International law – A definition
By Lawyer Help | February 26, 2007
In a global economy, law is globalising too. International law can refer to three things; public international law, private international law or conflict of laws and the law of supranational organisations.
- Public international law concerns the relationships between sovereign nations. It has a special status as law because there is no international police force, and courts lack the capacity to penalise disobedience. The sources for public international law to develop are custom, practice and treaties between sovereign nations. The United Nations, founded under the UN Charter and the Universal Declaration of Human Rights is the most important international organisation, established after the failure of the Versailles Treaty and World War II. Other international agreements, like the Geneva Conventions on the conduct of war, and international bodies such as the International Labour Organisation, the World Trade Organisation, or the International Monetary Fund also form a growing part of public international law.
- Conflict of Laws (or "private international law" in civil law countries) concerns which jurisdiction a legal dispute between private parties should be heard in and which jurisdiction’s law should be applied. Today businesses are increasingly capable of shifting capital and labour supply chains across borders, as well as trading with overseas businesses. This increases the number of disputes outside a unified legal framework and the enforceability of standard practices. Increasing numbers of businesses opt for commercial arbitration under the New York Convention 1958.
- European Union law is the first and only example of a supranational legal framework. However, given increasing global economic integration many regional agreements, especially the South American Community of Nations, are on track to follow the same model. In the EU, sovereign nations have pooled their authority through a system of courts and political institutions. They have the ability to enforce legal norms against and for member states and citizens, in a way that public international law does not. As the European Court of Justice said in 1962, European Union law constitutes "a new legal order of international law" for the mutual social and economic benefit of the member states.
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