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Memorial gathering for HLS Professor Detlev Vagts (1929–2013)

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A memorial gathering to celebrate the life and work of Professor Detlev Frederick Vagts ’51 will be held on Wednesday, November 13, at 3:30 p.m. in the Wasserstein Caspersen Clinical Building, 2019 Milstein West, Harvard Law School. A reception will follow. All are welcome.

Vagts, a renowned scholar of international law at Harvard Law School and one of the world’s foremost experts on transnational business problems and the laws affecting international commerce, died Aug. 20.

Vagts’ career at Harvard Law School spanned more than 50 years. He joined the HLS faculty as an assistant professor in 1959 and received tenure in 1962. He was named the Bemis Professor of International Law in 1984. During his tenure at Harvard, he ran the joint J.D./M.B.A. degree program from its inception in 1969 until 2005.

In a message to the HLS community earlier today, Dean Martha Minow said: “We will always remember Det’s contributions to the worlds of public international law, international (and transnational) business transactions, corporate law, comparative lawyering, and legal ethics; his leadership of the Law and Business joint degree program, and his kindness to colleagues and students over the past 50 years. We have lost a friend and colleague who made a real difference in the world.”

Read a full obituary on the HLS website and an appreciation of Vagts on the Human Rights Program blog.