Populism's Antagonism to International Law: Lessons from Latin America

Abstract

International legal scholarship often assumes that populists will have an antagonistic relationship with international law.1 But a view from Latin America, where populism has been an object of study since the early twentieth century, tells a more complex story: populist leaders have engaged in multilateralism, promoted regional unity, and attempted to create international institutions. And populists as well as non-populists have resisted international institutions. This essay questions the assumption that populists have an antagonistic relationship with international law, and argues that this assumption lacks robust empirical support and is theoretically underdeveloped. Latin America is a particularly significant site for challenging this assumption, given the prominent role of the executive in foreign relations2 and the rich intellectual history regarding populism itself. The essay concludes by stressing the need for developing a theoretical framework for the study of populism and international law, which international legal scholarship currently lacks. Such a framework should be less Euro-centric and less normatively biased: it should not assume that resistance to international law is always without merit. And it should also allow us to identify what is distinctively populist about populism's relation with international law and which aspects are mediated by populism's host ideologies.