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Americans And The Quest For An Ethical International Law, Mark Weston Janis

Faculty Articles and Papers

Foreign critics sometimes accuse Americans of taking a hypocritical stance on international law. They say we preach an ethical international law to others, but practice a selfishly utilitarian international law ourselves. Here is the remarkable opinion, given just last year, of a leading European international lawyer. Martti Koskenniemi, a distinguished Finnish scholar, is Professor of International Law at the University of Helsinki and a Global Professor of Law at New York University. Koskenniemi believes that the Europeans speak the language of universal international law, but: How differently the Americans see the world! Legalization, is just a policy choice, a matter …