Anthea Roberts serves as a Reporter for the Restatement (Fourth) of the Foreign Relations Law of the United States. This project updates the highly influential Restatement (Third) of the Foreign Relations Law of the United States that was published by the American Law Institute in 1987. The Restatement covers both international law as it applies to and in the United States and domestic law that has substantial foreign relations or international law consequences. Anthea is the first foreign academic to ever be appointed as a Reporter for a US Restatement project.

The US Restatements of Law are extremely influential both within the United States and around the world. The Restatements aim to codify state-of-the-art legal rules that apply in particular subject areas, while also providing comments on these rules and notes on the sources and commentaries underlying these rules. The Restatement (Third) of the Foreign Relations Law of the United States has been cited in hundreds of US and international law cases, as well as countless books and articles. It has been extremely influential in a range of areas, from the formation and content of customary international law to the scope of extraterritorial jurisdiction.

Restatements are written by experts in the field and are subject to a rigorous consultation process with academics and practitioners. The advisory group that reviews and comments upon drafts of the Restatement (Fourth) includes current and former ICJ judges, legal advisors to the US Department of State and Members of the International Law Commission.

The initial topics that the Restatement (Fourth) is covering are Jurisdiction, the Domestic Effect of Treaties, and Sovereign Immunity. It is anticipated that this scope will be enlarged after these initial topics are completed. Along with Paul Stephan (Virginia Law School) and Bill Dodge (UC Davis Law School), Anthea works on updating the rules and commentary on Jurisdiction. The other topics are led by Sarah Cleveland (Columbia Law School), Curtis Bradley (Duke Law School) and Ed Swaine (GW Law School) on Treaties and Ingrid Wuerth (Vanderbilt Law School) and David Stewart (Georgetown Law Center) on Sovereign Immunity. A full list of the domestic and international advisors on this project is available on the American Law Institute webpage.

A full description of the Restatement project as a whole, including drafts of the above three components, is available on the American Law Institute webpage.