Wouter Werner

This article examines the changing image of war in international law and politics. In classical international law, the ideal typical image of war was a duel between equal states, represented as 'magni homines', This conception of war was based on a particular reading of the sovereign equality of states and a corresponding interpretation of the enemy in war. Due to the attempts to outlaw war and the growing enthusiasm for the use of force in the name of humanity, this image of war has changed significantly. In current international relations, the use of force is increasingly defined as enforcement or a preventive action against wrong-doers, risks to international peace and security or against 'rogues'. This article examines the changing conceptions of sovereignty and war as well as the changing image of the international community that underlie this changing conceptualisation of the enemy.

This article examines therelation between the Security Council andinternational judicial bodies. The first partexplains, on the basis of linguistic theoriesof international security, the new role assumedby the Security Council after the Cold War. Thesecond part analyses, on the basis of insightsborrowed from legal semiotics, the position ofinternational judicial organs vis-à-vis theSecurity Council (especially the InternationalCourt of Justice and the Tribunals for Rwandaand the former Yugoslavia). The article arguesthat international judicial bodies havedeveloped ways of checking the power of theSecurity Council, which go beyond thetraditional modes of judicial review. Legalsemiotics offers the tools necessary tounderstand these countervailing activities andthus the relation between internationaljudicial bodies and the Security Council ingeneral.

Drones, Targeted Killings and the Politics of Law In this article I discuss one of the latest reports on the practice of drone warfare, the UN SRCT Drone Inquiry. I use the report to illustrate some of the specific forms of legal politics that surround drone warfare today. In the first place, I focus on the tension between the capacity of drones to target more precisely and the never-ending critique that drone warfare victimizes civilian populations. Secondly, I focus on the call for more objective legal rules that can be found in many debates on drone warfare.

International law is not merely a set of rules or processes, but is a professional activity practised by a diversity of figures, including scholars, judges, counsel, teachers, legal advisers and activists. Individuals may, in different contexts, play more than one of these roles, and the interactions between them are illuminating of the nature of international law itself. This collection of innovative, multidisciplinary and self-reflective essays reveals a bilateral process whereby, on the one hand, the professionalisation of international law informs discourses about the law, and, on the other hand, discourses about the law inform the professionalisation of the discipline. Intended to promote a dialogue between practice and scholarship, this book is a must-read for all those engaged in the profession of international law.

Is it possible and desirable to translate the basic principles underlying cosmopolitanism as a moral standard into eff ective global institutions? Will the ideals of inclusiveness and equal moral concern for all survive the marriage between cosmopolitanism and institutional power? What are the eff ects of such bureaucratization of cosmopolitan ideals? Th is book examines the strained relationship between cosmopolitanism as a moral standard and the legal institutions in which cosmopolitan norms and principles are to be implemented. Five areas of global concern are analyzed: environmental protection; economic regulation; peace and security; the fight against international crimes; and migration.

For decades, Martti Koskenniemi has not just been an influential writer in international law; his work has caused a significant shift in the direction of the field. This book engages with some of the core questions that have animated Koskenniemi's scholarship so far. Its chapters attest to the breadth and depth of Koskenniemi's oeuvre and the different ways in which he has explored these questions. Koskenniemi's work is applied to a wide range of functional areas in international law and discussed in relation to an even broader range of theoretical perspectives, including history, political theory, sociology and international relations theory. These invaluable insights have been expertly brought together by the volume editors, who identify the key and common themes of many of the book's contributions. This volume demonstrates the importance of critical legal scholarship in the ways international law is enacted, shaped and reshaped over time.

This paper agrees with Walker on the existence of a tension between democracy and constitutionalism, but questions whether democracy and constitutionalism necessarily depend on each other. While democracy needs constitutionalism on normative grounds, as an empirical matter it may also rest on alternative political structures. Moreover, it is questionable whether democracy is indeed the solution to the incompleteness of international constitutionalism. Traditional forms of democracy do not lend themselves well to transplantation to the international level and could even intensify some problems of international governance. Attempts to democratize international relations should be carried out prudentially, with due regard for possible counterproductive effects

Institutional theory of law (ITL) reflects both continuity and change of Kelsen's legal positivism. The main alteration results from the way ITL extends Hart's linguistic turn towards ordinary language philosophy (OLP). Hart holds – like Kelsen – that law cannot be reduced to brute fact nor morality, but because of its attempt to reconstruct social practices his theory is more inclusive. By introducing the notion of law as an extra-linguistic institution ITL takes a next step in legal positivism and accounts for the relationship between action and validity within the legal system. There are, however, some problems yet unresolved by ITL. One of them is its theory of meaning. An other is the way it accounts for change and development. Answers may be based on the pragmatic philosophy of Charles Sanders Peirce, who emphasises the intrinsic relation between the meaning of speech acts and the process of habit formation.

Along with the exploding attention to globalization, issues of global justice have become central elements in political philosophy. After decades in which debates were dominated by a state-centric paradigm, current debates in political philosophy also address issues of global inequality, global poverty, and the moral foundations of international law. As recent events have demonstrated, these issues also play an important role in the practice of international law. In fields such as peace and security, economic integration, environmental law, and human rights, international lawyers are constantly confronted with questions of global justice and international legitimacy. This special issue contains four papers which address an important element of this emerging debate on cosmopolitan global justice, with much relevance for international law: the principle of sovereign equality, global economic inequality, and environmental law.