scholarly journals Fatal attraction: a critique of Carl Schmitt's international political and legal theory

2011 ◽  
Vol 3 (2) ◽  
pp. 179-227 ◽  
Author(s):  
Benno Gerhard Teschke
Keyword(s):  
International Law ◽  
Legal Theory ◽  
Explanatory Power ◽  
Law And Order ◽  
Counter Narrative ◽  
International Theory ◽  
History Of ◽  
History Of International Law ◽  
Intellectual Product ◽  
International Thought

The ongoing Schmitt revival has extended Carl Schmitt's reach over the fields of international legal and political theory. Neo-Schmittians suggest that his international thought provides a new reading of the history of international law and order, which validates the explanatory power of his theoretical premises – the concept of the political, political decisionism, and concrete-order-thinking. Against this background, this article mounts a systematic reappraisal of Schmitt's international thought in a historical perspective. The argument is that his work requires re-contextualization as the intellectual product of an ultra-intense moment in Schmitt's friend/enemy distinction. It inscribed Hitler's ‘spatial revolution’ into a full-scale reinterpretation of Europe's geopolitical history, grounded in land appropriations, which legitimized Nazi Germany's wars of conquest. Consequently, Schmitt's elevation of the early modern nomos as the model for civilized warfare – the ‘golden age’ of international law – against which American legal universalism can be portrayed as degenerated, is conceptually and empirically flawed. Schmitt devised a politically motivated set of theoretical premises to provide a historical counter-narrative against liberal normativism, which generated defective history. The reconstruction of this history reveals the explanatory limits of his theoretical vocabulary – friend/enemy binary, sovereignty-as-exception, nomos/universalism – for past and present analytical purposes. Schmitt's defective analytics and problematic history compromise the standing of his work for purposes of international theory.

Epochenwandel im Völkerrecht?

2020 ◽  
Vol 6 (3) ◽  
pp. 263-274
Author(s):  
Stefan Kadelbach ◽  
Thomas Kleinlein
Keyword(s):  
International Law ◽  
Final Section ◽  
Legal Theory ◽  
Public International Law ◽  
Current Trends ◽  
Regulative Idea ◽  
Epochal Change ◽  
History Of ◽  
History Of International Law ◽  
Policy Fields

This article asks whether public international law is facing an epochal change. The first section spots various current trends in international law that suggest a decreasing significance of international law and institutions in today’s international relations. In order to assess whether these observations amount to an overall trend, the second section traces perceptions of instability and change in public international law scholarship of the past, presents a short history of international law since 1945 and discusses the problems of a periodization of the history of international law. The third section adopts a normative perspective to capture tendencies of change in the policy fields of security, economy and governance. The final section discusses responses to these developments in international legal theory, offers a brief practical political philosophy of contemporary international law, or recommendations for foreign policy. It suggests not to abandon the belief in the „co-operation thesis“ but to adhere to constructive multilateralism as a regulative idea.

Part II Approaches, Ch.25 Kant, Cosmopolitanism, and International Law

2016 ◽  
Author(s):  
Werner Wouter ◽  
Gordon Geoff
Keyword(s):  
International Law ◽  
Legal Theory ◽  
Categorical Imperative ◽  
History Of Ideas ◽  
Important Place ◽  
International Theory ◽  
History Of ◽  
Kantian Philosophy ◽  
The Way

This chapter explores the way in which Kantian ideas have been adopted and transformed in contemporary international law and international theory, with the twofold aim of introducing some core topics on Kantian philosophy, cosmopolitanism, and international law, as well as demonstrating the importance of acknowledging different forms of cosmopolitanism at work in international law, thereby shedding new light on the ‘forgotten’ tradition of innate cosmopolitanism. The work of Kant not only occupies an important place in the history of ideas in international legal theory; his work also constitutes an enduring source of inspiration for widely diverging contemporary approaches to international law. On that note, the chapter references four core Kantian ideas incorporated in contemporary cosmopolitan thinking: the categorical imperative, the roughly contractual notion of a federation of free republics, the conception of a cosmopolitan right of hospitality, and the idea of an innate cosmopolitanism.

The Renaissance of Roman Colonization

2020 ◽  
Keyword(s):  
International Law ◽  
Roman History ◽  
Italian Renaissance ◽  
Ancient Rome ◽  
Legal Interpretation ◽  
Colonial Discourse ◽  
Property Distribution ◽  
Carlo Sigonio ◽  
History Of ◽  
History Of International Law

The colonization policies of Ancient Rome followed a range of legal arrangements concerning property distribution and state formation, documented in fragmented textual and epigraphic sources. Once antiquarian scholars rediscovered and scrutinized these sources in the Renaissance, their analysis of the Roman colonial model formed the intellectual background for modern visions of empire. What does it mean to exercise power at and over distance? This book foregrounds the pioneering contribution to this debate of the great Italian Renaissance scholar Carlo Sigonio (1522/3–84). His comprehensive legal interpretation of Roman society and Roman colonization, which for more than two centuries remained the leading account of Roman history, has been of immense (but long disregarded) significance for the modern understanding of Roman colonial practices and of the legal organization and implications of empire. Bringing together experts on Roman history, the history of classical scholarship, and the history of international law, this book analyses the context, making, and impact of Sigonio’s reconstruction of the Roman colonial model. It shows how his legal interpretation of Roman colonization originated and how it informed the development of legal colonial discourse, from visions of imperial reform and colonial independence in the nascent United States of America, to Enlightenment accounts of property distribution, culminating in a specific juridical strand in twentieth-century Roman historiography. Through a detailed analysis of scholarly and political visions of Roman colonization from the Renaissance until today, this book shows the enduring relevance of legal interpretations of the Roman colonial model for modern experiences of empire.

scholarly journals Introduction

2017 ◽  
Vol 30 (4) ◽  
pp. 799-800
Author(s):  
MÓNICA GARCÍA-SALMONES ROVIRA ◽  
PAOLO AMOROSA
Keyword(s):  
International Law ◽  
Case Studies ◽  
Point Of View ◽  
Colonial Legacy ◽  
Normative Systems ◽  
Diverse Backgrounds ◽  
History Of ◽  
Colonial Governance ◽  
History Of International Law

The deep relation between the colonial past and contemporary international law has been convincingly established. Scholars from diverse backgrounds, employing a variety of approaches, have shown the multifaceted ways in which the colonial enterprise occasioned the birth of doctrines and practices that are still in common use. The conference that occasioned this symposium, the last of the project History of International Law: Between Religion and Empire, directed by Martti Koskenniemi, was held in Helsinki in October 2016 and approached the issue of the colonial legacy of international law from the point of view of specific histories. The ‘techniques of empire’ raised at the conference encompassed colonial governance in the broadest sense, looking at practices, norms and normative systems, doctrines and concepts, and events. The case studies making up the articles featured in the symposium treat subjects as diverse as the experiences of colonialism have been, assuming an array of forms. Even so, from the multiplicity of techniques certain patterns and themes emerge.

International Law

2021 ◽  
Author(s):  
Anders Henriksen
Keyword(s):  
International Law ◽  
Environmental Law ◽  
International Criminal Law ◽  
Legal Personality ◽  
State Immunity ◽  
Peaceful Settlement ◽  
International Economic Law ◽  
History Of ◽  
History Of International Law ◽  
Settlement Of Disputes

International Law provides comprehensive and concise coverage of the central issues in public international law. The text takes a critical perspective on various aspects of international law, introducing the controversies and areas of debate without assuming prior knowledge of the topics discussed. Supporting learning features, including central issues boxes, chapter summaries, recommended reading and discussion questions, highlight the essential points. Topics covered include the history of international law, legal sources, the law of treaties, legal personality, jurisdiction and state immunity. The text also looks at the international law of the sea, human rights law, international environmental law, international economic law, the peaceful settlement of disputes, the use of force, the laws of armed conflict and international criminal law.

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