Carl Schmitt and International Law

2015 ◽  
Author(s):  
Martti Koskenniemi
Keyword(s):  
International Law ◽  
Doctoral Dissertation ◽  
League Of Nations ◽  
Carl Schmitt ◽  
Legal Realism ◽  
Treaty Of Versailles ◽  
History Of ◽  
History Of International Law ◽  
Theory Of Law ◽  
Concept Of Law

Carl Schmitt always presented himself and was above all a jurist. His doctoral dissertation was based on an antiformal theory of law that was also in evidence in his acerbic critics of the League of Nations and the system of control over Germany established in the Treaty of Versailles. This chapter shows that the concrete-order thinking of his later years espoused a more conventional legal realism that has always constituted an important stream of international jurisprudence. Schmitt’s main postwar work, Nomos der Erde, puts forward an influential view of the history of international law as inextricably entangled with the imperial pretensions. This chapter argues that the much-cited book, together with Schmitt’s polemical concept of law and his critiques of the discriminatory concept of war, has proven a fruitful basis for much of today’s postcolonial jurisprudence.

A Short History of International Law

2018 ◽  
Author(s):  
Stephen C Neff
Keyword(s):  
International Law ◽  
Middle Ages ◽  
Natural Law ◽  
League Of Nations ◽  
Ancient World ◽  
Classical Period ◽  
Law Of Nations ◽  
History Of ◽  
The Law ◽  
History Of International Law

This chapter presents a brief history of international law. It proceeds chronologically, beginning with an overview of the ancient world, followed by a more detailed discussion of the great era of natural law in the European Middle Ages. The classical period (1600–1815) witnessed the emergence of a dualistic view of international law, with the law of nature and the law of nations co-existing (more or less amicably). In the nineteenth century—the least-known part of international law—doctrinaire positivism was the prevailing viewpoint, though not the exclusive one. For the inter-war years, developments both inside and outside the League of Nations are considered. The chapter concludes with some historically oriented comments on international law during the post-1945 period.

scholarly journals EL LEGADO DE LA SOCIEDAD DE NACIONES: THE LEAGUE OF NATIONS AND THE EMERGENCE OF INTERNATIONAL ADMINISTRATION: FINDING THE ORIGINS OF INTERNATIONAL INSTITUTIONAL LAW

2019 ◽  
Vol 2 (71) ◽  
pp. 285-293
Author(s):  
Richard Collins
Keyword(s):  
International Law ◽  
Institutional Design ◽  
League Of Nations ◽  
World War ◽  
Institutional Governance ◽  
The First World War ◽  
History Of ◽  
History Of International Law ◽  
Modern Era ◽  
First World

n contemporary reflections on the history of international law and international organization the creation of the League of Nations in the aftermath of the First World War stands as a critical dividing line between an older, pre-institutionalised era of sovereign coexistence and a modern era of cooperation, conflict resolution and institutional governance. Projecting forwards from this point, however, the legacy of the League in its somewhat short-lived existence is rather more mixed. In terms of what was clearly its primary purpose, to pacify inter-state diplomacy and put an end to the scourge of war, its overriding failure is well-known and does not need repeating here. However, in terms of the League’s contribution to the project of international organisation its contribution has been considerable and often overlooked. In fact, as Pitman Potter has claimed, the League has arguably made «a far greater contribution to the progress of international organisation than any other institution in history». Indeed, as Philippe Sands and Pierre Klein have equally commented, that it failed in its primary purpose —and, indeed, did so quite dramatically— cannot be blamed so much on its institutional design as a more profound failure of political will of those states that were tasked with making the institution work.

scholarly journals The Empire of International Law?

2019 ◽  
Vol 113 (1) ◽  
pp. 183-199
Author(s):  
Karen J. Alter
Keyword(s):  
International Law ◽  
League Of Nations ◽  
Law School ◽  
Public International Law ◽  
Self Defense ◽  
Sovereign Equality ◽  
History Of ◽  
Pan American ◽  
The Hague ◽  
History Of International Law

This review essay examines three intellectual histories focused on fundamental transformations of international law in the early twentieth century. Juan Pablo Scarfi's Hidden History of International Law in the Americas is most interested in debates about a Pan-American international law, meaning the idea that international law might work differently in different regions, which was debated but eventually gave way to the change that Arnulf Becker Lorca, a Lecturer in Public International Law at Georgetown Law, discusses. Becker Lorca's Mestizo International Law is most interested in how the conception that international law applied only to civilized nations transformed into the modern conception that presumes sovereign equality. The Internationalists, by Oona Hathaway and Scott Shapiro, respectively the Gerard C. and Bernice Latrobe Smith Professor of International Law and the Charles F. Southmayd Professor of Law and Professor of Philosophy at Yale Law School, and seeks to understand how the normal (and legal) recourse to force in international relations was replaced by an international law that bans the use of force, except in self-defense. Ideas regarding these issues started to evolve in the late 1800s, but the transformative debates occurred at roughly the same time because the Hague Peace Conferences and the League of Nations allowed contestations over old versus updated understandings of international law to flourish.

The Emergence of the International Law Societies

1957 ◽  
Vol 19 (3) ◽  
pp. 361-380 ◽  
Author(s):  
Irwin Abrams
Keyword(s):  
International Law ◽  
World Politics ◽  
League Of Nations ◽  
Peace Movement ◽  
Woodrow Wilson ◽  
Half Century ◽  
The World ◽  
History Of ◽  
History Of International Law ◽  
Significant Expression

The history of world politics of the half century before 1914 is full of nationalist wars, imperialist conflicts, and the diplomacy of the armed peace. To the less spectacular developments of internationalism so little attention is usually paid that the League of Nations almost seems to emerge full-grown from the head of Woodrow Wilson. It is true that the dominant trend in the relations between the sovereign states was anything but pacific, and the peoples were increasingly swayed by the emotion of aggressive nationalism. At the same time the world was becoming more interdependent economically and culturally, and there was a quiet but clearly perceptible growth of international-mindedness. A significant expression of this development was the movement of ideas in the eighteen-seventies which led to the establishment of two important law societies, the Institute of International Law and the International Law Association. The story of their origins is an interesting chapter in the history of international law and throws light as well upon its relationships with the organized peace movement.

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.

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