An ANU international law and human rights expert has jointly received a prestigious award from the American Society for International Law (ASIL), given in recognition of outstanding contributions to the development or effective realisation of international human rights law.
 
Professor Hilary Charlesworth, a professor of international law and human rights in the Research School of Social Sciences and the Faculty of Law at ANU was awarded the 2006 Goler T. Butcher Medal with Professor Christine Chinkin from the London School of Economics, for their book The Boundaries of International Law: A Feminist Analysis. 

The book takes a critical look at how and why the development of international law has often failed to address the needs of women. It cites such root causes as the lack of women in positions of power at the state and international level and advocates that the boundaries of international law be redrawn to correct those failures and create more equitable status and treatment of women in society. The book received an ASIL Certificate of Merit in 2001.
 
Professor Charlesworth, who was this year awarded a Federation Fellowship, chaired the Australian Capital Territory’s Bill of Rights Consultative Committee (2002-03), the report of which set out a blueprint for Australia’s first bill of rights, the ACT Human Rights Act 2004. She won a 2005 ACT International Women’s Day Award for this work. Professor Charlesworth has taught at the University of Melbourne and the University of Adelaide and has been a visiting professor at Washington and Lee School of Law, Harvard Law School, and New York University Global Law School. Since 1996 she has been Co-Editor of the Australian Yearbook of International Law.

Both Professor Charlesworth and Professor Chinkin serve on the Board of Editors of the American Journal of International Law, published by ASIL.

ASIL is a nonprofit, nonpartisan, educational membership organisation founded in 1906. Its mission is to foster the study of international law and to promote the establishment and maintenance of international relations on the basis of law and justice.

ASIL has 4000 members from nearly 100 countries, comprising attorneys, academics, corporate counsel, judges, representatives of governments and nongovernmental organisations, international civil servants, students and those interested in international law.

Further Information

Amanda Morgan
Media Liaison
Tel: 02 6125 5575 / 0416 249 245
Email: Amanda.Morgan@anu.edu.au