James Thuo Gathii is a professor of law and the Wing-Tat Lee Chair in International Law at Loyola University Chicago School of Law. He sits on the board of editors of the American Journal of International Law, the Journal of African Law and the Journal of International Trade Law and Policy. In June 2020, he was the Grotius Lecturer at the 2020 Virtual Annual Meeting of the American Society of International Law. He has sat as an arbitrator in two international commercial arbitrations hosted by the Permanent Court of Arbitration in the Hague. He has consulted for the Office of the United Nations High Commissioner for Human Rights, (OHCHR), and the Economic Commission for Africa, (ECA), among others. Professor Gathii has completed two terms as an Independent Expert of the Working Group on Extractive Industries, Environment, and Human Rights Violations in Africa formed by the African Commission on Human and Peoples’ Rights. Between 2017 and 2020, he was an expert member of the Working Group on Agricultural Land Investment Contracts of the International Institute for the Unification of Private Law (UNIDRIOT).
He is a founding member of the Third World Approaches to International Law, (TWAIL), network and an elected member of the International Academy of International Law. He is a founding editor of the Afronomicslaw.org blog on international economic issues as they relate to Africa and the Global South as well as the African Journal of International Economic Law (AfJIEL). Professor Gathii’s areas of teaching and research are Public International Law, International Trade Law, International Human Rights, Third World Approaches to International Law and Comparative Constitutional Law. He has published four books and over 100 articles and book chapters. His prior books are: African Regional Trade Agreements as Legal Regimes (Cambridge University Press, 2011, Paperback 2013); War, Commerce and International Law (Oxford University Press, 2010); and The Contested Empowerment of Kenya’s Judiciary, 2010-2015: A Historical Institutional Analysis, (Sheria Publishing House, 2016). His latest book is an edited volume titled The Performance of Africa’s International Courts: Using Litigation for Political, Legal and Social Change, (Oxford University Press, 2020) He is a graduate of the University of Nairobi, Kenya, and Harvard Law School.