Lawfare Daily: ‘The Criminal State’ with Lawrence Douglas

Lawfare Daily: ‘The Criminal State’ with Lawrence Douglas

From The Lawfare Podcast: Patreon Edition by The Lawfare Institute

April 22, 2026 · 45 min

About this episode

Tyler McBrien interviews Lawrence Douglas about his book on international criminal justice and its evolution from Nuremberg to the present.

On today’s episode,  Lawfare  Managing Editor Tyler McBrien sits down with Lawrence Douglas, the James J. Grosfeld Professor of Law, Jurisprudence, and Social Thought at Amherst College to discuss  Douglas’s new book, “The Criminal State: War, Atrocity, and the Dream of International Justice.” They talk about how and why international criminal justice shifted from a focus at Nuremberg on the crime of aggression to an “atrocity paradigm,” as well as the “belatedness problem” and other limitations of atrocity trials. They even get into Douglas’s thoughts on casting decisions for Robert Jackson, Herman Göring, and characters in last year’s film “Nuremberg.”  Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

People in this episode

Host: Tyler McBrien

Guest: Lawrence Douglas

Topics covered

  • international criminal justice
  • atrocity trials
  • Nuremberg
  • war crimes
  • law and jurisprudence

Keywords

  • international justice
  • atrocity paradigm
  • criminal state
  • war
  • law
  • Nuremberg trials

Mentioned in this episode

Organizations: Amherst College

Books & works: The Criminal State: War, Atrocity, and the Dream of International Justice

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