Craig Martin is a lawyer and legal scholar, and is currently a Professor at Washburn University School of Law, teaching public international law, the law of armed conflict, constitutional law, human rights, and climate change law, among other things. His primary areas of scholarly interest and academic writing are international law, with an emphasis on the use of force and international humanitarian law, and comparative constitutional law, with a focus on rights and war powers in Anglo-American and Japanese constitutional law. He also writes periodically on these topics in the popular media. He is the Co-Director of the International and Comparative Law Center at Washburn Law.
Craig returned to the academy after several years in legal practice, completing his doctorate (S.J.D.) at the University of Pennsylvania Law School in 2010. His research examined the constitutional incorporation of international law principles on the use of force, looking at the Japanese constitution as one example, and developed theoretical arguments for greater constitutional limits on the use of force more generally in constitutional democracies.
After growing up in St. Lucia, West Indies, Craig did his undergraduate work at the Collège Militaire Royal and the Royal Military College of Canada, graduating with a B.A. (Hons.) in history. He served four years as a Naval Officer in the Canadian Armed Forces, during which he spent time as a naval attaché in the Canadian Mission to the United Nations in New York City, where he worked on disarmament issues in the First Committee. Following his service he went to Japan on a Monbush? Scholarship, where he spent close to four years studying Japanese and public law, and conducting research on conflicts between Japan and the U.S. over Japan’s international legal interests in Manchuria in the 1920s. He graduated from Osaka University, Graduate School of Law and Politics, with an LL.M. Upon returning to Canada he studied at the University of Toronto, Faculty of Law, where he earned a J.D. He practiced civil litigation in Toronto, first at Stikeman Elliott LLP and then Lenczner Slaght Royce Smith Griffin LLP. He appeared before all levels of court and various administrative tribunals in Ontario, working on corporate-commercial and securities law, tort law, professional malpractice, administrative law, and constitutional law claims. During this time he also taught courses at Osgoode Hall Law School in Toronto, and at Osaka University Graduate School of Law and Politics.