Formalizing Displacement
International Law and Population Transfers
Umut Özsu
Reviews and Awards
"The author is extremely effective in relating the legal and diplomatic side of this fascinating story ... It sheds a great deal of light on a murky corner of international legal history which deserves to be much better known. For this, we are greatly in the authors debt." - Stephen C. Neff, International Journal of Constitutional Law
"In Formalizing Displacement, Umut Özsu provides a new and engaging analysis of the role of international law in the interwar Greek-Turkish population exchanges. Against interpretations that present the exchange of minorities as a sui generis development, Özsu situates it within the longue durée of Ottoman disintegration and traces its roots to antecedent forced migrations in the Balkans and Asia Minor. Rich historical detail provides the context within which Özsu analyses the role of international law, legal institutions and lawyers in engineering the compulsory exchange ... Rich in detail and trenchant analysis, Formalizing Displacement is an important and welcome new work." - Tor Krever, London School of Economics and Assistant Editor of the London Review of International Law (OUP)
"The book is important for highlighting the intricate relationship between law and politics and reminding the reader that even the purest notions and ideals that form the basis of interstate legal relations cannot escape being entangled in the political realties of their time." - Resat Kasaba, University of Washington
"Özsu's book is based on exhaustive reading of secondary material on population exchange, and an extensive review of the legal documents that formed the basis of discussions and decisions in Lausanne. The book is important for highlighting the intricate relationship between law and politics and reminding the reader that even the purest notions and ideals that form the basis of interstate legal relations cannot escape being entangled in the political realties of their time. They are, after all, the products of those very political realities." - Resat Kasaba, Law and History Review
"This first book by Umut Özsu reads all the more readily because the subject is fascinating and because of the legal analysis, nourished by the diplomatic background that the author has restored very well. EL [T]he author succeeds in presenting the context and impact of population displacements in all their complexity." - Alain Zamaria, Journal of the History of International Law