Building Pragmatic Utopias: The "Other" Security Council, International Law, and the United Nations Dream

In: German yearbook of international law: Jahrbuch für internationales Recht, Band 60, Heft 1, S. 607-636

Abstract

This article revisits certain aspects of the foundational idea of international cooperation within the framework of the United Nations. By providing an empirically grounded analysis of the use of international law by the Security Council, the article aims at redesigning the breadth, scope, and limits of the United Nations utopian mission of creating a world without war. An argument is made that despite significant legal and political limitations, the United Nations is delivering an increasingly humanised type of international cooperation. Hence, after seven decades it is still on track eventually to deliver a pragmatic utopia.