The New International Courts

2014 ◽  
Author(s):  
Karen J. Alter
Keyword(s):  
International Relations ◽  
International Law ◽  
Rule Of Law ◽  
Significant Variation ◽  
Legal Institutions ◽  
State Control ◽  
Legal Practice ◽  
International Courts ◽  
Regional Trends

This chapter identifies a significant variation in which states have consented to compulsory international judicial oversight. The reach of international courts (ICs) and international law varies, but where there is international law that litigants can invoke in court, the circle of actors involved in defining what international law means, and what it means for governments to be rule of law actors, expands. This expansion brings with it a shift in international relations, away from state control in both the domestic and international realms. The chapter sketches the international judicial landscape today by presenting a bird's-eye overview of the contemporary international judiciary, revealing temporal, substantive, and regional trends in delegating authority to ICs. But the perspective is largely static, a snapshot in time that obscures how legal practice, international law, and international legal institutions evolve.

Tipping the Balance: International Courts and the Construction of International and Domestic Politics

2011 ◽  
Vol 13 ◽  
pp. 1-21
Author(s):  
Karen J Alter
Keyword(s):  
International Relations ◽  
International Law ◽  
Domestic Politics ◽  
Tipping Point ◽  
Legal Institutions ◽  
International Courts ◽  
State Compliance ◽  
Point Argument

Abstract The proponents of international courts (ICs) expect that creating formal legal institutions will help to increase respect for international law. International relations scholars question such claims, since ICs have no tools to compel state compliance. Such views are premised on the notion that states have unique preferences that ICs must satisfy in order to be effective. The tipping point argument is premised on the notion that within each state are actors with numerous conflicting preferences. ICs can act as tipping point actors, building and giving resources to compliance constituencies—coalitions of actors within and outside of states—that favour policies that happen to also be congruent with international law.

Tipping the Balance: International Courts and the Construction of International and Domestic Politics

2011 ◽  
Vol 13 ◽  
pp. 1-21 ◽  
Author(s):  
Karen J Alter
Keyword(s):  
International Relations ◽  
International Law ◽  
Domestic Politics ◽  
Tipping Point ◽  
Legal Institutions ◽  
International Courts ◽  
State Compliance ◽  
Point Argument

AbstractThe proponents of international courts (ICs) expect that creating formal legal institutions will help to increase respect for international law. International relations scholars question such claims, since ICs have no tools to compel state compliance. Such views are premised on the notion that states have unique preferences that ICs must satisfy in order to be effective. The tipping point argument is premised on the notion that within each state are actors with numerous conflicting preferences. ICs can act as tipping point actors, building and giving resources to compliance constituencies—coalitions of actors within and outside of states—that favour policies that happen to also be congruent with international law.

International ethics and international law

1992 ◽  
Vol 18 (1) ◽  
pp. 19-30 ◽  
Author(s):  
Terry Nardin
Keyword(s):  
International Relations ◽  
International Law ◽  
Rule Of Law ◽  
International Affairs ◽  
International Ethics ◽  
The Rule Of Law ◽  
Ethical Significance

In this paper I am going to argue a familiar but still controversial thesis about the relation between international ethics and international law, which I would sum up in the following list of propositions:First, international law is a source as well as an object of ethical judgements. The idea of legality or the rule of law is an ethical one, and international law has ethical significance because it gives institutional expression to the rule of law in international relations.Secondly, international law—or, more precisely, the idea of the rule of law in international relations—reflects a rule-oriented rather than outcome-oriented ethic of international affairs. By insisting on the priority of rules over outcomes, this ethic rejects consequentialism in all its forms.

scholarly journals International Courts and Tribunals – the New Environmental Sentinels in International Law

2020 ◽  
Vol 50 (1-2) ◽  
pp. 17-33
Author(s):  
Bharat H. Desai ◽  
Balraj K. Sidhu
Keyword(s):  
Human Rights ◽  
International Relations ◽  
International Law ◽  
Law Of The Sea ◽  
Human Rights Law ◽  
International Courts ◽  
Peaceful Settlement ◽  
The Common ◽  
Common Future

This study examines the role of international courts and tribunals (ICTs) as important agents for the peaceful settlement of international disputes through the instrumentality of law. The rapid upswing in the number of specialised international courts and tribunals (in areas such as trade, human rights, law of the sea, criminal justice and environment) can be perceived as an attempt by sovereign States to maintain the viability of ICTs in light of perplexity in international relations, growing recognition of peaceful co-existence, quest for institutionalised cooperation and emergence of some of the “common concerns of humankind”, as well as the “duty to cooperate”. The article has sought to make sense of the emergence of ICTs as the “New Environmental Sentinels” and what it portends for our common future. Do we need a specialised international environmental court?

Afghanistan

2019 ◽  
pp. 674-700
Author(s):  
Veronica L. Taylor
Keyword(s):  
Twentieth Century ◽  
United Nations ◽  
International Law ◽  
Rule Of Law ◽  
Legal History ◽  
Legal Institutions ◽  
Legal Norms ◽  
Post Conflict ◽  
International Rule ◽  
Conflict Period

This chapter addresses international law in Afghanistan. States where the ‘post-conflict’ period is, in fact, a series of continuing sub-national conflicts, are often coded as ‘failed’ or ‘fragile’ and are also criticized as failing in their embrace of international law. In the case of Afghanistan, such ‘discourses of deficiency’ also erase some important legal history. For most of its history, Afghanistan has been contingent as a Westphalian state. This means that it has also had a fluid relationship with the institutions and norms of international law, including the normative discourse and practice of the international rule of law. Although Afghanistan has been a member of the United Nations since 1946, and thus a contributor to international law in the twentieth century, it is seen more as a subject of international law. After considering these issues, the chapter then highlights the complexity of Afghan’s location within, as well as its relationship with, international law, international legal institutions, and international legal norms.

scholarly journals 2000–2020: twenty years later, where are we in terms of the unity of international law?

2020 ◽  
Vol 9 (1) ◽  
pp. 6-23
Author(s):  
Pierre-Marie Dupuy
Keyword(s):  
International Relations ◽  
United Nations ◽  
International Law ◽  
Rule Of Law ◽  
Legal Order ◽  
Public International Law ◽  
International Legal Order ◽  
The Hague ◽  
Peremptory Norms ◽  
International Rule

Twenty years have passed since the author's delivery in 2000 of the general course of public international law at the Hague Academy of International Law, titled ‘The Unity of the International Legal Order’. That course was designed to combat the all-too-common idea that international law was in the process of ‘fragmentation’. It did so by developing a theory focused on the existence of and tension between two forms of unity in the international legal order: the formal unity (concerning the procedures by which primary norms are created and interpreted, and their non-compliance adjudicated) and the material unity (based on the content of certain norms of general international law, peremptory norms). Twenty years later, the time is ripe to revisit this theory to determine the extent to which it is still valid as a framework for the analysis of international law, particularly as an increasing number of ‘populist’ leaders very much seem to ignore, or voluntarily deny, the validity of some of the key substantial principles on which the international legal order was re-founded within and around the United Nations in 1945. When confronted with the factual reality of the present state of international relations as well as with the evolution of the law, one can conclude that the validity of the unity of the international legal order is unfailingly maintained, and that its role in upholding the international rule of law is more important now than ever.

How to Do Things with International Law

2019 ◽  
pp. 47-57
Author(s):  
Ian Hurd
Keyword(s):  
International Relations ◽  
International Law ◽  
Rule Of Law ◽  
Social Practice ◽  
International Politics ◽  
Practice Theory ◽  
Legal Realism ◽  
Political Legitimation ◽  
International Rule

This chapter presents an account of the international rule of law that reflects the particular dynamics of international politics, drawing on legal realism and practice theory in international relations (IR). On this reading, the international rule of law is a social practice that states and others engage in when they provide legal reasons and justifications for their actions. The goal may be either political legitimation for oneself or delegitimation of adversaries. This sort of use of international law both relies on and reinforces the idea that states should act lawfully rather than unlawfully. The priority of lawfulness is taken for granted. The chapter then outlines an approach which helps to make sense of international law's contribution to contemporary disputes and crises.

scholarly journals More than meets the eye – and less: Comments on The Internationalists

2018 ◽  
Vol 7 (3) ◽  
pp. 330-341
Author(s):  
ANDREAS FOLLESDAL
Keyword(s):  
International Relations ◽  
International Law ◽  
New World ◽  
Legal Theory ◽  
World Order ◽  
New World Order ◽  
Great Contribution ◽  
Old World ◽  
International Courts ◽  
Assurance Game

Abstract:These comments address three themes concerning Oona A Hathaway’s and Scott J Shapiro’s The Internationalists (Hathaway and Shapiro 2017), a great contribution to scholarship about international relations, international law and international legal theory. I first explore further some game theoretical themes, how the Peace Pact arguably contributed to avoid war by creating institutions – such as international courts – that helped stabilise an assurance game among states by providing trustworthy information and commitments, in turn influencing practices and beliefs concerning mutual non-aggression. Second, I suggest that the authors should not claim more than that the Peace Pact was one cause of the massive shift in reduced warfare. Further arguments are needed to show that this treaty was the trigger that ‘began a cascade’. Third, I suggest that the lessons for the future are limited, as we explore how to preserve and improve on the New World Order of the Pact, rather than backsliding into the Old World Order.

Stakeholder Applications

2014 ◽  
Vol 14 (4-5) ◽  
pp. 944-968
Author(s):  
Anja Matwijkiw ◽  
Bronik Matwijkiw
Keyword(s):  
International Relations ◽  
International Law ◽  
Rule Of Law ◽  
Criminal Law ◽  
Critical Reflection ◽  
International Criminal ◽  
Legal Theory ◽  
International Criminal Law ◽  
The Rule Of Law ◽  
Separation Thesis

Given that talk about “stakeholders” have become commonplace in international law and international relations, the authors examine some of the issues that arise from an account of the theoretical, jurisprudential, and doctrinal parameters that can be derived from competing frameworks. For the specific purpose of international criminal law, the authors concentrate on the single most important question: whether stakeholder applications constitute advantages or disadvantages in a philosophy of law approach to the rule of law. It appears that current matches with concepts, norms and strategies warrant, as a minimum, more critical reflection. Incorporating stakeholder applications from various UN-documents, the ambiguities and inadequacies of these – in comparison to non-UN alternatives and contemporary legal theory of an idealist and progressive orientation even seem to substantiate arguments against too close affiliations with the trend, especially because the separation thesis recently re-emerged in broad frameworks.

“FRAGMENTATION” OF INTERNATIONAL LAW AS A STRATEGY FOR REFORMING INTERNATIONAL INVESTMENT LAW

2014 ◽  
Vol 23 (1) ◽  
pp. 49-68 ◽  
Author(s):  
Ernst-Ulrich Petersmann
Keyword(s):  
Human Rights ◽  
International Law ◽  
Rule Of Law ◽  
International Investment ◽  
Economic Regulation ◽  
International Courts ◽  
International Investment Law ◽  
International Economic Law ◽  
Commutative Justice ◽  
Constitutional Pluralism

International economic law (IEL) continues to evolve through dialectic processes of unilateral, bilateral, regional and worldwide regulation aimed at protecting cosmopolitan rights and transnational rule of law in mutually beneficial economic cooperation among citizens in a globalizing economy (section 1). The more transnational protection of cosmopolitan rights (e.g., human rights, trading, investor and social rights) depends on multilevel cooperation among national and international courts, the stronger becomes the need for justifying “multilevel judicial governance” by conceptions of “cosmopolitan” and “constitutional justice” rather than only by “Westphalian justice” and “commutative justice”, as reciprocally agreed in treaties among States (section 2). “Fragmentation” of “IEL among States” through multilevel economic regulation and adjudication (e.g., inside free trade areas and economic communities) is a necessary strategy for reforming international law for the benefit of citizens. In order to remain legitimate and reconcile the rational self-interests of citizens with their reasonable common interests, investment arbitration must remain embedded into multilevel human rights law and respect for legitimate “constitutional pluralism” protecting cosmopolitan rights, transnational “participatory” and “deliberative democracy” and rule of law through “consistent interpretations” and “judicial comity” among national and international courts of justice (section 3).

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