Editorial: Populism and International Law: Global South perspectives

Authors

DOI:

https://doi.org/10.5102/rdi.v17i2.7273

Keywords:

International law, populism, global south

Abstract

The rise of populist governments around the world has been a source of concern for international legal scholars. As a result, the field of international law witnesses a range of academic publications analyzing recent populist movements and their impact on international law as we know it. These analyses have focused on different areas of international law and their institutions, such as trade, environment, human rights, labor and migration. Across these different contexts, populism has been equated with authoritarianism, and a fundamental challenge to a liberal international legal order. Further, international law is often approached in a binary/antagonistic fashion, either as a tool to ban populist-driven policies or as an instrument to allow such policies to thrive, and states are seen as part of a binary of either populist and challengers to international law, or democratic and favoring liberal internationalism. This scholarship therefore, while valuable, tends to miss more nuanced accounts of co-production of domestic regime (il)legitimacy and international ordering as part of a continuum that does not fit “either/or” accounts.

Author Biographies

  • Fabio Costa Morosini, Faculdade de Direito da UFRGS
    Fabio Morosini is an associate professor at the Federal University of Rio Grande do Sul School of Law. He is also a research fellow at the National Council of Scientific and Technological Development (CNPq, Ministry of Science and Technology, Brazil). In addition to his current role, Professor Morosini has taught law at the University of Michigan Law School. During the 2015–2016 academic year, he was a Global Hauser Research Fellow at New York University School of Law. Professor Morosini holds a PhD and an LLM from the University of Texas at Austin and a master's degree, with honors, from the University of Paris 1/ Paris' Institute of Political Sciences. Upon completion of his PhD, he was a post-doctoral fellow at the World Trade Organization. He has presented papers before the United Nations and World Trade Organization in Geneva, on the health & environmental policies in WTO jurisprudence, and on trade & climate change, respectively. Professor Morosini has taught at the United Nation's Regional Courses in International Law. His recent edited and co-edited books include Reconceptualizing International Investment Law from the Global South (CUP, 2018), Regulacao do Comercio e Investimento Estrangeiro (Saraiva, 2017), and Direito Internacional: Abordagens Críticas (Almedina, 2020).
  • Lucas Lixinski, UNSW, Sydney Australia
    Law

References

Tom Ginsburg, ‘Authoritarian International Law?’, The American Journal of International Law, vol. 114(2), 221-260 (2020), at 222

Brian J Preston, ‘The End of Enlightened Environmental Law?’, Journal of Environmental Law, vol. 31(3), 399-411 (2019).

Nienke Grossman, ‘Populism, International Courts, and Women’s Human Rights’, Maryland Journal of International Law, vol. 35, 101-123 (2020). See also Ginsburg, 221

Laurence R Helfer, ‘The ILO at 100: Institutional Innovation in an Era of Populism’, AJIL Unbound, vol. 113, 396-401

Cassese, The Human Dimension of International Law (OUP, 2008).

Heike Krieger, ‘Populist Governments and International Law’, The European Journal of International Law, vol. 30(3), 971–996 (2019), 973.

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Published

2020-12-12

Issue

Section

Dossiê especial: Populismo e Direito Internacional: perspectivas do Sul Global

How to Cite

Editorial: Populism and International Law: Global South perspectives. (2020). Revista de Direito Internacional, 17(2). https://doi.org/10.5102/rdi.v17i2.7273