Please join SSPI-MA for its next exciting online discussion! 

As humanity inches toward deeper space exploration, the Moon, our closest planetary body, will become a kind of "Welcome Center" to space much like one you would see when traveling by car from state-to-state or country-to-country.  As the first stop to outer space, the Moon and the flight path to and beyond it will become increasingly more congested.  As deep space exploration grows, laws surrounding planetary property and flight paths will continue to evolve.  The policy and regulation for property rights and flight paths will become increasingly imperative to space operations and planning.  This panel seeks to understand the development of the laws on property and transportation in space.  What will become of space property rights (for planetary bodies) as space becomes more widely accessed (on a daily basis)?  How will transportation regulation evolve as those governing them broaden their scope (from air traffic control to space traffic control)?

Panelists Include:

Professor Dr. Frans G. von der Dunk

Professor Dr. Frans G. von der Dunk holds the Harvey and Susan Perlman Alumni / Othmer Chair of Space Law at the University of Nebraska-Lincoln’s LL.M. Programme on Space and Telecommunication Law since January 2008. He also is Director of Black Holes BV, Consultancy in space law and policy, based in Leiden.

Von der Dunk was awarded the Distinguished Service Award of the International Institute of Space Law (IISL) of the International Astronautical Federation (IAF) in Vancouver, in October 2004, the Social Science Award of the International Academy of Astronautics (IAA) in Valencia, in October 2006 and the Social Science Book Award of the International Academy of Astronautics (IAA) in Jerusalem, in October 2015. He was a signatory, together with various Nobel Prize winners, dozens of astronauts and cosmonauts and other luminaries from the global science and entertainment community, of the ‘Asteroid 100x Declaration’, December 2014.

Following his studies in Modern History and International Law he defended his dissertation on “Private Enterprise and Public Interest in the European ‘Spacescape’” in 1998, published the first comprehensive Handbook on Space Law, with a foreword by Apollo 9 astronaut Rusty Schweickart, in 2015, and Advanced Introduction to Space Law in 2020. As of 2006, he is the Series Editor of ‘Studies in Space Law’, published by Brill.

Von der Dunk has written more than 200 articles and published papers, many of which can be accessed at http://digitalcommons.unl.edu/spacelaw/, giving rise to hundreds of full-text downloads monthly. He has given more than 400 presentations at international meetings and was visiting professor at over 50 universities and other academic institutions across the world on subjects of international and national space law and policy, international air law and public international law. He has (co-)organised some 20 international symposia, workshops and other events, and has been (co-)editor of a number of publications and proceedings.

Von der Dunk has acted as legal advisor or legal task manager in more than 130 projects, advising various government agencies and international organizations as well as a number of non-governmental organizations and industrial stakeholders on matters of space law and policy, including major space applications such as satellite navigation, remote sensing and private commercial spaceflight.

Christopher D. Johnson

Christopher Johnson is the Space Law Advisor at the Secure World Foundation, and a Professor of Law (Adjunct) at the Georgetown University Law Center where he co-teaches the Space Law Seminar. He is also a Faculty Member at the International Space University and a Member of the International Institute of Space Law. Mr. Johnson has written widely on space law and policy issues, and represents the Secure World Foundation at the United Nations Committee on the Peaceful Uses of Outer Space (COPUOS). Mr. Johnson holds a Bachelor's of Art degree from Michigan State University, a Juris Doctor from New York Law School, and an Advanced Masters in Law in Air and Space Law from Leiden University’s International Institute of Air and Space Law (IIASL). He also has professional certificates from New York University’s School of Continuing and Professional Studies, the Oxford Institute of Legal Practice, the European Centre for Space Law, the Hague Academy of International Law, and the International Institute of Humanitarian Law (IIHL). Mr. Johnson is also a Core Expert and Rule Drafter in the MILAMOS project, an observer at the Hague International Space Resources Governance Working Group, a Field Editor at the Journal of Space Safety Engineering, on the Board of Editors of the journal Air and Space Law, on the Academic Review Board of the Cambridge International Law Journal, and currently serves on the US Board of Directors of the Space Generation Advisory Council (SGAC).