Scholarship as Dialogue? TWAIL and the Politics of Methodology

Abstract

Scholars of International Criminal Law (ICL) and Third World Approaches to International Law (TWAIL) rarely speak to each other and part of the reason for this is often divergent approaches to methodology. Thus this article begins with an exploration of the ways in which international lawyers (mis)conceive methodology in their work so as to account for patterns of scholarly dialogue as well as silence. I argue in this article that ICL scholars can learn from TWAIL experiences with methodology, especially as the ICL field leaves the ‘honeymoon’ phase and enters a more ‘mature’ period that calls for greater reflexivity by practitioners and scholars alike. Understanding methodology with and against TWAIL is one way of contributing to ICL’s scholarly evolution.