Simon 
CHESTERMAN

 
Vice Provost (Educational Innovation)

David Marshall Professor

Senior Director of AI Governance, AI Singapore

Editor, Asian Journal of International Law

Academic Fellow

Simon Chesterman is David Marshall Professor and Vice Provost (Educational Innovation) at the National University of Singapore, where he is also the founding Dean of NUS College. He serves as Senior Director of AI Governance at AI Singapore and Editor of the Asian Journal of International Law. Previously, he was Dean of NUS Law from 2012 to 2022 and Co-President of the Law Schools Global League from 2021 to 2023.

FULL BIOGRAPHY

Contact

(65) 6516-7342
ETS-02-32

Education

DPhil (University of Oxford); LLB (Hons), BA (Hons) (University of Melbourne)

Curriculum Vitae

Simon Chesterman is David Marshall Professor and Vice Provost (Educational Innovation) at the National University of Singapore, where he is also the founding Dean of NUS College. He serves as Senior Director of AI Governance at AI Singapore and Editor of the Asian Journal of International Law. Previously, he was Dean of NUS Law from 2012 to 2022 and Co-President of the Law Schools Global League from 2021 to 2023.

Educated in Melbourne, Beijing, Amsterdam, and Oxford, Professor Chesterman’s teaching experience includes periods at the Universities of Melbourne, Oxford, Southampton, Columbia, and Sciences Po. From 2006-2011, he was Global Professor and Director of the New York University School of Law Singapore Programme. Prior to joining NYU, he was a Senior Associate at the International Peace Academy and Director of UN Relations at the International Crisis Group in New York. He has also worked for the UN Office for the Coordination of Humanitarian Affairs in Yugoslavia and interned at the International Criminal Tribunal for Rwanda.

Professor Chesterman is the author or editor of more than twenty books, including We, the Robots? Regulating Artificial Intelligence and the Limits of the Law (CUP, 2021); One Nation Under Surveillance (OUP, 2011); You, the People (OUP, 2004); and Just War or Just Peace? (OUP, 2001). He is a recognized authority on international law, whose work has opened up new areas of research on conceptions of public authority — including the rules and institutions of global governance, state-building and post-conflict reconstruction, the changing role of intelligence agencies, and the emerging role of artificial intelligence and big data. He also writes on legal education and higher education more generally, and is the author of five novels including the Raising Arcadia trilogy and Artifice.

Books
Simon Chesterman, Artifice: A Novel (Marshall Cavendish 2023)

Simon Chesterman, We, The Robots? Regulating Artificial Intelligence and the Limits of the Law (Cambridge University Press 2021)

Edited Books
Simon Chesterman, Goh Yihan and Andrew Phang Boon Leong (eds), Law and Technology in Singapore (Academy Publishing 2021)

Book Chapters
Simon Chesterman, 'Data Protection Law' in Simon Chesterman, Goh Yihan and Andrew Phang Boon Leong (eds), Law and Technology in Singapore (Academy Publishing 2021) 541

Simon Chesterman, Goh Yihan and Andrew Phang, 'Introduction' in Simon Chesterman, Goh Yihan and Andrew Phang Boon Leong (eds), Law and Technology in Singapore (Academy Publishing 2021) 1

Simon Chesterman, Leslie Chew, Goh Yihan and Eleanor Wong, 'Legal Education' in Simon Chesterman, Goh Yihan and Andrew Phang Boon Leong (eds), Law and Technology in Singapore (Academy Publishing 2021) 219

Simon Chesterman, 'Responsibility to Protect and Humanitarian Intervention: From Apology to Utopia and Back Again' in Robin Geiß and Nils Melzer (eds), The Oxford Handbook of the International Law of Global Security (Oxford University Press 2021) 808

Simon Chesterman, 'Terrorism, Surveillance, and Privacy' in Ben Saul (ed), Research Handbook on International Law and Terrorism (Edward Elgar Publishing 2020) 411

Journal Articles

Simon Chesterman, 'Weapons of Mass Disruption: Artificial Intelligence and International Law' (2021) 10 (2) Cambridge International Law Journal 181

Simon Chesterman, 'Herding Schrödinger’s Cats: The Limits of the Social Science Approach to International Law' (2021) 22 (1) Chicago Journal of International Law 49

Simon Chesterman, 'Through a Glass, Darkly: Artificial Intelligence and the Problem of Opacity' (2021) 69 (2) The American Journal of Comparative Law 271

Simon Chesterman, '"Move Fast and Break Things": Law, Technology, and the Problem of Speed' (2021) 33 Singapore Academy of Law Journal 5

Simon Chesterman, 'Artificial Intelligence And The Limits Of Legal Personality' (2020) 69 (4) International & Comparative Law Quarterly 819

Simon Chesterman, 'Artificial Intelligence and the Problem of Autonomy' (2020) 1 (2) Notre Dame Journal on Emerging Technologies 210

Simon Chesterman, ‘Asia’s Ambivalence about International Law and Institutions: Past, Present and Futures‘ (2016) 27(4) European Journal of International Law 945


  • International law, international organizations, and global governance
  • Intervention, state-building, and post-conflict reconstruction
  • National security law, regulation and oversight of intelligence services
  • Artificial intelligence law and policy, data protection and privacy
  • Education