3L Austin Edens’ focus on international law has allowed him to travel the globe. In summer 2023, he studied in the United Kingdom through the University of Utah’s Hinckley Institute’s Global Internship Program. During summer 2024, Edens had planned to work with the Australian parliament, but he couldn’t get security clearance in time. Fortunately, another opportunity presented itself—this time, in Paris.
“I worked with Professor Ariel Colonomos in Paris when I earned my master’s degree in international security, diplomacy and European affairs,” Edens recalls. “I talked to the Hinckley Institute about working with Colonomos again and doing research for a future law review or academic publication article, and they agreed and were able to fund my summer in Paris.”
While writing his master’s degree thesis in 2017, Edens learned about lethal autonomous weapon systems (LAWS) and international humanitarian law, or the law of war, which is what he has focused his research on.
“There are a handful of international states who want these systems to only be regulated by existing humanitarian law because it would be more permissible for them to use the weapons,” Edens explains. “The majority of countries are skeptical or desirous of having a new binding treaty that would both prohibit and regulate these weapons systems. All of this is being negotiated under a current treaty called the Convention on Certain Conventional Weapons.”
The week before he was supposed to return to Utah from Paris, where he was continuing his research about LAWS and existing international law to regulate these systems, Edens received word from the United Nations that he could attend a convention of the Group of Governmental Experts on Lethal Autonomous Weapons Systems in Geneva, Switzerland.
“I hastily got all my stuff together to go to Geneva,” Edens recalls. “This GGE is in charge of laws and legal autonomous weapon systems, and they were negotiating for a future binding treaty. I technically represented the Hinckley Institute and the University of Utah at these negotiations.”
Edens has returned to Utah for his final year of law school and wants other law students to be aware of the international options available.
“I can’t emphasize enough how grateful I am to the Hinckley Institute. I think a lot of law students feel disconnected from the main University of Utah campus, and the Hinckley Institute has so many great opportunities,” he says. “Former Dean Reyes Aguilar told me I should look into it and really put me on this track. I owe so much to him. He also connected me with and .”
Though Utah Law has a small international law faculty, Edens says he is very impressed with Professor Tony Anghie—”I don’t think other students know what a big deal Professor Anghie is,” he says—and Assistant Lecturer Professor Jackie Morrison, whom he says is critical to the success of the Philip C. Jessup International Law Moot Court Competition. Participating in the Jessup competition has also been a highlight of Edens’ time at Utah Law.
“I am really, really enjoying being part of the Jessup program. It is an amazing opportunity to get a real-world sense of how international law is applied,” he says. “In the program last year, several issues raised were issues preeminently discussed at the negotiations I was at in Geneva. I was able to see how theoretical concepts were being applied to create a treaty.”
Edens plans to apply for an LLM in international law and earn PhDs in the intersection of international law and international relations.
“I ultimately see myself being a practitioner and an academic. Whenever a state has a claim against it in the International Court of Justice (ICJ), that state will often seek experts in international law,” he explains. “Oxford, Cambridge, and Leiden Universities have consultants that can represent them before the ICJ. As an alternative, I could also work to prosecute war crimes and crimes against humanity.”
Law students often think they have to go into “big law” or litigation work, Edens says. He encourages students to look beyond that type of law.
“Look at the type of law being written at legislatures or being applied by countries internationally. There are a lot of principles that affect daily life. For example, tariffs are technically governed by the World Trade Organization, and that gets lost in domestic discourse,” he says. “It’s important to recognize that even though the world is large, we are increasingly interconnected and interdependent on one another. We are seeing how domestic and international law become intertwined with one another, and that affects all of us.”