dr. Richard Clements

Bio

Richard's main areas of research and teaching are international legal theory, expertise, and international institutions. He is interested in the uses and effects of legal and managerial expertise in global settings. He is a Faculty member of the Institute for Global Law & Policy, Harvard Law School, where he was previous a Residential Fellow and Affiliate Scholar. Richard received his PhD from the University of Cambridge University in 2020, where he also served as Co-Editor-in-Chief of the Cambridge International Law Journal.

Richard has also worked in a professional capacity at the International Criminal Court, Yugoslavia Tribunal, and the Northern Ireland Human Rights Commission. He has published in several journals including the Leiden Journal of International Law and the Journal of International Criminal Justice and his first monograph, The Justice Factory: Management Practices and the International Criminal Court will be published by Cambridge University Press in fall 2023.

Expertise

International law , international criminal law, global health law, international institutional law, global administrative law, critical legal theory, TWAIL, postcritique, critical management studies. 

Teaching

I currently convene the following courses:

• Fundamentals of International Law (Bachelor of Liberal Arts & Sciences, Law major, Tilburg University College)
• International Law: An Introduction (LLM International Law & Global Governance, Tilburg Law School) (fall & spring courses)
• GLB Final Essay (Final year bachelor thesis course, Global Law Bachelor program)
• International Law & Human Security (LLM International Law & Global Governance)

Courses

• International Law: an Introduction
• International Law and Human Security
• Fundamentals of International and EU Law

Collaboration

Institute for Global Law & Policy - organising online seminars on core texts in social and critical theory for the IGLP faculty network.

Highlights

Richard has been awarded an NWO Veni grant to pursue a three-year project entitled 'Mapping Management: The Missing Link in International Legal Work' (2024-2027). Here is a taster of the project scope: Although legal experts who operate globally make extensive use of treaties and other legal instruments, they also increasingly rely on so-called management tools – think of strategic plans, audits and mission statements. This research project maps in detail three different challenges at the international level (migration, pollution and pandemics) in order to better understand the effects of this management turn on the legal profession. This creates a more insightful picture of the legal practice of crisis management. 

Richard is concurrently pursuing the project 'Managers of Crisis: International Lawyering of Pandemics, Pollution, Populations' with the assistance of a Starters Grant, awarded by the Dutch government in January 2023. This project centres around the conceptualisation of international law and lawyering as a practice of crisis management, and seeks to further existing work on legal performativity and international legal work in various areas of expert practice, including global health law and marine plastic pollution.

Recent publications

1. The justice factory - Management practices at the international crimi…

   Clements, R. (2024). The justice factory: Management practices at the international criminal court. (Cambridge Series in International & Comparative Law; No. 182). Cambridge University Press.

2. Efficiency is paramount in this regard - The managerial role of the I…

   Clements, R. (2022). Efficiency is paramount in this regard: The managerial role of the ICC Presidency from Kirsch to Fernández. The Law & Practice of International Courts and Tribunals, 21(2), 342-368.

3. From utopia to efficiency

   Clements, R., & Bonadiman, L. (2021). From utopia to efficiency. In G. Demarchi, F. Di Chiara, E. Fiocchi Malaspina, & B. Rodríguez Arrocha (Eds.), Las fronteras de la Ilustración: Itinerarios entre historia y derecho (pp. 285-313). Dykinson.

4. Governing international criminal justice - Managerial practices and t…

   Clements, R. A. (2021). Governing international criminal justice: Managerial practices and the International Criminal Court. [Doctoral Thesis, University of Cambridge]. University of Cambridge.

5. Near, far, wherever you are - Distance and proximity in international…

   Clements, R. (2021). Near, far, wherever you are: Distance and proximity in international criminal law. European Journal of International Law, 32(1), 327-350.