NATURAL LAW AND LEGAL POSITIVISM: INTEGRATIVE JURISPRUDENCE AND THE LEGALITY OF HUMANITARIAN INTERVENTION
INTRODUCTION
International Law is an evolving dialogue between competing approaches and cannot be simply categorized. There is usually a choice put forward between Legal Positivism and Natural law in order to understand international law, however, this choice need not be made. International actors actually employ international law according to both approaches and neither, entirely or partly. The natural law tradition can be traced back to the time of Socrates and the Stoics. The legitimacy of it relies on its obedience to higher values of justice and morality. Over time, Natural Law was criticized as legal theorists maintained that morality …show more content…
Positive Law at state level has clear legitimacy because of a clearly delegated sovereign and people’s acceptance of that authority, however, international law cannot enforce policies on states as they see this as an attack on their sovereignty and autonomy. Natural law exists not only as the foundation of positive international law, but as the reason international law is possible. The upsurge of Legal Positivism led to the demise of Natural Law theories (NLT); however NLT experienced revival, under the umbrella of human rights, after the barbaric atrocities committed in World War II. It is extremely important to remember that both these approaches have contributed to International Law and have also shaped it to a large …show more content…
After the atrocities of World War II, NLT experienced resurgence. Humanitarian intervention is essential here because it generated a debate between legal theorists, which would get to the core of the tension between law and morality. Through the course of this paper, that the assertions of legal positivism and natural law alone are inadequate as illustrative paradigms for understanding the operation of international law today. This is also one of the main reasons why the debate surrounding humanitarian intervention has reached a sort of
INTRODUCTION
International Law is an evolving dialogue between competing approaches and cannot be simply categorized. There is usually a choice put forward between Legal Positivism and Natural law in order to understand international law, however, this choice need not be made. International actors actually employ international law according to both approaches and neither, entirely or partly. The natural law tradition can be traced back to the time of Socrates and the Stoics. The legitimacy of it relies on its obedience to higher values of justice and morality. Over time, Natural Law was criticized as legal theorists maintained that morality …show more content…
Positive Law at state level has clear legitimacy because of a clearly delegated sovereign and people’s acceptance of that authority, however, international law cannot enforce policies on states as they see this as an attack on their sovereignty and autonomy. Natural law exists not only as the foundation of positive international law, but as the reason international law is possible. The upsurge of Legal Positivism led to the demise of Natural Law theories (NLT); however NLT experienced revival, under the umbrella of human rights, after the barbaric atrocities committed in World War II. It is extremely important to remember that both these approaches have contributed to International Law and have also shaped it to a large …show more content…
After the atrocities of World War II, NLT experienced resurgence. Humanitarian intervention is essential here because it generated a debate between legal theorists, which would get to the core of the tension between law and morality. Through the course of this paper, that the assertions of legal positivism and natural law alone are inadequate as illustrative paradigms for understanding the operation of international law today. This is also one of the main reasons why the debate surrounding humanitarian intervention has reached a sort of