The salon was held on May 27, 2020 at 7pm. The content of the salon focuses on the discovery and demonstration of problems in international law studies, which has always been the focus of international law teachers and students in their field of study and research. The keynote speaker is Prof. Song Yang from Hebei University. Prof. Song is a doctor of law, Associate Professor of School of political science and law of Hebei University, Executive Director and Deputy Secretary General of Hebei society of international law, the first level candidate of Kunyu young scholars of Hebei University. He presided over one national project and two provincial and ministerial projects, published two academic monographs, and published 18 papers in CSSCI source journals. Prof. Ma Guang presided over the lecture, and nearly 70 teachers and students watched the salon live.
At the beginning of the lecture, Prof. Song shared his methodological views on the study of international legal issues with the teachers and students from three aspects: the self-nature and utilitarian nature of international legal research, the localization and transplanting of international legal research, the theoretical aspects and countermeasures of international legal research. Prof. Song shared that for the self-nature and utilitarian nature of legal research, to grasp the balance between the two, for young scholars and students, they should have the "utilitarian" mentality of learning to conduct research. We can use western methods to study Chinese problems, but we should critically use western academic viewpoints to study domestic legal issues, and distinguish western academic theories to break Occidentalism.
In terms of the discovery of international law issues, Prof. Song shared his experience and found the topic with a sense of problem. A good topic has the characteristics of novelty, arguability, authenticity and reality. In the article, the writing context to distinguish between the primary and secondary, avoid everywhere as the focus. Through the cultivation of academic sense of smell and the specific path to find the problem to improve their ability to grasp the topic.
In the meanwhile, Prof. Song introduced his argumentation thinking in academic research from the aspect of the argumentation of international law. First of all, Prof. Song introduced the counterexamples of beginners writing articles, such as the typical way to demonstrate beginners: introduction of concepts and principles, listing of the so-called problems, "the foreign moon is round", cause analysis, unreliable countermeasures and suggestions. The standard argumentation method should have strict system construction and sufficient argumentation materials.
At the end of the lecture, the teachers and students also communicated with Prof. Song about their problems in the learning process. Through attending the lecture, the students had a reflection and new understanding of their learning methods.
