Introduction

Abstract

It is not infrequent to encounter claims to the effect that there exists a dichotomy between the “rule of law” and political expediency based on the concept of national interest, posing a perennial dilemma in the maintenance of normal international relations among States. The basic reason for this dilemma is said to lie in the very nature of the functions of law and politics in international relations, the former, by definition, regulating the conduct of its subjects, and the latter striving to maximize the power of nation states through whatever means are available to them, including the violation of rules of conduct, the validity of which the former purportedly claims. The nature of international law has been described categorically by a leading proponent of the realist school as follows:

International law is a primitive type of law resembling the kind of law that prevails in certain preliterate societies, such as the Australian aborigines and the Yurok of northern California.¹