Rebel Without a Cause? Martti Koskenniemi and the Critical Legal Project

German Law Journal

Volumn 7, Issue 12, 2006, Pages 1045-1088

  Beckett, Jason A ^a  

^a UNIVERSITY OF LEICESTER   (United Kingdom)

Author keywords

[No Author keywords available]

Indexed keywords

EID: 85143610462     PISSN: None     EISSN: 20718322     Source Type: Journal    
DOI: 10.1017/S2071832200005290     Document Type: Article

References (172)

1. See, for example, Behind Relative Normativity: Rules and Process as Prerequisites of Law, 12 EUROPEAN JOURNAL OF INTERNATIONAL LAW [EJIL] 627 (2001)
2. Countering Uncertainty and Ending Up/Down Arguments: Prolegomena to a Response to NAIL, 16 EJIL 213 (2005).
3. The third attempt was The End of Customary International Law? Jun, 30, 2006 (Unpublished Ph.D dissertation, University of Glasgow) especially chapter 5.
4. For consideration of such misunderstandings, see KOSKENNIEMI supra, note 1 at 590 footnote 78.
5. Blake W. "The Proverbs of Hell, " in The Marriage of Heaven and Hell, Jacob Bronowski (ed.) Blake Poems and Letters 98 (1958).
6. Martti Koskenniemi, International Law in Europe: Between Tradition and Renewal, 16 EJIL 113, 122 (2005).
7. See MICHEL FOUCAULT, Truth and Power, in POWER: ESSENTIAL WORKS OF FOUCAULT, 1954-1984, VOL. 3, 111 (2001);
8. and TERRY EAGLETON, IDEOLOGY (1991).
9. See also MARTTI KOSKENNIEMI, THE GENTLE CIVILISER OF NATIONS 499-500 (2004).
10. See Martti Koskenniemi, 'The Lady Doth Protest Too Much' Kosovo, and the Turn to Ethics in International Law, 65 MODERN LAW REVIEW 159, 165, 170 (2002);
11. Martti Koskenniemi, What is International Law For?, in INTERNATIONAL LAW 57, 59 (Malcolm Evans, ed., 2d 2006), especially footnote 4.
12. On this Hegelian idea, see FRANCIS FUKAYAMA, THE END OF HISTORY AND THE LAST MAN (1993).
13. For a critique, see Susan Marks, The End of History? Reflections on Some International Legal Theses, 8 EJIL 449 (1997).
14. Martti Koskenniemi, International Law as Therapy: Reading The Health of Nations 16 EJIL 329, 332 (2005), emphasis added.
15. Koskenniemi, supra note 5, at 122.
16. KOSKENNIEMI, supra note 1, at 597, emphasis added.
17. Sonia Harris-Short, Listening To "The Other"? The United Nations Convention on the Rights of the Child, 2 MELBOURNE JOURNAL OF INTERNATIONAL LAW 304 (2001) .
18. See infra notes 35-72 and accompanying text.
19. See Koskenniemi, What Is International Law For?, supra note 8, at 78;
20. Akbar Rasulov, International Law and the Poststructuralist Challenge, 19 Leiden Journal of International Law [LJIL] 799, 812-813 (2006).
21. Koskenniemi, 'The Lady Doth Protest Too Much' Kosovo, and the Turn to Ethics in International Law, supra note 8, at 173.
22. Koskenniemi, supra note 5, at 122;
23. see also Koskenniemi, 'The Lady Doth Protest Too Much' Kosovo, and the Turn to Ethics in International Law, supra note 8, at 173;
24. Koskenniemi, What Is International Law For?, supra note 8, at 63;
25. KOSKENNIEMI, supra note 1, at 606-9.
26. KOSKENNIEMI, supra note 1, at 598.
27. KOSKENNIEMI, supra note 7, at 504
28. Koskenniemi's rejection of Schmitt is discussed in the text accompanying notes 199-210 infra.
29. KOSKENNIEMI, supra note 1, at 606-7. A similar point is acknowledged in Koskenniemi, supra note 5, at 115.
30. Koskenniemi, What Is International Law For?, supra note 8, at 77.
31. KOSKENNIEMI, supra note 7, at 502. 508.
32. KOSKENNIEMI, supra note 1, at 599.
33. WILLIAM RASCH, SOVEREIGNTY AND ITS DISCONTENTS (2004);
34. see also Jason Beckett, Conflicting Orders: How Peace is Waged LJIL (forthcoming 2007).
35. Chantal Mouffe, Deliberative Democracy or Agonistic Pluralism? 66 Social Research 745, 755 (1999);
36. see also Beckett, supra note 27 for a critique of this approach.
37. Koskenniemi, What Is International Law For?, supra note 8, at 62
38. Koskenniemi, supra note 5, at 119;
39. see also KOSKENNIEMI, supra note 7, at 495.
40. Iain Scobbie, Towards the Elimination of International Law: Some Radical Scepticism About Sceptical Radicalism, 61 BRITISH YEARBOOK OF INTERNATIONAL LAW [BYBIL] 339, 349 (1990).
41. KOSKENNIEMI, supra note 1, at 607. However, it is also worth noting the presence (and apparent stabilising force) of "structural bias";
42. Koskenniemi continues the quotation above, "the former are always taken as the starting-point while the latter have to struggle for limited realisation". On structural bias, see infra.
43. ROBERTO MANGABEIRA UNGER WHAT SHOULD LEGAL ANALYSIS BECOME? 130-1 (1996).
44. Neil MacCormick, Reconstruction After Deconstruction: A Response to CLS, 10 OXFORD JOURNAL OF LEGAL STUDIES [OJLS] 539, 556 (1990).
45. Ofer Raban, Dworkin's 'Best Light' Requirement and the Proper Methodology of Legal Theory, 23 OJLS 243, 244 (2003).
46. This is precisely the charge Dyzenhaus levels against contemporary legal positivism. David Dyzenhaus, Positivism's Stagnant research Proposal, 20 OJLS 703, 711-2 (2000).
47. Koskenniemi, 'The Lady Doth Protest Too Much' Kosovo, and the Turn to Ethics in International Law, supra note 8, at 173.
48. MacCormick, supra note 46, at 578.
49. ALASDAIR MACINTYRE, AFTER VIRTUE 14 (1984).
50. KOSKENNIEMI, supra note 1, at 608. Footnotes omitted.
51. A similar pathology afflicts the "descriptive thesis" of Koskenniemi's project, infra KOSKENNIEMI, supra note 1, at 597.
52. Scobbie, supra note 38, at 347.
53. KOSKENNIEMI, supra note 1, at 597-8. Footnotes omitted.
54. Scobbie, supra note 38, at 349.
55. See Robert Cover, Nomos and Narrative 97 HARVARD LAW REVIEW 4 (1983).
56. RONALD DWORKIN, LAW'S EMPIRE 65-6 (1988).
57. I have attempted to respond to the question of ontological indeterminacy in Jason Beckett, Countering Uncertainty and Ending Up/Down Arguments: Prolegomena to a Response to NAIL, 16 EJIL 213-238 (2005).
58. NEIL DUXBURY, PATTERNS OF AMERICAN JURISPRUDENCE 191-9 (1997).
59. KOSKENNIEMI, supra note 1, at 591.
60. Scobbie, supra note 38, at 350 72 Beckett, supra note 64, at 221.
61. Scobbie, supra note 38, at 346.
62. KOSKENNIEMI, supra note 1, at 591.
63. David J. Bederman, Book review of From Apology to Utopia, 23 NEW YORK JOURNAL OF INTERNATIONAL LAW AND POLITICS 228 (1990)
64. also KOSKENNIEMI, supra note 1, at 603.
65. KOSKENNIEMI, supra note 1, at 591.
66. Koskenniemi, What Is International Law For?, supra note 8, at 77.
67. Alasdair MacIntyre, Epistemological Crises, Dramatic Narrative and the Philosophy of Science, 60 THE MONIST 453, 453-4, and 462-3 (1977).
68. Koskenniemi, What Is International Law For?, supra note 8, at 69-70.
69. KOSKENNIEMI, supra note 1, at 596-7.
70. Martti Koskenniemi, International Law as Political Theology: How to Read Nomos der Erde? 11 CONSTELLATIONS 492, 506 (2004).
71. Koskenniemi, supra note 5, at 118-119.
72. KOSKENNIEMI, supra note 1, at 606.
73. Koskenniemi, 'The Lady Doth Protest Too Much' Kosovo, and the Turn to Ethics in International Law, supra note 8, at 162.
74. Koskenniemi, What Is International Law For?, supra note 8, at 66.
75. See Beckett, supra note 27;
76. and Mercy, Particularity, the Map from the Void, in Archiv fur Rechts und Sozialphilosophie (forthcoming 2007).
77. Koskenniemi, 'The Lady Doth Protest Too Much' Kosovo, and the Turn to Ethics in International Law, supra note 8, at 173.
78. See Martti Koskenniemi The Politics of International Law 1 EJIL 4 (1990).
79. KOSKENNIEMI, supra note 1, at 564.
80. This was my second misreading, supra note 64. On the limitations of immanent critique, see Id. at 600.
81. KOSKENNIEMI, supra note 7, at 502.
82. KOSKENNIEMI, supra note 1, at 564.
83. Koskenniemi, supra note 83, at 505.
84. KOSKENNIEMI, supra note 1, at 600.
85. KOSKENNIEMI, supra note 7, at 504.
86. Koskenniemi, What Is International Law For?, supra note 8, at 57
87. KOSKENNIEMI, supra note 1, at 616.
88. ROBERTO MANGABEIRA UNGER, THE CRITICAL LEGAL STUDIES MOVEMENT 1 (1986).
89. KOSKENNIEMI, supra note 7, at 500.
90. Jörg Kammerhofer, The Uncertainty in the Formal Sources of International Law: Customary International Law and Some of Its Problems, 15 EJIL 523 (2004).
91. Koskenniemi, supra note 7, at 500, 503. Again, Kammerhofer's writings may be relevant here, as they suggest that Kelsen was fully aware of the necessary indeterminacy of normative orders;
92. see KOSKENNIEMI, supra note 1, at 602-4.
93. KOSKENNIEMI, supra note 1, at 616.
94. KOSKENNIEMI, supra note 7, at 503.
95. Koskenniemi, supra note 5.
96. Koskenniemi, What Is International Law For?, supra note 8, at 78;
97. Koskenniemi, 'The Lady Doth Protest Too Much' Kosovo, and the Turn to Ethics in International Law supra note 8, at 165.
98. Koskenniemi, 'The Lady Doth Protest Too Much' Kosovo, and the Turn to Ethics in International Law, supra note 8, at 174.
99. KOSKENNIEMI, supra note 7, at 501.
100. KOSKENNIEMI, supra note 7, at 500.
101. RONALD BOGUE, DELEUZE AND GUATTARI 31 (1989).
102. KOSKENNIEMI, supra note 1, at 606, footnote 122 (citing Charlesworth).
103. Koskenniemi, supra note 5, at 120.
104. NEIL MACCORMICK, LEGAL REASONING AND LEGAL THEORY 97 (1978).
105. THEORY OF MORAL SENTIMENTS, Bk. III, ch. i., para. ii, at p. 110 (1976 Raphael and Macfie eds.).
106. see also Bk. III, ch. iii, at p. 134-56.
107. Bk. III, ch. i, para. ii, at p. 105.
108. Koskenniemi, What Is International Law For?, supra note 8, at 63. Emphasis added. [there is no emphasis here!] 125 Smith, supra note 122, Bk. III, ch. iii, para. iv, at p. 136.
109. The phrases and the contrast between them are analysed by JUDITH SHKLAR, THE FACES OF INJUSTICE (1990).
110. On the inaccuracy of this understanding, see THOMAS POGGE, WORLD POVERTY AND HUMAN RIGHTS 11-20 (2002).
111. Koskenniemi, 'The Lady Doth Protest Too Much' Kosovo, and the Turn to Ethics in International Law, supra note 8, at 172.
112. KOSKENNIEMI, supra note 1, at 562.
113. KOSKENNIEMI, supra note 7, at 502.
114. Koskenniemi, 'The Lady Doth Protest Too Much' Kosovo, and the Turn to Ethics in International Law, supra note 8, at 175.
115. See, for example, Rex Zedalis, Preliminary Thoughts on Some Unresolved Questions Involving the Law of Anticipatory Self-Defense, 19 CASE WESTERN RESERVE JOURNAL OF INTERNATIONAL LAW 129 (1987).
116. KOSKENNIEMI, supra note 1, at 609.
117. Koskenniemi, supra note 83, at 506.
118. KOSKENNIEMI, supra note 7, at 500.
119. Koskenniemi, 'The Lady Doth Protest Too Much' Kosovo, and the Turn to Ethics in International Law, supra note 8, at 172.
120. KOSKENNIEMI, supra note 1, at 609.
121. Smith, supra note 121, Bk. III, ch. I, para. vi, at p. 106-7.
122. See Beckett, supra note 64.
123. KOSKENNIEMI, supra note 1, at 602.
124. See, for example, Pierre-Marie Dupuy, Some Reflections on Contemporary International Law and the Appeal to Universal Values: A Response to Martti Koskenniemi, 16 EJIL 131 (2005).
125. KOSKENNIEMI, supra note 7, at 509.
126. Koskenniemi, What Is International Law For?, supra note 8, at 73.
127. KOSKENNIEMI, supra note 1, at 566.
128. Beckett, supra note 64.
129. KOSKENNIEMI, supra note 1, at 605.
130. See, for example, Legality of the Use of Force (FRY v. USA) Preliminary Objections ICJ Order of 2nd June 1999 para. 30, 1999 ILM p. 1188 at p. 1195
131. KOSKENNIEMI, supra note 1, at 570.
132. GERRY SIMPSON, GREAT POWERS AND OUTLAW STATES: UNEQUAL SOVEREIGNS IN THE INTERNATIONAL LEGAL ORDER (2004).
133. Koskenniemi, What Is International Law For?, supra note 8, at 69;
134. Koskenniemi, 'The Lady Doth Protest Too Much' Kosovo, and the Turn to Ethics in International Law, supra note 8, at footnote note 46.
135. http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/uk_politics/vote_2005/frontpage/4491801.stm.
136. KOSKENNIEMI, supra note 7, at 505.
137. Koskenniemi, What Is International Law For?, supra note 8, at 63.
138. LON L. FULLER, THE MORALITY OF LAW 147 (1969).
139. Theses on Feuerbach, thesis XI. Marx/Engels Selected Works, Volume One, p. 13 - 15 (Progress Publishers, Moscow, USSR, 1969) available at: http://www.marxists.org/archive/marx/works/1845/ theses/theses.pdf.
140. KOSKENNIEMI, supra note 1, at 569.
141. KOSKENNIEMI, supra note 7, at 501.
142. H. W. A. THIRLWAY, CUSTOMARY LAW AND CODIFICATION 52 (1972).
143. Beckett, supra note 64, at 175.
144. Philip Allott, Language, Method and the Nature of International Law, 45 BYBIL 112 (1971).
145. KOSKENNIEMI, supra note 7, at 499.
146. See Beckett, supra note 64.
147. Neil MacCormick, The Ethics of Legalism, 2 RATIO IURIS 184, 191 (1989).
148. Hans Kelsen makes a very similar point in PURE THEORY OF LAW 2 (1934).
149. Beckett, supra note 64, at 214-5.
150. Koskenniemi, supra note 5, at 119.
151. KOSKENNIEMI, supra note 1, at 599.
152. PHILIP ALLOTT, EUNOMIA xxvii (2001);
153. MAARTEN BOS, A METHODOLOGY OF INTERNATIONAL LAW 7 (1984).
154. Joseph Raz, Two Views of the Nature of the Theory of Law: A Partial Comparison, in HART'S POSTSCRIPT 1, 36 (Jules L. Coleman, ed., 2001).
155. Beckett, supra note 64.
156. Koskenniemi, What Is International Law For?, supra note 8, at 58.
157. KOSKENNIEMI, supra note 7, at 500.
158. KOSKENNIEMI, supra note 1, at 590.
159. Umberto Eco, Reading My Readers, 107 MODERN LANGUAGE NOTES 819, 821 (1992).
160. KOSKENNIEMI, supra note 7, at 496.
161. Kelsen, supra note 173, at 350-2.
162. Koskenniemi, What Is International Law For?, supra note 8, at 69;
163. but contra KOSKENNIEMI, supra note 1, at 572-3.
164. Iain Scobbie, Wicked Heresies or Legitimate Perspectives? Theory and International Law, in INTERNATIONAL LAW, supra note 8, at 83, 89-90.
165. Koskenniemi, What Is International Law For?, supra note 8, at 59, especially footnote 4.
166. KOSKENNIEMI, supra note 1, at 571, 614 footnotes 15, 151.
167. Koskenniemi, supra note 83, at 495.
168. Koskenniemi, What Is International Law For?, supra note 8, at 73.
169. KOSKENNIEMI, supra note 1, 606, 615 footnotes 122, 154.
170. http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/sci/tech/4897252.stm and
171. http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/sci/tech/4696924.stm
172. Koskenniemi, What Is International Law For?, supra note 8, at 77.