Christopher C. Joyner is Professor of Government and Foreign Service at Georgetown University, where he teaches courses on international law and organizations, U.S. foreign policy, and global environmental law. Also Director of Georgetown University’s Institute  for International Law and Politics, he is featured as an international legal educator in Who’s Who  in America, Who’s Who  in the World, Who’s Who in Science and Engineering, and Who’s Who in American Education. Professor Joyner received the Edmund A. Walsh medal for honored teaching faculty from Georgetown University's School of Foreign Service in 1997, 2001 and 2004. For 2004-2006 he served as national Vice President of the International Studies Association. 

Formerly Professor of Political Science and International Affairs at George Washington University (1981-1994), Dr. Joyner was a visiting professor in the Department of Government and Foreign Affairs at the University of Virginia, as well as Senior Editor of the Virginia Journal of International Law and Co‑Director of the Center for Peace and Environmental Studies at Florida State University. During 1986‑87, he was at the Woods Hole Oceanographic Institution as a Senior Research Fellow on ocean law issues with the Marine Policy Center. In 1989, 1991, 1993, 1995 and 1997 he taught at Dartmouth College as a Visiting Professor of Government and lectured on international law at the Johns Hopkins University School of Advanced International Studies. During 1993 and 2001 he participated in the University of Pittsburgh's Semester-at-Sea Program. In 1994 he was a Visiting Research Fellow with the Institute of Antarctic and Southern Ocean Studies at the University of Tasmania, Australia, and in 2001 was a Visiting Canterbury Fellow with the Faculty of Law and Gateway Antarctica at the University of Canterbury in Christchurch, New Zealand.   

Professor Joyner earned the Ph.D. degree in Foreign Affairs from the University of Virginia in 1977. He holds a B.A. degree in International Relations and two M.A. degrees (one in International Relations, the other in Government) from Florida State University.  

Professor Joyner twice served on the Executive Council of the American Society of International Law (1981-84 and 1997-2000) and was elected to its Executive Committee. He directed the ASIL's Project on the United Nations and the International Legal Order, sponsored by the Ford Foundation. He is co-editor of United Nations Legal Order (Cambridge University Press, 1995), the two-volume product of that research effort involving 20 scholars worldwide and the editor of its revision, The United Nations and International Law (Cambridge University Press, 1997).   

Professor Joyner is a well-known authority on international politics concerning Antarctica and ocean law, and is often an expert commentator for CNN, USIA, National Public Radio and USA Today on issues concerning common space resource regimes, the use of force, US foreign policy, the United Nations, the Middle East, human rights, and terrorism. He is a former Vice Chair of the Governing Council of the Academic Council on the United Nations (ACUNS) and served three times as Chair of the ISA’s International Law Section. Professor Joyner has served on the Board of Directors of the Antarctican Society, as Chair of the International Law Association's Committee on Antarctica, and as a member of the ILA's Committee on the Law of the Sea. He is a frequent consultant for the United Nations, the U.S. Department of State, the National Defense University, the Inter‑American Defense College, and numerous other public and private organizations.