Chance, Order, Change: The Course of International Law

The course of international law over time needs to be understood if international law is to be understood. This work aims to provide such an understanding. It is directed not at topics or subject headings - sources, treaties, States, human rights and so on - but at some of the key unresolved problems of the discipline. Unresolved, they call into question its status as a discipline. Is international law "law" properly so-called? In what respects is it systematic? Does it - can it - respect the rule of Iaw? These problems can be resolved, or at least reduced, by an imaginative reading of our shared practices and our increasingly shared history, with an emphasis on process. In this sense the practice of the institutions of international law is to be understood as the law itself. They are in a dialectical relationship with the law, shaping it and being shaped by it. This is explained by reference to actual cases and examples, providing a course of international law in some standard sense as well.

James Crawford AC SC FBA is the Whewell Professor of International Law, University of Cambridge, and Research Professor of Law, LaTrobe University. In 2010 he was awarded the Nessim Habif World Prize by the University of Geneva and in 2012 the Hudson Medal by the American Society of International Law. He was made a Companion of the Order of Australia in 2013.