law
7 Nov 2020

Populism and the pandemic: law expert Campbell McLachlan

From Saturday Morning, 10:42 am on 7 November 2020
Campbell McLachlan

Campbell McLachlan Photo: supplied

How will the global rise of populism, allied to the pandemic, shape the future of international law?

Professor Campbell McLachlan QC of Victoria Law School recently returned to New Zealand from Berlin, where he was considering this issue at the Berlin-Potsdam Research Group.

He argues that the brand of populism we are seeing in countries including the US, UK and Brazil has weakened the world's capacity to respond to COVID-19 through the usual mechanisms to combat the threat of infectious diseases.

He is currently serving as one of a 16-member Commission of the Institute of International Law on 'Pandemics and International Law'. Next year he takes up the Arthur Goodhart Visiting Professorship of Legal Science at the University of Cambridge.