2024 WOLFGANG FRIEDMANN MEMORIAL

AWARD RECIPIENT:

Judge Sarah Cleveland

On April 2, 2024, the Columbia Journal of Transnational Law awarded the 50th Annual Wolfgang Friedmann Memorial Award to Judge Sarah Cleveland. Gillian Lester, Dean of the Faculty of Law and Lucy G. Moses Professor of Law, provided introductory remarks. Nicholas Kourides, Chairman of the Board of the Columbia Journal of Transnational Law, introduced the Wolfgang Friedmann Memorial Award. Dean Lester then introduced the award recipient.

Since 1975, the Columbia Journal of Transnational Law has presented the Wolfgang Friedmann Memorial Award to a distinguished scholar or practitioner who has made outstanding contributions to the field of transnational law.

As a recently elected Judge of the International Court of Justice and the Louis Henkin Professor of Constitutional and Human Rights at Columbia Law School, Judge Cleveland is an expert in the areas of human rights, national security, international law, and U.S. foreign relations. She is the co-director of Columbia’s Human Rights Institute, and leads the law school’s partnership with the Clooney Foundation for Justice TrialWatch initiative. 

Judge Cleveland is currently a member of the Secretary of State’s Advisory Committee on International Law and the Global Media Freedom Initiative’s High Panel of Legal Experts. Previously, Judge Cleveland served as vice chair and member of the U.N. Human Rights Committee (2015-2018), co-coordinating reporter of the American Law Institute’s Restatement (Fourth) of the Foreign Relations Law of the United States (2012-2018), and international law counselor to the legal advisor at the State Department (2009-2011).

Throughout Judge Cleveland's career, she has committed herself to supporting the rule of law and recognizing human rights around the world, and will continue to do so in her new role as Judge of the International Court of Justice. It is our great privilege to present Judge Sarah Cleveland with the 2024 Wolfgang Friedmann Memorial Award.