· You shall receive some essay titles after the end of the course. You must select one title and develop it.
· At the beginning of the essay, write the exact title as provided. You must not change the title. You must declare your word count at the end of your essay.
· The total number of words is 3,000 (as maximum, with +/- 10% )
· The number of words is for the main text of the essay. Remember that footnotes and the final bibliography DO NOT COUNT for the total number of words.
· You can use headings and subheadings to make the essay better structured.
· For the main text use either Times New Roman 12 or Arial 12 character. Use 1.5 or double space.
· For footnotes, you can use the same font but smaller (11 or 10 points). Use single space. Footnotes must be number consecutively. NO USE OF REFERENCES IN THE MAIN TEXT because they do not count for the total number of words.
· For your citations of cases, treaties, statutes, journals, books, please follow one of the accepted style guides for law. If you already follow a specific style, please use it!If you do not know how to do it, use the following guides for academic style in law:
https://www.law.ox.ac.uk/sites/files/oxlaw/oscola_4th_edn_hart_2012quickreferenceguide.pdf
More detailed information can be found in the following document: https://www.law.ox.ac.uk/sites/files/oxlaw/oscola_4th_edn_hart_2012.pdf
If you cannot find a suitable example/guide in OSCOLA, you can check the style in one of the following academic publications:
European Journal of International Law http://www.ejil.org/
International & Comparative Law Quarterly https://www.cambridge.org/core/journals/international-and-comparative-law-quarterly
What is important is that you show “consistency” of the style that you use in the entire work.
· References and footnotes should be placed at the foot of the page upon which they are used, not at the end of the essay. Use footnotes that are numbered consecutively throughout the essay. They should not contain major discussion and information. Use footnotes to provide full and adequate references to materials that are cited or used in the main text.
· You should present a final bibliography of your references. The bibliography must contain all sources referred to, even if they are not directly referred to in the text. Use a standard format for bibliography. You can check how to organize it by looking at any academic legal publication (i.e. a book or some articles).
· LLM Essays are marked with content, structure, and argument in mind by the examiner responsible for the module. This is an LLM essay; therefore, a good amount of legal materials and discussion is required. Use primary sources (sources of international law, in particular IHL treaties, you may have to refer to international customary legal rules, refer to official documents and case law from national and international tribunals, etc.) to support your discussion and analysis. You have to develop your academic knowledge by conducting independent research. It is important to show analysis and application of materials to gain higher marks. You also can use other sources, like reports and news to provide examples, as far as you are sure about the source and control the origin of those documents.
· Double-check your final text before submission, including the use of English, typos, structure and grammar. Badly written essays get lower marks because they are not easy to understand and do not provide clearly explained ideas due to mistakes and confusion.