Since its founding in 2002, the Institute for International Law and Public Policy has set the pace for Temple Law’s rise as a global leader in the study of international law. Under current co-directors Margaret M. deGuzman and Jeffrey Dunoff, and with the energetic support of a strong core of Affiliated Faculty, the Institute sponsors an ambitious menu of activities. The Institute has been a core element of the rich international programs at Temple Law.
The Institute hosts a broad range of conferences, roundtables, seminars, lectures, and other programs for scholars, policymakers, and students. Participants include international law leaders from top academic institutions and government agencies. The Institute sponsors the International Law Colloquium, in which scholars from other institutions present scholarly works-in-progress on cutting edge issues of international law as part of a for-credit curricular offering. The Institute directors are assisted by student fellows competitively selected for their international law interest and experience.
Institute events are designed to support and enrich an intellectually vibrant community of students and faculty interested in international and comparative law issues at Temple University Beasley School of Law.
Institute Directors
Professor of Law
Co-Director, Institute for International Law and Public Policy
Judge of the Residual Mechanism for International Criminal Tribunals
Professor Margaret M. deGuzman is James E. Beasley Professor of Law at Temple Law School and and a judge of the Residual Mechanism for International Criminal Tribunals. She specializes in criminal law, international criminal law, international humanitarian law, international human rights law, and transitional justice. Her scholarship focuses on the role of international criminal law in the global legal order, with a particular emphasis on the work of the International Criminal Court (ICC). Her recent publications have addressed such issues as how the concept of gravity of crimes affects the legitimacy of international criminal law, the relationship between international criminal law and the responsibility to protect doctrine, proportionate international sentencing, and the selection of cases and situations for ICC investigation and prosecution. She is currently participating in an international expert group studying the proposed addition of criminal jurisdiction to the mandate of the African Court on Human and Peoples’ Rights, and in a project studying the impact of the Extraordinary African Chambers in the Courts of Senegal on national, regional, and global justice norms.
Before joining the Temple Law faculty, Professor deGuzman clerked on the Ninth Circuit Court of Appeals and practiced law in San Francisco for six years, specializing in criminal defense. Professor deGuzman also served as a legal advisor to the Senegal delegation at the Rome Conference where the ICC was created and as a law clerk in the Office of the Prosecutor of the International Criminal Tribunal for Former Yugoslavia. She was a Fulbright Scholar in Darou N’diar, Senegal.
Associate Professor of Law
Co-Director, Institute for International Law and Public Policy
J. Benton Heath is an Associate Professor of Law Professor at Temple Law School. Professor Heath’s primary research interests include international trade, investment law, dispute resolution, global health, administrative law, public international law, and the national security dimensions of trade and investment. He teaches Civil Procedure and International Arbitration.
Professor Heath previously practiced international law and arbitration at the U.S. State Department, and at Curtis, Mallet-Prevost, Colt & Mosle. He has represented governments and state-owned enterprises before the International Court of Justice, the Iran-United States Claims Tribunal, other international arbitral tribunals, and the federal courts. His work at the State Department also included bilateral claims negotiations with the Republic of Cuba, matters relating to embargoes and economic sanctions, and U.S. court cases brought against foreign governments by victims of terrorism. He also served as a clerk to Judge Robert D. Sack of the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Second Circuit.
Professor Heath’s research has appeared in the Yale Law Journal, the Northwestern University Law Review, the Harvard International Law Journal, and the American Journal of International Law, among others. He holds a J.D. and LL.M. from New York University School of Law, and a B.A. (Philosophy) from the University of Texas at Austin. From 2018 to 2020, Professor Heath was an Acting Assistant Professor of Lawyering at NYU School of Law.