Distinguished Canadian politician and former Member of Parliament Bill Graham will present the 2017 Jean-Gabriel Castel Lecture on International Law and International Organizations on March 14 at 7:30 pm with a focus on “International Law: A Political Perspective”.
Bill Graham
The annual lecture, hosted by Glendon College, will be delivered in English and is free to attend. It will take place at the BMO Conference Centre, 2275 Bayview Ave., North York.
Graham was educated at the University of Toronto and the Université de Paris. He practiced law with the firm of Fasken and Calvin and taught at the University of Toronto Faculty of Law.
In 1993, he was elected Member of Parliament for Toronto-Centre-Rosedale, and from 1995 to 2002 served as Chairman of the Standing Committee of the House of Commons on Foreign Affairs and International Trade.
He was Minister of Foreign Affairs from 2002 to 2004 and Minister of National Defence from 2004 to 2006. From February to December 2006, he was Leader of the Official Opposition and Interim Leader of the Liberal Party of Canada. He is currently Chancellor, Trinity College, University of Toronto; Chair of the Canadian International Council; and Honorary Colonel of the Governor General’s Horse Guards. He is Chevalier de la Légion d’honneur and a Member of the Order of Canada.
Registration is required for this event and can be done here.
About the annual Jean-Gabriel Castel Lecture
The annual Jean-Gabriel Castel Lecture was created in 2004 to honour Professor Jean-Gabriel Castel, an internationally acknowledged jurist and now emeritus Distinguished Research Professor in international law at Osgoode Hall Law School of York University, Fellow of the Royal Society of Canada, and Officer of the Order of Canada.
For a decade, Castel taught international law to Glendon’s undergraduate students in the International Studies Program. This public lecture series was launched in order to honour his contribution to this department, and to give the students in the Department of International Studies, as well as other social sciences disciplines, the opportunity to hear an eminent jurist and/or a well-known personality in public life discuss issues in law that demand public debate.
The first speaker in the series was Jean-Gabriel Castel himself, who spoke in February 2005 on the topic “The Legality and Legitimacy of Unilateral Armed Intervention in an Age of Terror, Neo-Imperialism and Massive Violations of Human Rights. Is International Law Evolving in the Right Direction?”.
For more on the background, visit www.glendon.yorku.ca/international-studies/castel-conference.