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Fleur Johns

@fleurjohns.bsky.social

2.3K followers 1.1K following 28 posts

Dean & Head of School, Sydney Law School, University of Sydney. International law, legal theory, law & technology etc. Latest books: https://tinyurl.com/HelpBookOUP & https://tinyurl.com/2cv626hf (Views expressed here are mine not those of my employer.) .. more

Political science 53%

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Nanna B Thylstrup @nannathylstrup.bsky.social · Dec 9

1/ Honored (!) to explore digital dispossession's implications for law, critical/cultural data studies & STS with @fleurjohns.bsky.social in @4sweb.bsky.social's Backchannels: 4sonline.org/news_manager.php?page=38459!Thank you Aaron Gregory and @ludovico-rella.bsky.social for editorial guidance!

Possession as Ruse—A Conversation about Digital DispossessionSearchMobile Menu

Fleur Johns @fleurjohns.bsky.social · Jul 23

If you end up reading it, feel free to get in touch. As always, I couldn’t have done this work without the support, prior work, and generous engagement of many people — too many to thank here, but acknowledged in the notes. End.

Fleur Johns @fleurjohns.bsky.social · Jul 23

However, this is not the only register of presentism that international lawyers may imbibe in connection with digitalization. An abundance of creative and scholarly resources for thinking about the present offer alternatives, this article concludes.

Fleur Johns @fleurjohns.bsky.social · Jul 23

Using the above-mentioned examples, I show how the digitally assembled emergency no longer interrupts time (as in many prior international legal conceptions of crisis) but rather invites waiting and watching — vigilant attentiveness to present conditions and sufferance of their inevitability.

Fleur Johns @fleurjohns.bsky.social · Jul 23

In other words, this article asks whether the presentism of some ICT might be helping to foster a palliative orientation in international legal work – towards incrementally addressing symptoms of global deterioration and exploitation without attempting, ambitiously, to arrest them.

Fleur Johns @fleurjohns.bsky.social · Jul 23

The article asks whether, insofar as international lawyers incline towards hand-wringing temporizing in the face of death and devastation, this might be a matter (in part) of their internalizing the logic of digital interfaces through which they are invited to engage with these phenomena.

Fleur Johns @fleurjohns.bsky.social · Jul 23

The article focuses on the temporal implications of this shift, situating it amid recent humanities and social sciences literature on presentism, and scrutinizing it through a close reading of two exemplary interfaces developed by IOs: VAMPIRE and HungerMap LIVE.

Fleur Johns @fleurjohns.bsky.social · Jul 23

It starts from the observation that international organizations are having growing recourse to digital technologies in emergency response. Digital interfaces, such as online earning warning tools, are informing how humanitarian emergencies are perceived and analysed, and in what time frame.

Fleur Johns @fleurjohns.bsky.social · Jul 23

Hello all. My OA article “Palliative Presentism & Its Alternatives: International Legal Emergencies via Digital Interfaces” has been published in the European Journal of International Law. It is about time, technology, humanitarian emergencies & international law.
academic.oup.com/ejil/advance...

Palliative Presentism and Its Alternatives: International Legal Emergencies via Digital Interfaces

Abstract. International organizations (IOs) are having growing recourse to digital technologies in emergency response. Digital interfaces, such as online e

academic.oup.com

Fleur Johns @fleurjohns.bsky.social · Jun 17

To the extent that Trump’s foreign policy has a coherent logic, that logic — the accompanying conception of state territory & national interest etc — is best understood through the historical & legal lens of consular internationalism rather than diplomatic relations www.cambridge.org/core/journal...

Fleur Johns @fleurjohns.bsky.social · May 25

Great hybrid-conversation at the Law & Society conference about our book (co-ed by Gavin Sullivan, @dimitrivdm.bsky.social & me) Global Governance by Data: Infrastructures of Algorithmic Rule, f’coming open access with @cambridgeup.bsky.social. 🙏to Gavin & to @mattcanfield.bsky.social for comments.

Reposted by Adam S. Posen, Jason Stajich, Ingrid Piller , and 12 more Adam S. Posen, Jason Stajich, Ingrid Piller, Jennifer Clark, Anna Tarrant, Amy McGovern, Robert T. Tally, Fleur Johns, Michael J. Taylor, Jenny Pickerill, Lesley Bartlett, Ian Bogost, Alexandra Cirone, Goldie Blumenstyk, Alexander Starre

Evan Torner @guyintheblackhat.bsky.social · May 18

There is a false dichotomy drawn between "the ivory tower" and "the real world," and I'm here to report that in a post-industrial society, your real-world economy absolutely hinges on the university.

University towns are factory towns. Universities drive economic activity, not the other way around.

Prof Christina Pagel @chrischirp.bsky.social · May 18

A must read

Reposted by Fleur Johns

Itamar Mann @itamann.bsky.social · May 16

Thanks to the editors of @verfassungsblog.de for publishing this new short essay, somewhat bleak, but it did give me the privilege of linking to work by my better half.

verfassungsblog.de/in-the-grave...

Reposted by Cathryn Costello

Fleur Johns @fleurjohns.bsky.social · May 6

For anyone thinking about doing a PhD in Law, expressions of interest for Pitch-a-PhD at The University of Sydney Law School are now open for international applicants. Please share widely. Submission link: lnkd.in/gcibSc9g Scholarships info here: www.sydney.edu.au/scholarships...

Fleur Johns @fleurjohns.bsky.social · May 3

Ernst Fraenkel’s work is worth revisiting but the “dual state” as a diagnosis of contemporary authoritarianism (A) is misguided insofar as it maintains the separability of a “zone of legality” from a “legal abyss”, absolving the former of responsibility for A’s rise

www.nytimes.com/2025/05/03/w...

The Frightening Precedents for Trump’s ‘Legal Abyss’

The ‘dual-state theory’ explains how authoritarians bend the law to their will.

www.nytimes.com

Fleur Johns @fleurjohns.bsky.social · Apr 10

In this OA article in the Leiden Journal of Int’l Law, I argue that the distinctive logic of consular internationalism can aid analysis of entanglements of imperial & commercial power & grappling with unofficial actors’ role in shaping international law www.cambridge.org/core/journal...

On consular internationalism | Leiden Journal of International Law | Cambridge Core

On consular internationalism

www.cambridge.org

Reposted by Fleur Johns, Gráinne McKeever

Victoria Adelmant @victoriaadamant.bsky.social · Mar 26

How does the design of digital govt infrastructure impact decision-making & accountability? @jenraso.bsky.social & I argue that data-sharing arrangements underlying digital govt programs are dispersing responsibilities within decision-making, generating what we call 'bureaucratic disempowerment' 1/4

Data Entry and Decision Chains: Distributed Responsibility and Bureaucratic Disempowerment in the UK’s Universal Credit Programme

Abstract. Digitalising public programmes creates new accountability challenges, many of which are under-theorised. Using Universal Credit to illustrate its

academic.oup.com

Reposted by Fleur Johns

AJIL and AJIL Unbound @ajil.bsky.social · Mar 17

AJIL Unbound's latest symposium "International Criminal Law's Critical Aftermaths: Abolitionism, Redistribution, and Transformational Pedagogies" is now available to read and features and incredible line-up of scholars. www.cambridge.org/core/journal...

Reposted by Fleur Johns, Cathryn Costello

Völkerrechtsblog @voelkerrechtsblog.org · Mar 10

📢 Out now! #DigitalEchoes: Season 2 – 'Listening to New Normativities' New episodes 📼 every second Monday on Völkerrechtsblog & Spotify!
Read the introduction by @dogot.bsky.social, Rebecca Mignot-Mahdavi, @minorjurisprudent.bsky.social & Anna Sophia Tiedeke.
voelkerrechtsblog.org/introducing-...

Introducing the Second Seasons of Digital Echoes

voelkerrechtsblog.org

Reposted by Fleur Johns

Dimitri Van Den Meerssche @dimitrivdm.bsky.social · Feb 14

🔥🔥🔥 Excited to share this collection in @ejiltalk.bsky.social: International Law and Technology as a Critical Project: A Collective Reading.

👇 This piece draws the contours of a critical approach to IL and technology by introducing five wonderful review essays.

t.co/bd0DOcbXKp

https://academic.oup.com/ejil/advance-article/doi/10.1093/ejil/chae069/7994342

Reposted by Fleur Johns

Belinda Reeve @belindareeve.bsky.social · Jan 30

New publication alert ⚠️

We evaluated controls on food marketing in six different jurisdictions, producing recommendations for effective, transparent, and accountable regulation.

Key takeaway: good regulatory design is just as important as regulatory tool choice.

Full version: shorturl.at/ky4fp

Reducing unhealthy food and beverage advertising to children: a framework for strengthening performance, transparency and enforcement

Food and beverage multinationals spend vast sums of money marketing unhealthy foods and drinks to children, using an integrated array of advertising techniques and media platforms. Countries have resp...

Reposted by Fleur Johns

Rosemary Grey @rosemarygrey.bsky.social · Jan 27

Interested in competing ideas of "gender" in international criminal law? I'll be chatting next week on this with the brilliant Akila Radhakrishnan, Valerie Oosterveld, Lily Kather, Juliana Santos de Carvalho & Lena Holzer. Tune in on Monday 3 February at 10am, Cambridge time.

Reposted by Thomas Gammeltoft-Hansen, Fleur Johns, Cathryn Costello

Louis Ravn @louravn.bsky.social · Jan 17

Very pleased to see my interview with @fleurjohns.bsky.social out in Critical Humanities: mds.marshall.edu/criticalhuma...! 🌞

In it, Fleur Johns explains the central arguments of her recent book “#Help: Digital Humanitarianism and the Remaking of International Order“ (OUP, 2023)…🧵

Fleur Johns @fleurjohns.bsky.social · Jan 19

I’m so grateful to @louravn.bsky.social for the opportunity to talk about some of the arguments in my @oxfordunipress.bsky.social book ‘#Help: Digital Humanitarianism and the Remaking of International Order’ in the Critical Humanities journal 👇

Louis Ravn @louravn.bsky.social · Jan 17

Very pleased to see my interview with @fleurjohns.bsky.social out in Critical Humanities: mds.marshall.edu/criticalhuma...! 🌞

In it, Fleur Johns explains the central arguments of her recent book “#Help: Digital Humanitarianism and the Remaking of International Order“ (OUP, 2023)…🧵

Reposted by Fleur Johns

Thomas Streinz @streinz.bsky.social · Dec 16

The paper seeks to contribute to broader questions about global data/infrastructure governance. The final version of the paper will be published in a volume on governance by data edited by @fleurjohns.bsky.social @dimitrivdm.bsky.social and Gavin Sullivan.

Reposted by Fleur Johns

Reposted by Rocco Bellanova

Fleur Johns @fleurjohns.bsky.social · Dec 12

I have a new article forthcoming in the European Journal of International Law (@ejiltalk.bsky.social): 'Palliative Presentism and its Alternatives: International Legal Emergencies via Digital Interfaces'. It is available via SSRN pending publication: ssrn.com/abstract=505...
Below is an abstract:

Fleur Johns @fleurjohns.bsky.social · Dec 9

I am especially grateful to @nannathylstrup.bsky.social & @tgammeltoft.bsky.social hansen for hosting the visit at which this conversation started.