hello this lecture introduces the topic of enforcement of international law over the next few sessions i will explain different strategies the states and non-state actors use to instigate compliance with international law international lawyers because they are lawyers tend to focus on legal approaches that are by their own nature adversarial and many times in international law textbooks you will only find references in on when you are looking at this topic to counter measures and very particularly to the role and functions of the security council my approach is going to be much wider i think it reflects better the practice of states and non-state actors in international relations and i will have a broader approach if you want and i will cover both confrontational approaches to compliance to compliance such as naming and shaming sanctions conditionalities countermeasures legal proceedings but also more the plethora of that are of more cooperative mechanisms that are often missing as i say from manuals and the literature on enforcement and compliance this includes confidence building measures peer review mechanisms or technical assistance because there is no centralized or even decentralized structure to impose the compliance of international law in a manner that seems similar to enforcement powers at domestic level and because the existence of law is premised on its possible enforcement international lawyers are frequently confronted with the presumption that international law cannot be enforced many times that because of this international law does not even exist so perhaps because they are eager to respond to this claim and to contest them many international lawyers and international law books focus as i said the explanations on strategies to instigate compliance on to the closest approximation to a standing body of enforcement that you can find in international law the united nations security council considering the unrepresentative and democratic composition of the security council and its role in preserving peace and security this approach reinforces rather than contest the impression that international law can only be enforced exceptionally when a few countries with lots of power are interested in that result but in reality states and non-state actors use a wide range of mechanisms to instigate the compliance of international law they might not look like putting someone in prison or giving a fine or punishing them by force but they are still mechanisms of enforcement and international law is not only followed by states spontaneously it is followed because they know that some unwanted negative consequences will follow if they behave otherwise on other occasions they respond better to positive incentives designed to ensure adherence to international law so over the next few minutes my first video will outline the logic that leads to an excessive focus on confrontational approaches in general and the security council in particular then a second recording will introduce some of the most used strategies to prompt compliance that are based on negative consequences for the wrongdoer this will be followed by a third video focusing on cooperative strategies and i will end with the explanations on the topic of enforcement by referring to the role of the united nations security council and also the general assembly in this field lets start exploring the reasons that underpin an excessive focus on confrontational approaches in general and the security council in particular in my opinion they are linked to misleading conceptions of the rule of law in international law as well as what i call judicial fetishism along with a fascination for the extraordinary powers of the security council and the use of armed force lacking central structures monopolizing power to create and enforce norms the politicization of international law defies the logic that associates law with a system of rules and enforcement mechanisms that are able to deliver the same consequences for equivalent events this is not a flaw of international law but an inherent characteristic derived from the sovereignty of states who remain the main actors but not the only ones creating and enforcing international regulations other non-state actors especially international organizations such as those composing the world bank group the wto or the european union have an immense power and leverage in the creation and enforcement of rules too for all of them the consent of the state remains central in any norm creating an enforcement process so despite some grand declarations claiming otherwise the concept of an international rule of law is largely vacuous in the international space states and non-state actors do not abide with the principle of supremacy of the law equality before the law fairness in its application and independent adjudication these elements remain subject to the consent of the state and therefore unrestrained by conventional conceptions of the rule of law in international law politicization understood as the application of double standards that undermine the essence of the rule of law is a feature of the legal regime not a malfunction if the rules that are part of what we call international law have normative force some degree of penalty ought to be associated with a failure of compliance otherwise what is the difference between binding and non-binding rules if there's no difference between breaching a rule that's binding and not binding because there's no difference in the consequence then there's no difference between binding and not binding and pretty much law it doesn't exist and in addition this general principle of law prescribes that there is always a right where there is a remedy so law should provide a remedy to protect the right that is damaged or lost legal scholars and practitioners are prone to what i call judicial fetishism and too often there is a tacit understanding that the norm is not really a norm until articulated by a judicial body this is linked to the theoretical primitivism of international law in comparison with national law justiciability of norms is often made a condition of legal status and the perfection of international law is measured against a more evolved imaginary model of national jurisdiction with centralized judicial administrative and legal measures of implementation following these premises it is often deduced logically that any step to get closer to this more perfect model is desirable this logic is probably behind the proliferation or the increasing number of international tribunals first and a more and the more recent backlash against them uh currently in summary while the progressive institutionalization of international law through the proliferation of international organization has implied some delegation of sovereign powers states remain the principal actors when it comes to enforcing international rules even when states decide to bring a dispute to an international court the judicial body will settle the dispute without normally dictating how the final result should be reached at the national level the vast majority of disputes between states are resolved outside legal quarters and the mechanisms to enforce international law don't follow a model of rights breach responsibility process sanction leading to punishment of every violator fiiting the same category or at least to redress victi any all the victims suffering from the same harm deriving from a breach of international law international law has its own rules to protect the integrity of its rules and we should not limit our views on how they are replicated in the imaginary more perfect domestic system the implementation and enforcement machinery of international standards cannot be expected then from a centralized impartial supranational international body seeking to put pressure on the state to compel a change of behavior respectful of international law although many times that's what people uh legal scholars and even states expect from the security council the next sessions will examine the main measures used to instigate compliance by separating them in two categories confrontational and cooperative approaches so here i highlighted confrontational approaches and i listed them and also cooperative approaches