Evening Lecture: 'Choral Intervention: Situating the Role of Music in Reshaping International Law in Africa' - Prof Babatunde Fagbayibo, University of South Africa

This lecture is is part of the Art, Architecture and International Law seminar series which is being launched this academic year. The series is designed to bridge the worlds of art, architecture and international law. It explores the different ways in which art and architecture and international law intersect. It also demonstrates that international law exists well beyond the written word.

Lecture summary: At the heart of this lecture is the question of how music could serve as an effective instrumental tool for rethinking the theoretical and processual dimensions of international law in Africa. This lecture argues that socially conscious songs provide a beneficial lens/gateway to the popular understanding of the problematics of international law. As Daniel Newman rightly noted, “the use of popular music offers a writer a valuable device to render what could be quite dry and, otherwise dull, argument suddenly more interesting and thus engaging to the reader”. Such knowledge further engenders the possibility of repurposing the applicative dimensions of international law on the continent.

Babatunde Fagbayibo is a Professor in Law at the University of South Africa. He graduated with a doctoral degree in Public Law, with specialisation in regional integration law, from the University of Pretoria, South Africa. His research interests include supranational regionalism, transnational policy analysis, critical approaches to international law, and governance and democratisation in Africa. His writings have been published in several academic journals, as chapters in books, and on other online platforms. In 2014, he was recognised by the Young People in International Affairs (YPIA) as one of the top 35 Africans under the age of 35 for his research in the field of supranational regionalism in Africa. He currently serves as the Editor-in-Chief of the Southern African Public Law Journal (SAPL) and is on the editorial boards of the African Journal of Democracy and Governance (RADG) and the Nigerian Yearbook of International Law (NYIL).