The paradox of state identification: de facto states, recognition, and the (re-)production of the international

2019 ◽  
Vol 11 (3) ◽  
pp. 241-263 ◽  
Author(s):  
Janis Grzybowski
Keyword(s):  
International Relations ◽  
International Law ◽  
Social Order ◽  
The State ◽  
Political Order ◽  
Legal Norms ◽  
State Identification ◽  
The Individual ◽  
Political Decisions ◽  
Do So

AbstractThe literature on de facto states challenges the conventional identification of states by legal recognition, proposing to identify states based on their effectiveness instead. Yet, as I argue in this paper, rather than turning the tables on recognition, the de facto state challenge ultimately reveals all state identification in International Relations and international law to be essentially indeterminate. This lacuna, I suggest, is not an accidental omission, but an expression of the foundational paradox of modern political order that is rooted in the intertwined ontology of the state system and the individual states constituting it, with each presupposing the other. As a result, the opposition between empirical facts, political decisions, and legal norms invoked in attempts to identify states cannot but remain irresolvable. This should not be regarded as a problem to be overcome, however, but as a source of social order. Although states cannot be substantively identified, any effort to do so in practice naturalizes the state as the very form through which we articulate and shape political claims, conflicts, and settlements. In performatively enacting states precisely at the contested margins, state identification thus both invokes and (re-)produces the statist international as the central imaginary of modern political order.

Hobbes among the Classic Jurists

2018 ◽  
Author(s):  
David Boucher
Keyword(s):  
International Relations ◽  
International Law ◽  
The State ◽  
Law Of Nature ◽  
Law Of Nations ◽  
Complete Identification ◽  
The Law ◽  
The Individual ◽  
Hedley Bull ◽  
Hans Morgenthau

The classic foundational status that Hobbes has been afforded by contemporary international relations theorists is largely the work of Hans Morgenthau, Martin Wight, and Hedley Bull. They were not unaware that they were to some extent creating a convenient fiction, an emblematic realist, a shorthand for all of the features encapsulated in the term. The detachment of international law from the law of nature by nineteenth-century positivists opened Hobbes up, even among international jurists, to be portrayed as almost exclusively a mechanistic theorist of absolute state sovereignty. If we are to endow him with a foundational place at all it is not because he was an uncompromising realist equating might with right, on the analogy of the state of nature, but instead to his complete identification of natural law with the law of nations. It was simply a matter of subject that distinguished them, the individual and the state.

Grand Days, Dark Palaces

2013 ◽  
Author(s):  
Heather Rae ◽  
Christian Reus-Smit
Keyword(s):  
International Relations ◽  
Political Engagement ◽  
The State ◽  
Political Justice ◽  
Liberal Internationalism ◽  
The Past ◽  
The Future ◽  
The Individual ◽  
Do So

Exploring contradictions inherent in liberal orders, this chapter questions the treatment of liberalism in the International Relations academy as a relatively straightforward set of beliefs about the individual, the state, the market, and political justice. It asserts that the contradictions and tensions within liberal internationalism are in fact deep and troubling. Highlighting some of liberalism's obscured and sometimes denied contradictions — between liberal ‘statism’ and liberal ‘cosmopolitanism’; between liberal ‘proceduralism’ and liberal ‘consequentialism’; and between liberal ‘absolutism’ and liberal ‘toleration’ — the chapter explores their implications for liberal ordering practices internationally. It concludes that liberal political engagement necessitates a more reflective standpoint and more historical sensibility if we are to be aware of how contradictions have shaped liberal orders in the past and are likely to continue to do so in the future.

State Responsibility for COVID-19: Does International Contagion Constitute Transboundary Harm?

2021 ◽  
pp. 1-19
Author(s):  
Sophie CAPICCHIANO YOUNG
Keyword(s):  
International Law ◽  
Significant Risk ◽  
International Community ◽  
The State ◽  
Direct Result ◽  
State Responsibility ◽  
Current Article ◽  
International Responsibility ◽  
The Individual ◽  
Do So

Abstract As the damage caused by COVID-19 has increased exponentially, so too has the insistence that China bears some international responsibility for the unquantifiable damage sustained as a direct result of the state having failed to contain the virus, and to notify the international community of its existence. Some have suggested that the international contagion of the virus may be classified as transboundary harm. The current article analyses the law of transboundary harm, and proposes a set of criteria based on treaty and precedent that may be relied on to properly classify an event as such. It concludes that it is not only incorrect to classify international contagion as transboundary harm, but that to do so would pose a significant risk to the position and treatment of the individual in international law.

The International Legal Personality of the Individual

2018 ◽  
Author(s):  
Astrid Kjeldgaard-Pedersen
Keyword(s):  
International Law ◽  
Legal Rights ◽  
Legal Personality ◽  
Legal Norms ◽  
State Of Affairs ◽  
The Individual ◽  
International Legal Personality ◽  
The Relationship ◽  
Second World

This book scrutinizes the relationship between the concept of international legal personality as a theoretical construct and the position of the individual as a matter of positive international law. By testing four main theoretical conceptions of international legal personality against historical and existing international legal norms that govern individuals, the book argues that the common narrative about the development of the role of the individual in international law is flawed. Contrary to conventional wisdom, international law did not apply to States alone until the Second World War, only to transform during the second half of the twentieth century to include individuals as its subjects. Rather, the answer to the question of individual rights and obligations under international law is—and always was—solely contingent upon the interpretation of international legal norms. It follows, of course, that the entities governed by a particular norm tell us nothing about the legal system to which that norm belongs. Instead, the distinction between international and national legal norms turns exclusively on the nature of their respective sources. Against the background of these insights, the book shows how present-day international lawyers continue to allow an idea, which was never more than a scholarly invention of the nineteenth century, to influence the interpretation and application of contemporary international law. This state of affairs has significant real-world ramifications as international legal rights and obligations of individuals (and other non-State entities) are frequently applied more restrictively than interpretation without presumptions regarding ‘personality’ would merit.

Remarks by Sean D. Murphy

2020 ◽  
Vol 114 ◽  
pp. 193-199
Author(s):  
Sean D. Murphy ◽  
Claudio Grossman
Keyword(s):  
Human Rights ◽  
International Law ◽  
The State ◽  
Human Right ◽  
Human Rights Movement ◽  
Interstate System ◽  
International Human ◽  
The Individual

Our conversation might begin by looking backward a bit. The human rights movement from 1945 onward has been one of the signature accomplishments of the field of international law, one that refocused our attention from a largely interstate system to a system where the individual moved in from the periphery to the center. Human rights champions point to numerous landmark treaties, numerous institutions, and the rise of NGOs as a critical vehicle for developing and monitoring human rights rules. Yet others look at the international human right system and still see the state as overly central, tolerating and paying lip service to human rights, but too easily discarding them when they prove to be inconvenient. The persistence of racism comes to mind. As a general matter, how would you assess the strengths and weaknesses of the system that was built essentially during your lifetime?

DEFINITIONS OF CATEGORIES PURPOSE AND TASKS OF CRIMINAL PROCEEDINGS IN THE MODERN CRIMINAL PROCESS

2018 ◽  
Author(s):  
Svitlana Patiuк ◽  
Keyword(s):  
Criminal Procedure ◽  
The State ◽  
Modern Theory ◽  
Criminal Proceedings ◽  
Criminal Process ◽  
Legal Norms ◽  
State Changes ◽  
The Individual ◽  
Goals And Objectives ◽  
Functional Purpose

"Definitions of categories, the goal and objectives of criminal proceedings in modern criminal proceedings" analysed the legal norms and provisions of doctrinal concepts to determine the goals and objectives of criminal proceedings. The author formulated conclusions and generalizations that since criminal proceedings are a sphere of state activity, it depends on the direction of the political course of the state, changes in state policy, which always leads to a change in the ideology of the criminal process as a whole, including the transformation of goals and objectives criminal proceedings. The purpose and objectives of criminal proceedings depend on the historical form of the criminal process, a common feature of which is the ratio of freedom (interests) of the individual and the state, expressed in the procedural position of the main participants in the process. Criminal procedure legislation and doctrine define the resolution of a dispute (conflict) between the state and the accused arising as a result of the commission of a crime as the goal of the criminal process in most countries in which the adversarial nature of criminal proceedings prevails. As the goal of criminal proceedings in the modern theory of criminal procedure, it is proposed to consider the protection of the individual, society and the state from criminal offences in the settlement of criminal-legal conflicts arising as a result of these offences. The goal in the criminal process determines the setting of tasks and represents the ultimate conclusion from the sum of all the tasks being implemented. The task of criminal proceedings should be determined taking into account the functional purpose of the subjects of criminal proceedings, and therefore the task is the fulfilment of his duty by a participant in criminal proceedings, which is determined by his functional purpose, based on the principle of competition of the parties.

An issue of legal personality of Kyivan Rus’ in Ukraininan law science

2021 ◽  
Author(s):  
Marina Okladnaya ◽  
Vadym Ptytsia
Keyword(s):  
International Relations ◽  
International Law ◽  
General Position ◽  
The State ◽  
Main Body ◽  
Complex Issue ◽  
Legal Personality ◽  
History Of ◽  
History Of International Law ◽  
Problem Setting

Problem setting. Legal personality of Kyivan Rus’ is very complex issue, which contains elements such as contract law, law of war, ambassadorial law, general position of the state in the international relations sphere. The condition of Kyivan Rus’ in medieval history can be determined only after analyzing researches of well-known scientists, who had different opinions on this subject. In spite of the fact that a lot of researches were made on this topic, there is no clear and unambiguous answer to the question: “was Kyivan Rus’ independent and equal subject of international law?” In our opinion, this topic is actual even nowadays, because without an analysis of the issue it is impossible to form a modern understanding of Ukrainian statehood and its features in different periods. Analysis of recent researches and publications. Valuable contribution to the research of Kyivan Rus’ position in international relations sphere were made by lots of scientists in areas of Ukrainian history and history of international law such as O. Zadoroznyi, P. Tolochko, O. Butkevich, A. Dmitriev, Y. Dmitriev, M. Kotlyar, V. Pashuto, D. Feldman, V. Butkevich, I. Shekera, O. Pavlenko etc. Target of research is to analyze and compare opinions of different authors on the issue of determining Kyivan Rus’ as legal entity of international law. To achieve this target these tasks have to be solved: to research and analyze modern scientists’ studies about the position of Kyivan Rus’ in international law sphere in medieval period; to compare scientists’ views on legal personality of the state and come to a certain conclusion on this issue. Article’s main body. In this article author analyzes different periods of Kyivan Rus’ existence, general position of the state in international relations sphere and opinions of different scientists on this subject. Also, the article provides a comparison of scientists’ views on the topic of legal personality of international law of Kyivan Rus’. Conclusions. Kyivan state in different periods of its existence was in various international legal positions. Despite of the fact, that features of international law of Kyivan Rus’ is a topic for controversy, Ukrainian and foreign scientists came to the conclusion that Rus’ was full-fledged subject of international law and after its collapse it revived in the Principality of Galicia-Volhynia, Zaporozhian Sich and the Cossack Hetmanate, Ukrainian People’s Republic, UkSSR (as independent UN member) and modern independent Ukraine.

scholarly journals Customary International Rules in Contemporary International Law // Međunarodna običajna pravila u savremenom međunarodnom pravu

2019 ◽  
Vol 9 (9) ◽  
pp. 136
Author(s):  
Duško Glodić
Keyword(s):  
International Relations ◽  
International Law ◽  
Legal Framework ◽  
International Community ◽  
Point Of View ◽  
Customary International Law ◽  
Practical Point ◽  
Legal Norms ◽  
State Practice ◽  
The Creation

This article explores the role and importance accorded to customary international law in contemporary international law. First of all, the author has explored a number of issues related to this topic. Particluarly, the manner in which norms of customary international law are being established through the relevant State practice and the formation of opinio juris, as well as how the changes in contemporary international relations generated some chages in custromary international law were examined from both theretical and practical point of view. Than, the article elaborated, in a more concrete manner, different ways of impact of changes in international relations and subjects of international law to the formation of customary international rules. It has also paid attention to the evolution in international law and its reflection to the creation of international legal norms, including customary rules. The article concluded that, despite an ever increasing number of treaties, customary rules are still present in international law and are important for regulation of international relations, thus ensuring that dynamics and developments within the international community are followed by the development of legal framework.

scholarly journals Do attackers have a legal duty of care? Limits to the ‘individualization of war’

2019 ◽  
Vol 11 (1) ◽  
pp. 1-25 ◽  
Author(s):  
Janina Dill
Keyword(s):  
International Relations ◽  
The State ◽  
Point Of View ◽  
International Humanitarian Law ◽  
Duty Of Care ◽  
Humanitarian Law ◽  
Moral Value ◽  
Legal Situation ◽  
Legal Duty ◽  
The Individual

AbstractDoes International Humanitarian Law (IHL) impose a duty of care on the attacker? From a moral point of view, should it? This article argues that the legal situation is contestable, and the moral value of a legal duty of care in attack is ambivalent. This is because a duty of care is both a condition for and an obstacle to the ‘individualization of war’. The individualization of war denotes an observable multi-dimensional norm shift in international relations. Norms for the regulation of war that focus on the interests, rights, and duties of the individual have gained in importance compared to those that focus on the interests, rights, and duties of the state. As the individual, not the state, is the ultimate locus of moral value, this norm shift in international relations, and the corresponding developments in international law, are morally desirable. When it comes to IHL, the goal of protecting the interests of the individual creates strong reasons both for and against imposing a legal duty of care on the attacker. The enquiry into whether IHL does and should impose a legal duty of care therefore reveals that the extent to which war can be individualized is limited.

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