Philosophy of International Law

Anthony Carty offers an internal critique of the discipline of international law whilst showing the necessary place for philosophy within this subject area. By reintroducing philosophy into the heart of the study of international law, he explains how traditional philosophy has always been an integral part of the discipline. However, this has been driven out by legal positivism, which has, in turn, become a pure technique of law. He explores the extent of the disintegration and confusion in the discipline and offers various ways of renewing philosophical practice.By covering a range of approaches - post-structuralism, neo-Marxist geopolitics, social-democratic constitutional theory and existential phenomenology - this book will encourage you to think afresh about how far to bring order to, or find order in, contemporary international society.

Carty can be said to be one of the leading scholars in 'critical international law' ... Carty's Philosophy of International Law explores the root of some problems existing in today's international relations, with unique views and methods. As an international jurist and philosopher, he defies some general beliefs with his bold critique of the effect of international law, theories of States and the existing international legal order ... These are things that we should consider carefully. And the book's interdisciplinary viewpoints and multidimensional thinking are very inspiring.--HE Tiantian, Institute of International Law, Chinese Academy of Social Sciences "Chinese Journal of International Law", In The Philosophy of International Law, the most radical and challenging idea is, in our view, the suggestion that international lawyers should pay much more attention to the people (or the 'social body or community; of each State (p. 67)) rather than focusing merely on the State and the individual, which may be (even) more abstract legal inventions than the people. It is true that every international lawyer has to consider the fact that after having largely ignored international Law for centuries, people are increasingly averse to it, perhaps because it still ignores them and follows its own path without them. In any event, instead of criticizing or lamenting this popular reaction, international lawyers should ask themselves why it is so and how they could change international Law and make people less angry about it. Anthony Carty's book could certainly help them to fulfil this task.--Florian Couveinhes Matsumoto, Ecole Normale Superieure "Journal of the History of International Law"

Anthony Carty is Cheng Yu Tung Chair of Public International Law at the Tsinghua University School of Law in Beijing and Professor of Law at the University of Aberdeen.