“Protecting the future of International Law Discourse: Taking into account the peculiarities of Emerging Societies”

Abstract

The emergence of international law was hinged on the need for state relations to be managed on the premises of certain acceptable doctrines. Such laws were either hard laws or soft laws. It represented the views and the wills of a few countries that were seen as powerful though influenced by the early writings of scholars like Socrates, Aristotle and Grotius. International laws at earlier stages operated on a supra national level; however, with the recent wave of globalization and its impact on all aspects of world existence; scholars like Slaughter argue that international law is tending towards representing national laws. This is against the back drop driven by the desire to create stability in the international system. It becomes imperative that international law must become part of the laws of nations to curb the emerging challenges to world peace. International law as it is today still represents the colonial powers that had the liberty and ability to partition the rest of the present developing world among them. It is therefore important to reiterate the fact that if the future of international law must be guaranteed the need to take cognizance of the peculiarities of the developing economies must not be overlooked. It is therefore advanced that the continued neglect of peculiarities of developing nations in the development of international law portends a clog in the development of international law in achieving its objectives.