Don't Let International Law Become an Exotic Field Irrelevant for Lawyers…Seven Demands

Abstract

Globalization and the current state of society demand a better understanding of the international aspects of problems and legal solutions available. Climate change, migration, poverty, terrorism, pandemics (like COVID-19) etc. require international cooperation, or at least a good understanding to what extent domestic solutions are affected by those taken in other countries. The recent mess created by nationalistic and protectionist measures showed too often the lack of knowledge regarding available mechanisms and coordination. This has weakened the relevance of the already challenged treaties and institutions (as core elements of international law) even more. This is not only true during the current crisis of multilateralism. In view of the long tradition of European integration and close cooperation between European States, one might think that in Europe international law plays a more important role in the education of lawyers. This is astonishingly not entirely true. Many of these States have long traditions of nation-building that also influence the legal culture. The idea that the typically German or English system in training lawyers should be preserved and that the domestic legal systems needs to be protected often leads to a focus on outdated syllabi and a reluctance to integrate international law into the teaching. In this respect, even the importance of European Union law has little changed in the teaching and makes the problems described in this contribution as relevant to Europe as to most legal systems around the world. A recent study (Scoville and Berlin, 2019) holds that legal tradition and regional geography predict variation undermine accounts that attribute all differences to national needs or socio-political conditions, suggest a variety of new research questions and indicate that, in at least one area, inter-traditional and inter-regional socialization might be the most effective mechanism for harmonizing national practices and perspectives. This is not a new finding, but it is surprising that ...