Democracy and International Law in the Post Colonial World: International Democracy Documents: A Compilation of Treaties and Other Instruments, edited by Frithjof Ehm & Christian Walter, Martinus Nijhoff 2015

• Author: Pranoto Iskandar
• Pages: 799-806

e Indonesian Journal of International & Comparative Law

ISSN: 2338-7602; E-ISSN: 2338-770X

http://www.ijil.org

© 2016 e Institute for Migrant Rights Press

Book Review

DEMOCRACY AND INTERNATIONAL

LAW IN THE POST COLONIAL WORLD

International Democracy Documents: A Compilation of Treaties and

Other Instruments, edited by Frithjof Ehm & Christian Walter, Martinus

Nijho 2015

International law has long been considered a tool that is employed

merely in favor of furthering the neo-colonial project among wider

non-Western legal scholars.1 While this critical stance is undoubtedly

of utmost importance for the third world’s struggle against the per-

sistency of the exploitative nature of the classical conception of inter-

national law,2 however, it has unwittingly deprived itself an opportuni-

ty in developing a more pragmatically grounded view of international

law for the benet of the Global South’s population.3 It should not be

1. See e.g., A A, I, S   M

 I L (2007); B.S. Chimni, A Just World under Law; A View

from the South, 22 A. U. I’ L. R. 199-220 (2007); B.S. Chimni, Inter-

national Institutions Today: An Imperial Global State in the Making, 15 E. J.

I’ L. 1-37 (2004); James uo Gathii, TWAIL: A Brief History of Its Origins,

Its Decentralized Network, and a Tentative Bibliography, 3 T, L.  D. 26-

64 (2011); Dianne Otto, Postcolonialism and Law, 15 T W L. S.

Vii-xviii (1999).

2. It should not be a surprise that “the Dumbarton Oaks dra of Articles 1(2)

and 55 did not contain any reference to self-determination.” M.K. Nawaz, e

Meaning and Range of the Principle of Self-Determination, 14 D L. J. 88

(1965).

3. See Brad R. Roth, Governmental Illegitimacy and Neocolonialism: Response to