POLS1005 Chapter Notes - Chapter 11: International Criminal Court, Rome Statute Of The International Criminal Court, Judicial Activism
19 Jul 2018
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Document Summary
International law: a body of rules that binds states and other agents in world politics and is considered to have the status of law. International law is a body of rules linked together in a common logical structure. Rules must be woven together by one or more unifying principles. The principle unifying concept is sovereignty, especially the notion that all states have equal rights to make international law and can be bound by law only by their own consent. The status of law, a body of rules must include both primary and secondary rules. Primary rules are the negative and positive rules regulating behaviour. Secondary rules are the constitutions that structure the making of primary rules, or the rules about how rules are made. In the case of international law, sovereignty implies a rule about how other rules are made : under sovereignty, only states can bind themselves to international law.
