‘On the Safe and Right Lines’: The Lloyd George Government and the Origins of the League of Nations, 1916–1918

1989 ◽  
Vol 32 (1) ◽  
pp. 131-155 ◽  
Author(s):  
Peter Yearwood
Keyword(s):  
Twentieth Century ◽  
International Law ◽  
International Society ◽  
League Of Nations ◽  
International Organization ◽  
Total War ◽  
Peace And Justice ◽  
Post War ◽  
Durable Peace

The success of wartime governments in the twentieth century is determined not just by their effectiveness in waging war, but also by their ability to plan for peace. Mobilizing the population for total war and winning the benevolent neutrality or active support of major uncommitted powers require the projection of a vision of a better, peaceful world which will be the necessary consequence of victory. The reordering of international society is therefore proclaimed as a war aim of each belligerent. By December 1916, when Lloyd George displaced Asquith, the desirability of establishing a league of nations was already a matter of serious popular and diplomatic discussion. The new administration almost immediately had to state its attitude on questions of post-war international organization. In launching his peace initiative President Wilson called for the establishment after the war of a ‘league of nations to insure peace and justice’. The joint reply of the Entente powers endorsed the setting up of such a body. In a separate commentary, which was given wide publicity in America, the foreign secretary, A. J. Balfour, explained that, as a condition of durable peace, ‘behind international law, and behind all treaty arrangements for preventing or limiting hostilities, some form of international sanction should be devised which would give pause to the hardiest aggressor’.

Picking Battles

2019 ◽  
pp. 216-232
Author(s):  
Rotem Giladi
Keyword(s):  
South Africa ◽  
Twentieth Century ◽  
Human Rights ◽  
International Law ◽  
Racial Discrimination ◽  
International Society ◽  
Minority Groups ◽  
League Of Nations ◽  
Genocide Convention ◽  
Mandate System

Race is one of the more ubiquitous, yet least explored, shifts in twentieth-century international law. From law that was founded in key areas and concepts on racial distinctions, international law quickly came to denounce various manifestations of race theories and racial discrimination. The establishment of the UN reflected a racialized understanding of the international society assumptions of the League of Nations mandate system. The 1948 Universal Declaration addressed entitlement to human rights without distinction of race, yet the Genocide Convention extended protection to racial (identity of) minority groups. In South Africa, race policies provided both the impetus and multiple occasions for formulating claims about a new, de-racialized international law from 1946 onwards. At these struggles against apartheid, binary political confrontations could take form as competing visions of international law, both old and new. This chapter charts the sites of contestation over apartheid and its effects on international law.

In International Pursuit of a Caliphate

2017 ◽  
Author(s):  
Mona Hassan
Keyword(s):  
Twentieth Century ◽  
New Age ◽  
League Of Nations ◽  
Religious Community ◽  
Nation State ◽  
Muslim Community ◽  
Early Twentieth Century ◽  
New Models ◽  
Muslim Intellectuals ◽  
Post War

This chapter analyzes the vibrant discussions of the early twentieth century over how to revive a caliphate best suited to the post-war era. While some advocated preservation of a traditional caliphal figurehead, many Muslim intellectuals were greatly persuaded by new models of internationalism embracing the nation-state and proposed international caliphal councils and organizations, similar to the League of Nations, or other purportedly spiritual institutions, similar to the refashioned papacy, to preserve the bonds of a transregional religious community. To varying degrees, all the participants in the debate over reviving a twentieth-century caliphate were influenced by an intriguing confluence of both the historic transregionalism of the Muslim community as well as the modern thrust of the new age of global internationalism.

The League of Nations between Scientific Knowledge and Political Dependence

2020 ◽  
Vol 29 (2) ◽  
pp. 188-202
Author(s):  
Dimitar Tyulekov ◽  
Ilko Drenkov ◽  
Jani Nikolla
Keyword(s):  
United Nations ◽  
International Law ◽  
Scientific Knowledge ◽  
League Of Nations ◽  
Peace Building ◽  
The Balkans ◽  
Political Outcomes ◽  
Border Dispute ◽  
The United Nations ◽  
Post War

The League of Nations sets strict professional frameworks that are subordinate to scientific knowledge and international law and respect, without any differences between small and big powers. The first chairman, Eric Drummond, who headed up to 1934, established a huge international prestige of the organization and achieved a number of successes in peace building. The League’s policy in the Balkans is revealed mainly through its relations with Albania and Bulgaria, which both joined the League in December 1920. The two countries rely on the international organization for the peaceful resolution of their political, minority and social problems. Under the supervision of the League of Nations, a number of agreements for voluntary and mutual exchange of people between Greece and Bulgaria are being concluded, which aims to soothe the Macedonian problem in Aegean Macedonia. Under her patronage are the agreements between Greece and Albania regulating the protection of Greek minorities and schools, as well as settling the border dispute between the Serb-Croat-Slovene Kingdom and Albania in 1921. The rapid intervention of the United Nations suspended the Greek aggression on Bulgarian territory in the autumn of 1925 and prevented a possible new war. Dimitar Shalev's petitions from Skopje to the United Nations aim to achieve the Yugoslav state's humane treatment towards Bulgarian minorities within its borders, but political dependencies and overlapping contradictions are an obstacle to peaceful and sustainable political outcomes. In the second half of the 1930s, the League lost its initial prestige, and in the course of the emerging new global conflict it fell into political dependence, marking its collapse. Unresolved issues and contradictions, along with the harsh political post-war realities, quickly bury the League’s noble impetus.

Soviet Concepts of the State, International Law and Sovereignty

1949 ◽  
Vol 43 (1) ◽  
pp. 21-36 ◽  
Author(s):  
Mintauts Chakste
Keyword(s):  
International Law ◽  
League Of Nations ◽  
The State ◽  
Main Task ◽  
Normal Functioning ◽  
Broad Agreement ◽  
Considerable Success ◽  
Post War ◽  
Mutual Relations ◽  
Essential Prerequisite

The failure of the United Nations Organization to promote cooperation among its members in solving urgent international problems is a disappointing feature of the post-war world and compares unfavorably with the opening stages of the League of Nations activities, which were marked by a will to cooperation among the members and considerable success in resolving outstanding international problems. The reasons for this failure may be manifold, but it would seem that among them there is also a want of agreement on some basic concepts which are essential for the normal functioning of the Organization. As the main task of the Organization is the development of cooperation among nations according to the proclaimed principles for the achievement of the avowed aims, it appears to be indispensable that among the nations there exist a broad agreement on concepts which are not only essential for the understanding and observance of the purposes and principles of the Organization, but also of importance in determining mutual relations among the member states themselves. These would be the concepts of the state, law and sovereignty, which form the basis of every international order. It must, however, be admitted that there exists no agreement on these concepts among the members of the Organization, ft is just there that the rift between East and West manifests itself in a conspicuous way, and deprives the Organization of an essential prerequisite for successful functioning.

Harold Laski (1893–1950): political theorist of a world in crisis

1999 ◽  
Vol 25 (2) ◽  
pp. 329-342 ◽  
Author(s):  
PETER LAMB
Keyword(s):  
Twentieth Century ◽  
International Politics ◽  
League Of Nations ◽  
Turbulent Environment ◽  
Political Theorist ◽  
Democratic System ◽  
Post War

Harold Laski was a writer who exercised enormous influence in the turbulent environment of the early to mid-twentieth century. Though normally regarded as a political theorist, Laski frequently wrote on the problems of international politics. Certainly, his work was fully engaged with world issues in the inter-war and post-war periods. Like many critical and idealist thinkers of the time, he initially hoped that the League of Nations would usher in a new, international democratic system. However his early hopes gave way to a more pessimistic (and more radical) perspective, and from the late 1920s onwards he believed that the only way of transcending the existing system of sovereign states was by moving beyond capitalism. Combining a critique of both the Westphalian system and the market which he assumed underpinned it, Laski raised major questions – relevant to his own times and to ours too. Mainly ignored since his death, it is perhaps time that the work of this unduly neglected figure should be revisited.

Aviation and International Law

1930 ◽  
Vol 24 (2) ◽  
pp. 228-240 ◽  
Author(s):  
Manley O. Hudson
Keyword(s):  
Nineteenth Century ◽  
International Law ◽  
International Society ◽  
Human Action ◽  
International Organization ◽  
Human History ◽  
Daily Lives ◽  
National Organization ◽  
The World ◽  
Made In

The first thirty years of the nineteenth century saw the beginnings of a great revolution in transportation and communication. Improvements were introduced which in time greatly changed the daily lives of people throughout the world, and made it possible for their efforts to reach out as never before in human history. The change was nowhere more significant than in its effect on international society. A century ago, the railroad, the steamship and the telegraph so extended the range of human action that national organization ceased to correspond with the activities of many peoples, and the state system upon which the nineteenth century dawned was greatly modified by the progress made in international organization before the century had passed. Certainly no period up to that time had produced such changes as those which began in the decades between 1800 and 1830.

scholarly journals Introductory Remarks by Hélène Tigroudja

2018 ◽  
Vol 112 ◽  
pp. 27-28
Author(s):  
Hélène Tigroudja
Keyword(s):  
International Law ◽  
International Society ◽  
The State ◽  
International Organization ◽  
Good Morning ◽  
Private Actors

Good morning, everybody, and welcome to this extraordinary panel on the operationalization of international law, beyond the state, so it is a very ambitious title and it is a very ambitious question, and we are trying to discuss a bit more about the private actors and the role and the place of the private actors in international society, but not only private actors as such but private actors in their relationship with other classical subjects of international law of states across an international organization.

The Doctrine of the Equality of States and its Recent Modifications

1951 ◽  
Vol 45 (3) ◽  
pp. 417-442 ◽  
Author(s):  
Herbert Weinschel
Keyword(s):  
Nineteenth Century ◽  
International Law ◽  
International Organizations ◽  
League Of Nations ◽  
Great Powers ◽  
International Organization ◽  
Dominant Position ◽  
Legal Principles ◽  
Legal Sanction ◽  
Political Scene

The doctrine of the equality of states has undergone gradual modifications, especially in more recent times—since the establishment of the League of Nations. The great Powers have probably at all times dominated the political scene, particularly during the nineteenth century. But since there existed no international organization, this predominance did not express itself in legal, but only in political terms, although it may at times have assumed a quasilegal status, such as in regard to the lawmaking provisions of various treaties of the nineteenth century, sponsored mainly by the great Powers, which acquired the character of general international law. It was only when international organizations were established, based on legal principles, that the dominant position of the great Powers received legal sanction.

scholarly journals Autonomy or Sovereignty: the Case of the European Union

2020 ◽  
Vol 20 (2) ◽  
pp. 73-92
Author(s):  
Danuta Kabat-Rudnicka
Keyword(s):  
European Union ◽  
International Relations ◽  
International Law ◽  
International Society ◽  
International Organizations ◽  
International Organization ◽  
Modern World ◽  
The European Union ◽  
Jean Bodin ◽  
New Type

Summary Sovereignty is a key concept in international law and international relations. First defined and discussed by Jean Bodin, sovereignty is considered to be an inherent attribute of any state. However, the changes that international society has undergone since the Treaty of Westphalia, including the emergence of different state and non-state actors vying for power and authority, have called into question the position of the state as the main actor in the modern world. This in turn has given rise to the following questions: how should the very concept of sovereignty be understood today? Given the growing importance of international organizations and regional integrational arrangements can the concept of sovereignty be extended to cover entities other than states; and in case of the European Union, what makes us think in terms of sovereignty rather than autonomy? This analysis is an attempt to apply the concept of sovereignty to contemporary international organizations. The main thesis is as follows: in the case of international organizations, especially a new type of organization, it is also legitimate to consider a narrative in terms of sovereignty, not just autonomy. The example studied here is the European Union as an international organization-cum-regional integrational arrangement.

Sovereignty beyond the West: The End of Classical International Law

2011 ◽  
Vol 13 (1) ◽  
pp. 7-73 ◽  
Author(s):  
Arnulf Becker Lorca
Keyword(s):  
Nineteenth Century ◽  
Twentieth Century ◽  
International Law ◽  
International Community ◽  
Turn Of The Century ◽  
Legal Order ◽  
The West ◽  
Historical Processes ◽  
Post War

AbstractThe historical processes through which international law became, conceptually, a universal legal order and, geographically, an order with a global scope of validity, are long and complex. These transformations, which began to appear during the second half of the nineteenth century, did not end until post-War-World-II decolonization. This article examines one particular aspect of these transformations: once non-Western states were admitted and begun to participate in the international community, did the rules of international law governing the interaction between Western and non-Western States change? What did it mean for semi-peripheral states to acquire sovereignty? The article argues that during the first decades of the twentieth century, semi-peripheral lawyers realized that sovereignty, so longed-for during the nineteenth century, conferred, under classical international law, much less autonomy and equality than they had anticipated. Moreover, at the turn of the century, the specific challenges faced by semi-peripheral states in their interaction with Western powers shifted, so that classical international law exhausted its power and stopped being useful. The article thus offers, from the perspective of the semi-periphery, an explanation of the shift from classical to modern international law.

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