Scientific Advances and International Law Making

Abstract

THAT THE WORLD of the sixties is radically different from that of previous generations is a truism to which international lawyers, no less than others, pay deference. They are frequently, almost routinely, reminded of the great changes in international society: the scientific and technological revolutions, the end of the empires and the burgeoning of new states, ideological challenges to existing power structures and traditional norms, the growth of international institutions and co-operative arrangements. No student of international law can be oblivious of these factors and of their potential relevance to international law. At the same time, in the eyes of the other professions, international lawyers appear traditional and old-fashioned in their intellectual approach, more concerned with precedents and verbal niceties than with the facts and figures of a rapidly changing environment or the techniques of change. They may, in a more kindly view, be regarded as the present-day classicists, dedicated to principles of reason and skilled in the analysis of concepts, in close reading of documents, in structured argumentation. But these time-honored skills are generally considered as only marginally relevant to solving the problems thrust up in a world of sweeping change and novelty, and the international lawyer will often be viewed as a draftsman or rhetorician who has little to contribute to substantive analysis. The present symposium is a welcome indication of the contrary. Nearly all of the contributors are international lawyers. They have not been intimidated by the complexities or the arcane character of scientific advances, and they have not hesitated to deal with substance and policy. Indeed, their principal contribution may be said to lie in the clarification of policy, more particularly, in relating the present and potential impact of advancing technology to the basic political, economic and social goals of the body politic. There is, moreover, little disposition to rely on the slow growth of custom, or on the unseen hand, to harmonize national interests and avoid conflict. The lawyer's main task is viewed as the purposive creation of norms and procedures to regulate the future. In reading the contributions, one is reminded of President Kennedy's observation to a group of scientists: Every time you scientists make a major