This Space Café Young Global Talents featured Prof Michelle Hanlon, Space Lawyer, Co-founder For All Moonkind, Co-Director Air and Space Law at UMiss, USA, in conversation with Markus Payer, Editor-in-Chief of SpaceWatch.Global and Frederik Wissner, representative of ELSA Frankfurt am Main, Germany. ELSA is the renowned European Law Students Association.
“Law in Space – What for?” – is the theme of our first session. Very basic. Very relevant for SpaceWatchers and those who want to become it.
“One small step for a man – one giant leap for mankind“. There is probably nobody on Earth who hasn’t heard those words of Neil Armstrong. But with the landing on the Moon and the planting of an American flag in its soil, Neil Amstrong kicked off a load of questions you didn’t even think about before.
- Who owns the Moon?
- Can the Moon be any nation’s property?
- Which country’s law is in force in space?
50 years later, these questions are still not answered. While some high-profile hightech-billionaires have started a real race to space and plan missions to “occupy” Moon and Mars, we are still struggling with the fundamentals. Is this the time to get some more regulation in place? Is space law the right tool to do it?
- We would like to discuss:
- What is space law and why do we need it?
- Who sets space law and what are space lawyers doing?
- How can students and young people get engaged in the field of space law and engage in our endeavours to become a beyond-Earth species?
Prof. Hanlon also answered relevant questions from the audience.
This Space Café Young Global Talents was held on 25 March 2021.
Here the video:
