Hula, Erich, 1900-

According to Arnold Brecht, a contemporary of Hula at the New School for Social Research, Erich Hula was "one of the most influential colleagues in the administrative and scholarly development of the Graduate Faculty of the New School for Social Research, which he joined in 1938 after his arrival as a fugitive from Nazi-occupied Austria." With the exception of a semester at Cornell University (Spring 1953) and a year at the Washington Center of Foreign Policy Research of The Johns Hopkins University (1957/1958), Hula spent his entire teaching career, from 1938 until 1967, at the New School, where he also served continuously from 1942 until retirement on the editorial board of Social Research as well as a two-year term as Dean of the Graduate Faculty from 1948-1950. Hula was born in Vienna, Austria on May 27, 1900, where he also received his formal education in jurisprudence and political science. After completion of his studies, Hula was taken under the wing of Hans Kelsen and became his assistant (1931-1933) at the Institute of International Law in Cologne, Germany. Hula's admiration for Kelsen and his work can be seen in the large volume of Kelsen materials collected in the Hula Papers, which include correspondence, notes and published materials. Hula wrote numerous essays on a variety of subjects: international law and international institutions, in particular the League of Nations and its successor the United Nations, national self-determination, punitive war and war crimes, as well as essays on the problems of individual countries, including Austria, Germany, Great Britain and many on the Soviet Union.