The Limits of International Law

The Limits of International Law

Author: Jack L. Goldsmith

Publisher: Oxford University Press

Published: 2005-02-03

Total Pages: 271

ISBN-13: 0199883378

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International law is much debated and discussed, but poorly understood. Does international law matter, or do states regularly violate it with impunity? If international law is of no importance, then why do states devote so much energy to negotiating treaties and providing legal defenses for their actions? In turn, if international law does matter, why does it reflect the interests of powerful states, why does it change so often, and why are violations of international law usually not punished? In this book, Jack Goldsmith and Eric Posner argue that international law matters but that it is less powerful and less significant than public officials, legal experts, and the media believe. International law, they contend, is simply a product of states pursuing their interests on the international stage. It does not pull states towards compliance contrary to their interests, and the possibilities for what it can achieve are limited. It follows that many global problems are simply unsolvable. The book has important implications for debates about the role of international law in the foreign policy of the United States and other nations. The authors see international law as an instrument for advancing national policy, but one that is precarious and delicate, constantly changing in unpredictable ways based on non-legal changes in international politics. They believe that efforts to replace international politics with international law rest on unjustified optimism about international law's past accomplishments and present capacities.


Review of General Theory of International Law (Ed. By S. Wiessner).

Review of General Theory of International Law (Ed. By S. Wiessner).

Author: Carol Castleberry

Publisher:

Published: 2019

Total Pages: 5

ISBN-13:

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In General Theory of International Law, Siegfried Wiessner presents a selection of specifically American general theories of and about international law, written by the theorists themselves. Included are American Legal Realism, the New Haven School of Jurisprudence, International and Transnational Legal Process, Liberal Theories of International Law, and theories that link to social sciences, including Law and Economics, Critical Legal Studies, LatCrit, TWAIL, and feminist approaches. The range of these works covers the very concept of international law, its justification, the struggle between formalism and experience, various theories of legitimacy and fairness, the law's effectiveness, empirical analysis, critiques from the margins and the center, and approaches to its improvement. Wiessner's Introduction provides context by placing this selection of American theories into historical context, threading together the sequence and interrelation of their development in the midst of contemporaneous political and philosophical movements, and critically appraising them. This book brilliantly elucidates America's prophetic and reformist role in international law theory. This is no surprise in light of Wiessner's description of America's vision of itself as a leader of thought, the star of that “shining city on a hill.” America is the nonconformist, revolutionary, and scrutinizer of what is beneath the façade precisely because of this vision and its quest to determine what roles America should play on the international front.


General Theory of International Law

General Theory of International Law

Author: Siegfried Wiessner

Publisher: Brill Nijhoff

Published: 2017

Total Pages: 0

ISBN-13: 9789004338456

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This introductory volume to the series of American Classics in International Law is intended to present, put into context, and critically appraise specifically American general theories of and about international law. Those frameworks of ideas include the very concept of international law, its justification, the struggle between formalism and experience, various theories of legitimacy and fairness, the law's effectiveness, empirical analysis, critiques from the margins and the center, and approaches to its improvement. Particular focus is on American Legal Realism, the New Haven School of Jurisprudence, International and Transnational Legal Process, liberal theories of international law, linkages to social sciences, including Law and Economics, Critical Legal Studies, LatCrit, TWAIL, and feminist approaches to the discipline.


International Law as Behavior

International Law as Behavior

Author: Harlan Grant Cohen

Publisher: Cambridge University Press

Published: 2021-04-01

Total Pages: 311

ISBN-13: 131699077X

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This volume includes chapters from an exciting group of scholars at the cutting edge of their fields to present a multi-disciplinary look at how international law shapes behavior. Contributors present overviews of the progress established fields have made in analyzing questions of interest, as well as speculations on the questions or insights that emerging methods might raise. In some chapters, there is a focus on how a particular method might raise or help answer questions, while others focus on a particular international law topic by drawing from a variety of fields through a multi-method approach to highlight how these fields may come together in a single project. Still others use behavioral insights as a form of critique to highlight the blind spots and related mistakes in more traditional analyses of the law. Throughout this volume, authors present creative, insightful, challenges to traditional international law scholarship.


Law at the Vanishing Point

Law at the Vanishing Point

Author: Aaron Fichtelberg

Publisher: Routledge

Published: 2016-04-22

Total Pages: 265

ISBN-13: 1317107640

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Two central questions are at the core of international legal theory: 'What is international law?', and 'Is international law really law?' This volume examines these critical questions and the philosophical foundations of modern international law using the tools of Anglo-American legal theory and western political thought. Engaging with both contemporary and historical legal theory and with an analysis of international law in action, the book builds an understanding and theory of law from the perspective of those who actually use this legal system and understand it, rather than constructing an artificial system from the standpoint of political scientists and moral philosophers. Law at the Vanishing Point provides a fascinating new challenge to those who reduce international law either to ethics or to politics and provides a critical new appraisal of its power as an independent force in human social relations.


Philosophy and International Law

Philosophy and International Law

Author: David Lefkowitz

Publisher: Cambridge University Press

Published: 2020-10-29

Total Pages: 289

ISBN-13: 1107138779

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Offers an accessible discussion of conceptual and moral questions on international law and advances the debate on many of these topics.


The Assault on International Law

The Assault on International Law

Author: Jens David Ohlin

Publisher: Oxford University Press

Published: 2014-12-22

Total Pages: 305

ISBN-13: 0199987424

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International law presents a conceptual riddle. Why comply with it when there is no world government to enforce it? The United States has a long history of skepticism towards international law, but 9/11 ushered in a particularly virulent phase of American exceptionalism, as the US drifted away from international institutions and conventions. Although American politicians and their legal advisors are often the public face of this attack, the root of this movement is a coordinated and deliberate attack by law professors hostile to its philosophical foundations, including Eric Posner, Jack Goldsmith, Adrian Vermeule, and John Yoo. In a series of influential writings, they have claimed that since states are motivated primarily by self-interest, compliance with international law is nothing more than high-minded talk. These abstract arguments provide a foundation for dangerous legal conclusions: that international law is largely irrelevant to determining how and when terrorists can be captured or killed; that the US President alone should be directing the War on Terror without significant input from Congress or the judiciary; that US courts should not hear lawsuits alleging violations of international law; and that the US should block any international criminal court with jurisdiction over Americans. These polemical accounts have ultimately triggered America's pernicious withdrawal from international cooperation. In The Assault on International Law, Jens David Ohlin exposes the mistaken assumptions of these "New Realists," in particular their impoverished utilization of rational choice theory. In contrast, he provides an alternate vision of international law based on an innovative theory of human rationality. According to Ohlin, rationality requires that agents follow through on their plans and commitments even when faced with opportunities for defection, as long as the original plan was beneficial for the agent. Seen in the light of this planning theory of rational agency, international law is the product of nation-states cooperating to escape a brutish State of Nature-a result that is not only legally binding but also in each state's self-interest.


International Law Theories

International Law Theories

Author: Andrea Bianchi

Publisher: Oxford University Press

Published: 2016

Total Pages: 337

ISBN-13: 0198725116

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Two fish are swimming in a pond. 'Do you know what?' the fish asks his friend. 'No, tell me.' 'I was talking to a frog the other day. And he told me that we are surrounded by water ' His friend looks at him with great scepticism: 'Water? What's that? Show me some water ' International lawyers often find themselves focused on the practice of the law rather than the underlying theories. This book is an attempt to stir up 'the water' that international lawyers swim in. It analyses a range of theoretical approaches to international law and invites readers to engage with different ways of legal thinking in order to familiarize themselves with the water all around us, of which we hardly have any perception. The main aim of this book is to provide interested scholars, practitioners, and students of international law and other disciplines with an introduction to various international legal theories, their genealogies, and possible critiques. By providing an analytical approach to international legal theory, the book encourages readers to enhance their sensitivity to these different approaches and to consider how the presuppositions behind each theory affect analysis, research, and practice in international law. International Law Theories is intended to assist students, scholars, and practitioners in reflecting more generally about how knowledge is formed in the field.


International Law and International Relations

International Law and International Relations

Author: Thomas J. Biersteker

Publisher: Routledge

Published: 2006-10-19

Total Pages: 336

ISBN-13: 1134145780

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This unique volume examines the opportunities for, and initiates work in, interdisciplinary research between the fields of international law and international relations; disciplines that have engaged little with one another since the Second World War. Written by leading experts in the fields of international law and international relations, it argues that such interdisciplinary research is central to the creation of a knowledge base among IR scholars and lawyers for the effective analysis and governance of macro and micro phenomena. International law is at the heart of international relations, but due to challenges of codification and enforceability, its apparent impact has been predominantly limited to commercial and civil arrangements. International lawyers have been saying for years that 'law matters' in international affairs and now current events are proving them right. International Law and International Relations makes a powerful contribution to the theory and practice of global security by initiating a research agenda, building an empirical base and offering a multidisciplinary approach that provides concrete answers to real-world problems of governance. This book will be of great interest to all students of international law, international relations and governance.