Beyond the West and the Rest: the Foundations of Cosmopolitanism and the Future of International Law

Abstract

For the past thirty years, the phrase “Beyond the West and the Rest” has often been used in the debates on international relations. The conference starts by recalling a few obvious facts about International Law and the West: and then proceeds to show that international law underwent a dramatic change in the course of the 20th century. It then goes on to argue that though international law has changed deeply, its main tenets remain Western, before introducing some of the ethical changes that should be adopted to complete the transition from the current situation to a cosmopolitan world – which is a world structured not according to the classical dualist perspective of “Us and the Other” but rather in a monistic perspective of “Us-Into-the-World”.