J.D. with Honors in International Legal Affairs

You may apply for the program any time after the completion of your first year of law school and prior to your thirds year of law school, by completing a request for admission to the JD-ILA program. To apply, you need only complete the short form linked below. Provided you are able to satisfy the requirements, admission is automatic for students who have attained a grade point average of 2.7. The Committee will find it helpful, however, if you will also state your language qualifications (if any) and briefly mention any foreign travel, work, military, or study experiences you have had, and any courses of study you have taken that were “international” in nature. To apply, please complete the application form lined below. Please note you will need to provide a copy of your CV and transcript.

Students in the program must complete 89 credit hours (rather than the traditional 84 required of J.D. students).1 The 89 required credit hours must include:

• Two specifically designated “Group 1” courses.
• One specifically designated comparative law course that is general in scope and includes instruction in civil law systems. The course may have a regional focus. Students may satisfy this requirement by taking Comparative Law: Civil Legal Traditions or one of the other “Group 2” courses listed below.
• At least three additional international or comparative law electives totaling a minimum of 7 credit hours, from the list provided under “Group 3” below.

With the approval from the International Programs Office, a course in the Law School’s Semester Abroad Program may be taken as a substitute for one of the required Group 1 or Group 2 courses. The course must be at least two credits. In the case of a proposed substitute for Public International Law or Conflict of Laws, the course must be substantially similar to the course that would have been taken at Cornell. In the case of a Comparative Law course, it must meet the criteria for such courses set out above.

Please note that in deciding whether you can complete the program requirements, JD/ILA program students will be allowed to take a maximum of 18 credits per semester during the second and third years. No exceptions can be made to the 18-credit maximum.

Students interested in the J.D. with Specialization in International Legal Affairs will have the following courses to choose from during the 2022-23 academic year. The Director for International Programs, in consultation with the Chair of the International Committee and Associate Dean for Academic Affairs, will update the courses in Groups 2 and 3 annually, in advance of the fall pre-registration period. Students are encouraged to speak with the Director for International Programs, to discuss course selection before doing their pre-registration.

Review these courses in the Course Catalog.

Group 1

• 6192 Conflict of Laws
• 6561 International Human Rights
• 6791 Public International Law

Group 2 (one of the following courses is required)

• 6161 Comparative Law: Civil Law Traditions*
• 7440 Law and Social Change: Comparative Law in Africa

^*The Comparative Law requirement also may be satisfied by taking 6177 at the Cornell-Paris 1 Summer Institute, together with a supervised writing on a comparative law topic during the following Fall semester.

Group 3: Elective Courses

Semester	Course Number	Title	Credits	Professor
Fall	6193	The Practice of International Arbitration	3	Hay/Ziyaeva
Fall	6632	Transnational Corruption and the Law	3	Alonso
Fall	6344	International Labor Law	3	LeClercq
Fall	6451	Federal Indian Law	3	Porter
Spring	6465	Global M&A Practice	1	Kihira
Fall	6514	Foreign, Comparative, and International Legal Research	2	Shea
Fall	6584	International Trade Law – Short Course	1	Lee
Spring	6625	Law and Society in North Korea	1	Hong
Spring	6661	Constitutional Law of the European Union	3	Lasser
Spring	6681	International Law and Foreign Direct Investment	3	Ndulo
Fall	6745	Middle East Business Law and Practice	3	Elsaman
Fall	7018	Advanced Topics in Transnational Labor Law	3	Blackett
Fall	7267	Comparative Contract Law	1	Cerchia
Spring	7282	Gender and International Human Rights	3	Babcock/ Greenfield
Spring	7295	Global Labor and Employment Law	3	Sander
Fall	7311	Immigration and Refugee Law	2	Yale-Loehr
Spring	7321	International Criminal Law	3	Ndulo
Spring	7358	International Environmental Law	3	Chatrchyan
Fall	7360	International Financial Regulation	2	Emmenegger/ Zulauf
Fall	7440	Law and Social Change: Comparative Law in Africa	4	Ndulo/Hackett
Fall	7589	Seminar in National Security Issues & Policy	3	Pepper
Fall	7785	Law of Genocide and War Crimes Trials	3	Rosensaft
Spring	7801	Asylum and Convention Against Torture Appellate Clinic	4	McKee/Yale-Loehr
Fall/Spring	7805	Advanced Labor Law Clinic	3	Cornell
Fall/Spring	7814	Advanced Transnational Disputes Clinic	6	Kysel
Fall	7832	Externship – Full Time*	12	Azemi
Fall	7834	Externship – Part Time*	4	Azemi
Fall/Spring	7842	Immigration Law and Advocacy Clinic II	2	Kelley-Widmer
Fall/Spring	7843	Immigration Law and Advocacy Clinic III	4	Kelley-Widmer
Fall	7855	International Human Rights: Litigation and Advocacy Clinic I	4	Babcock
Fall/Spring	7857	Farmworker Legal Assistance Clinic I	4	Lyon
Fall/Spring	7858	Farmworker Legal Assistance Clinic II	2	Lyon
Fall/Spring	7859	Farmworker Legal Assistance Clinic III	2	Lyon
Spring	7860	International Human Rights: Litigation and Advocacy Clinic II	4	Babcock
Fall/Spring	7864	Farmworker Legal Assistance Clinic IV	2	Lyon
Fall	7871	Labor Law Clinic	4	Cornell
Fall/ Spring	7878	International Human Rights: Litigation and Advocacy Clinic III	4	Babcock
Fall	7914	Gender Justice Clinic I	4	Brundige/Lee
Fall/Spring	7915	Gender Justice Clinic II	4	Brundige/Lee
Fall/Spring	7916	Gender Justice Clinic III	4	Brundige/Lee
Fall/Spring	7917	Gender Justice Clinic IV	4	Brundige/Lee
Fall/Spring	7959	Transnational Disputes Clinic	6	Kysel

*If externship is outside the U.S. or with an international organization in the U.S. or a domestic organization in the U.S. practicing international law.

With the approval of the Assistant Dean for External Education, a student may satisfy an elective requirement by:

• taking a similar course in other divisions of the University;
• taking an approved course in the law school’s Semester Abroad Program;
• taking a course offered by the Paris Summer Institute;
• completing a supervised writing project in international or comparative Law (provided the student is able to make arrangements with a supervising professor for such a project);
• taking Professor Lasser’s Research Colloquium (provided the student is admitted to the class);
• receiving up to 2 credit hours toward the required 89 credits by serving as a teaching assistant for an international or comparative law class taught at Cornell Law School. The student must demonstrate that the teaching assistant position will involve substantial academic work related to international law” or
• making a substantial contribution to the Cornell International Law Journal. Work on the Journal can alternatively be applied to the program total hours requirement, as explained above, but these are alternative options – if a student elects to have Journal work counted towards his or her credits hours, he or she cannot use the work in substitution for an elective from Group 3. Similarly, if a student elects to use Journal participation as one of his or her Group 3 electives, he or she must complete an additional 89 credit hours. In either case, for Journal work to be used as credit hours or a Group 3 elective, the student must make a substantial contribution to the work of the Journal, under the following ground rules (worked out between Journal editors and the faculty of the International Committee). Generally, a student will be deemed to have done sufficient work if he or she does a fair share of prelims, cite checking, proof-reading and the like, and, in addition, (1) serves a year’s term as one of the principal officers of the Journal, or (2) completes the Journal’s writing requirements, or (3) performs the substantial equivalent of such work over the student’s second and third years in law school.

Please complete this form to start the process to receive a degree credit review, change your program, or withdraw from a program.

If you have any questions, please contact us at international.law@cornell.edu.