About ILA
Part of the International Law Association
The Swedish Section of the International Law Association was founded in 1922 by Hjalmar Hammarskjöld and Knut Agathon Wallenberg with the aim of promoting the development of international law. Today, the association is one of around sixty national sections of the worldwide organization International Law Association (ILA). ILA has ancient roots – the organization was founded in Brussels in 1873 and has since then brought together lawyers from all over the world to jointly promote the development of international law. ILA is currently headquartered in London and consists of more than 5,000 members.
The activities are led by an Executive Council, where the national sections are represented, with the help of the headquarters secretariat in London. ILA’s purpose is to study, clarify and develop international law. ILA’s purpose is fulfilled primarily through work in international committees and working groups that study specific international law issues, ranging from international arbitration and dispute resolution to space law and artificial intelligence. Through this work, the ILA has played a crucial role in the development of international law for more than a century. In addition, an ILA congress is organized every two years for the organization’s members. The national chapters also organize activities, such as the International Law Weekend conference, which is organized in New York every year by the American chapter.
Swedish ILA members participate in the ILA’s international activities and contribute to the important work of the association.
+5000
Members
+60
National departments
+20
Committees
1873
ILA founded
"The objectives of the Association are the study, clarification and development of international law, both public and private, and the furtherance of international understanding and respect for international law."
History
The Swedish ILA was founded on 3 June 1922 by, among others, Hjalmar Hammarskjöld and Knut Agathon Wallenberg. Section 2 of the association’s statutes stated that “The purpose of the association is, as a Swedish section of the International Law Association, to work for the development of international law”. Hammarskjöld, who had previously been Prime Minister, was elected chairman and Wallenberg, who had previously been Minister of Foreign Affairs, was elected vice chairman. In 1924, the Swedish ILA hosted the 33rd ILA Congress.
Over the years, prominent Swedish lawyers active in international law have served on the board of the Swedish ILA, including ministers of state, justice and foreign affairs, presidents of the courts of appeal, marshals of the realm, business directors and company leaders, professors, ambassadors and lawyers, general secretaries of the Stockholm Chamber of Commerce’s Arbitration Institute, judges of the International Court of Justice in The Hague and members of the Permanent Court of Arbitration in The Hague and the United Nations International Law Commission. Examples include Algot Bagge, Annette Magnusson, Axel Ax:son Johnson, Birger Ekeberg, Emil Sandström, Gunnar Lagergren, Hans Blix, Hans Corell, Inger Österdahl, Kaj Hobér, Marie Jacobsson, Ove Bring, Pehr Gyllenhammar, Sten Rudholm, Sture Petrén, Ulf Franke and Östen Undén.
Since its founding in Brussels in 1873, the ILA has played a crucial role in the development of international law and continues to do so today. Reports and resolutions from the ILA’s international committees have been adopted and used by international organizations and legislative bodies such as the United Nations in the development of many of the texts that constitute international law today. The ILA committees are behind common principles and standards in subjects such as bills of exchange (1876, 1908, 1910), peacetime aviation (1920), international arbitration law (1895, 1922, 1938, 1948, 1959), international insolvency law (1938, 1946, 1954), jurisdiction over legal persons (2002), a permanent international criminal court (1922, 1923), the effect of war on contractual obligations (1930), rights to the seabed, rights relating to territorial waters, and international waterways and rivers (1948, 1954, 1960, 1962), peaceful uses of nuclear energy (1960, 1962), monetary law (1954, 1960), foreign investment arbitration (1962), and the responsibility of international organizations (2004). The work of the ILA has had an impact on the development of international law, for example through conventions on state immunity and jurisdiction and the recognition and enforcement of judgments.
With a history spanning more than 150 years, the ILA’s important work has continued in peacetime and periods of deepened international cooperation as well as in wartime and periods of international division. In the Swedish Legal Journal in 1946, the chairman of the Swedish ILA, Algot Bagge, commented on the ILA Congress that took place that year in Cambridge:
"One would think that the war that has brought about so much international division would have put an end to the cooperation of international lawyers, at least for the time being. However, the experience from the last world war already went in the opposite direction and it seems as if even now the international lawlessness during and after the war has made the work on an international legal system appear more necessary than ever. People's need for order and justice is no less now than before and even if the efforts to put law in the highest place among nations at times seem to bear the mark of Sisyphus, this work continues, not least after every major war, with surprising perseverance."