International Law for International Crises: How Can International Ties Bind?
Abstract
Jurisprudence has wrestled with the question of morality’s role in law, or lack-thereof, primarily arriving at two camps. There are those who believe law’s identity is separable from moral principle, while other scholars claim law cannot be meaningfully conceptualized apart from morality. At the level of international law, where states are recognized as fully sovereign entities and legitimacy faces higher stakes without a coercive central authority, the question is compounded. This thesis will draw upon the works of prominent legal and international relations scholarship to claim that morality cannot be separated from a human rights-based international legal system. More specifically, the project advances a claim of conceptual necessity: if international law is to issue genuine obligation—rather than mere externally coerced compliance—it must be intelligible to rational agents through moral reasoning. Legal positivism, particularly as articulated by H.L.A. Hart through the Separability Thesis, offers a partial account of law’s structure through social rules and recognition, yet proves insufficient to explain binding force absent moral criteria. Through engagement with Hobbesian anarchy, Hart’s rule of recognition, the Nuremberg Tribunal’s rejection of morally neutral legality, Dworkin’s account of principled adjudication, Wendt’s constructivist understanding of international social orders, and Nussbaum’s capabilities-based human rights framework, this thesis contends international law’s authority cannot rest on coercion, habit, or social fact absent morality alone. In the absence of a global sovereign, international law binds not through threat of force but shared moral understandings embedded in human rights norms. The case of Tuzla, which is presented, also illustrates that where moral principles are internalized and socially enacted, legal order can endure even under conditions of violent anarchy. International law, therefore, can properly be called law only insofar as it incorporates a moral core rendering obligation conceptually coherent to rational political actors.
Start Time
15-4-2026 10:00 AM
End Time
15-4-2026 11:00 AM
Room Number
252
Presentation Type
Oral Presentation
Presentation Subtype
UG Orals
Presentation Category
Arts and Humanities
Student Type
Undergraduate
Faculty Mentor
Michael Allen
International Law for International Crises: How Can International Ties Bind?
252
Jurisprudence has wrestled with the question of morality’s role in law, or lack-thereof, primarily arriving at two camps. There are those who believe law’s identity is separable from moral principle, while other scholars claim law cannot be meaningfully conceptualized apart from morality. At the level of international law, where states are recognized as fully sovereign entities and legitimacy faces higher stakes without a coercive central authority, the question is compounded. This thesis will draw upon the works of prominent legal and international relations scholarship to claim that morality cannot be separated from a human rights-based international legal system. More specifically, the project advances a claim of conceptual necessity: if international law is to issue genuine obligation—rather than mere externally coerced compliance—it must be intelligible to rational agents through moral reasoning. Legal positivism, particularly as articulated by H.L.A. Hart through the Separability Thesis, offers a partial account of law’s structure through social rules and recognition, yet proves insufficient to explain binding force absent moral criteria. Through engagement with Hobbesian anarchy, Hart’s rule of recognition, the Nuremberg Tribunal’s rejection of morally neutral legality, Dworkin’s account of principled adjudication, Wendt’s constructivist understanding of international social orders, and Nussbaum’s capabilities-based human rights framework, this thesis contends international law’s authority cannot rest on coercion, habit, or social fact absent morality alone. In the absence of a global sovereign, international law binds not through threat of force but shared moral understandings embedded in human rights norms. The case of Tuzla, which is presented, also illustrates that where moral principles are internalized and socially enacted, legal order can endure even under conditions of violent anarchy. International law, therefore, can properly be called law only insofar as it incorporates a moral core rendering obligation conceptually coherent to rational political actors.
