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Dr Russell Buchan

Russell Buchan portrait

Areas of interest

Russell Buchan is an expert in public international law and has particular research and teaching interests in international political and legal theory, UN law, the use of force, international humanitarian law, international criminal law and justice, and international dispute settlement. He is especially interested in how these legal frameworks apply to new and emerging technologies such as cyberspace, autonomous systems, and Artificial Intelligence.

Russell has published widely in the field of public international law. His first monograph entitled International Law and the Construction of the Liberal Peace (Hart, 2013) won the American Society of International Law’s 2014 Francis Lieber prize for an ‘exceptional published work in the field of the law of armed conflict’. His second monograph is entitled Cyber Espionage and International Law (Hart, 2018). In 2021, he co-authored a textbook (along with Nicholas Tsagourias) entitled Regulating the Use of Force in International Law: Stability and Change (Edward Elgar Publishing, 2021). He is also the co-editor (with Nicholas Tsagourias) of the Research Handbook on International Law and Cyberspace (Edward Elgar Publishing, 2nd Edition, 2021) and (with Asaf Lubin) The Rights to Privacy and Data Protection in Times of Armed Conflict (CCDCOE, 2022). In addition to these book-length projects, he has authored or co-authored multiple articles for law journals and book chapters for edited collections.

Postgraduate supervision

Russell welcomes applications from research students in the following areas: international political and legal theory, UN law, the use of force, international humanitarian law, international criminal law and justice, and international dispute settlement.

Teaching

Russell teaches on the following modules:

  • International Law and Global Security (UG) (Module co-convenor)
  • Foundations of International Law (UG) (Module convenor)
  • The Use of Military Force (PG) (Module convenor)
  • The Law of Armed Conflict (PG) (Module convenor)
  • Contemporary Issues in International Law (PG)

Research centres and groups

Background

Russell Buchan is Professor of International Law at the University of Reading and was previously Senior Lecturer in International Law at the University of Sheffield (2008-2023). He has held visiting positions at various universities across the world. Russell is co-editor in chief of the Journal of International Humanitarian Legal Studies and sits on the editorial boards of the Journal on the Use of Force and International Law and the International Community Law Review. He was previously a fully-funded British Academy secondee to the UK Foreign, Commonwealth, and Development Office (FCDO).

Academic qualifications

LLB; LLM; PhD

Selected publications

  • Russell Buchan, ‘Non-Forcible Measures and the Law of Self-Defence’ (2023) 72(1) International and Comparative Law Quarterly 1-33.
  • Russell Buchan and Nicholas Tsagourias, ‘Hacking International Organizations: The Role of Privileges, Immunities, Good Faith and the Principles of Sovereignty’ (2022) 104 International Review of the Red Cross 1171-1198.
  • Russell Buchan and Nicholas Tsagourias, Regulating the Use of Force in International Law: Stability and Change (Edward Elgar, 2021).
  • Russell Buchan and Nicholas Tsagourias, ‘Autonomous Cyber Weapons and Command Responsibility’ (2020) 96 International Law Studies 645-673.
  • Russell Buchan, ‘Taking Care of Business: International Law and Industrial Espionage’ (2019) 26(1) Brown Journal of World Affairs 143-160.
  • Russell Buchan, Cyber Espionage and International Law (Hart Publishing, 2018).
  • Iñaki Navarrete and Russell Buchan, ‘Out of the Legal Wilderness: Peacetime Espionage, International Law and the Existence of Customary Exceptions’ (2019) 51(4) Cornell International Law Journal 897-953.
  • Russell Buchan, ‘The Rule of Surrender in International Humanitarian Law’ (2018) 51(1) Israel Law Review 3-27.
  • Nicholas Tsagourias and Russell Buchan, ‘Automatic Cyber Defence’ (2017) 60 German Yearbook of International Law 203-237.
  • Russell Buchan and Nicholas Tsagourias, ‘The Crisis in Crimea and the Continuing Relevance of the Principle of Non-Intervention’ (2017) 19(2-3) International Community Law Review 165-193.
  • Russell Buchan, ‘Cyber Warfare and the Status of Anonymous under International Humanitarian Law’ (2016) 15(4) Chinese Journal of International Law 741-772.
  • Russell Buchan, International Law and the Construction of the Liberal Peace (Hart Publishing, 2013).

Publications

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