Towards a new jurisprudence of international organizations law

Abstract

This chapter ties together some of the threads woven in the previous chapters. It discusses the history of thought in the field of international organizations law, as it applies to a “common law” of international organizations’ constitutions. It also discusses the case against such a common law. Legal researchers have seen the folly of trying to develop a unified law of international organizations, even if they did not have access to a database like the one at the heart of this book. This chapter reviews some of this thinking and shows how the analysis of these constitutions bolsters their case. It also describes the developing jurisprudence, particularly in international tribunals, against the idea of a single, solitary, unifying law of international organizations. As reflected in the diversity observed in the network analyses and legal analyses of constitutions provided in the preceding chapters of this book, this chapter sees laws of international organizations, not a singular law of international organizations. Any attempt in the future to describe the law of international organizations must accept this variegated plurality, this differentiated heterogeneity, in the principles underpinning our international organizations’ constitutions.