Robert C Beckman, Head of CIL’s Ocean Law and Policy Programme, has been made an Emeritus Professor of the National University of Singapore.

Robert played a transformative role in the lives of virtually all of Singapore’s international lawyers and the many international students with whom he has had contact. His pioneering work on the Jessup Moot led NUS Law to a record number of victories, but also raised the profile of international law more generally. In his own right, he has developed a global reputation as a scholar of Ocean Law. He is routinely called on by academics, governments, and media to write and to speak — among other things becoming one of the world’s experts on the South China Sea.

Robert joined NUS in 1977 and remains an active educator and scholar to this day. Along the way, he contributed greatly to the institution through important service roles. This included his time as Vice Dean from 2001 to 2006, when he helped bring in a radical overhaul of education to embrace skills training and experiential learning. He also served as the founding Director of the Centre for International Law from 2009 to 2016, where he built the new Centre and secured permanent funding from the Attorney-General’s Chambers to guarantee its future.