International organization is generally regarded as an aggregate of machinery and processes whereby states cooperate with each other for the attainment of common objectives. Granting the validity of this conception, it may be shown that the fields in which states coöperate are of vital importance to individual persons. The international treatment of economic questions looks toward the improvement of the economic status of the individual. The cooperative efforts of states in regard to so-called political questions, such as disarmament, arbitration, and alliances, either promote amicable relations conducive to profitable transactions between the nationals of different countries or lead to hostile activities that injure economic activity and place the individual under the necessity of bearing arms.
The advisability of permitting judges from litigant states to participate in hearings before international judicial tribunals has been a subject of disagreement on several occasions. It provoked serious controversy for the first time at the Hague Conference of 1907, when the proposed Court of Arbitral Justice was under discussion. Recently it has received even more attention in connection with the establishment of the Permanent Court of International Justice and in discussions of amendments to the Statute of the court and its rules.