Law of the United States from 2012 to 2018.

Stephan joined the UVA Law faculty in 1979 after completing clerkships with Judge Levin H. Campbell of the U.S. Court of Appeals for the First Circuit and Justice Lewis F. Powell, Jr., of the Supreme Court. During his time at Virginia he also has been a visiting professor at Columbia and Duke Law Schools in the United States as well as lecturing at or serving on the law faculties of the Moscow State Institute for International Relations, the Diplomatic Academy of the Ministry of Foreign Relations of the U.S.S.R., Vienna University, Münster University, Lausanne University, Paris I, Paris II, Sciences Po, Melbourne University, Sydney University, Australia National University, the Interdisciplinary Center Herzliya, Peking University School of Transnational Law, Xiamen University, and Tartu University. His forthcoming book, The World Crisis and International Law – The Knowledge Economy and the Battle for the Future, will appear this winter, he hopes to rave reviews. This summer he will teach a special course on public international law at the Hague Academy of International Law.

Lunch will be provided.