Democratizing International Law

Abstract

Jus cogens are peremptory norms of international law. No treaty between states can violate them. They are based on fundamental moral precepts and are supposed to reflect a global consensus. As a result, the views of the people of the world – not just states and courts and international lawyers – ought to be assessed as part of that. Direct democratic input into what should be considered jus cogens can be promoted by convening Global Citizens' Juries on the norms under discussion. Deliberations in small groups of people drawn from many nations can provide robust indicators of what world opinion would be, if everyone had access to similar information and discussions. Where broad consensus emerges across several such Global Citizens' Juries, countries, courts and others ought to take that into account in deciding what to treat as preemptory norms of international law. Such a process would make a significant contribution to improving the democratic deficit that currently prevails in making and implementing international law.

Biography of the Speaker

Bob Goodin (DPhil Politics, Oxford, 1975) is Distinguished Professor of Social & Political Theory and of Philosophy in the Research School of Social Sciences, Australian National University. From 2011 he will also be Professor of Government at the University of Essex, where he taught for a decade

before moving to ANU. He is founding editor of The Journal of Political Philosophy and was General Editor of the eleven-volume series of Oxford Handbooks of Political Science as well as founding editor of the Cambridge University Press series of books on 'Theories of Institutional Design'. One strand of his recent work concentrates on normative and empirical issues surrounding the welfare state in comparative perspective – his coauthored book Discretionary Time (CUP 2008) in that genre won the Stein Rokkan Prize for Comparative Social Science Research. Another strand concentrates on deliberative democracy in theory and practice – his Innovating Democracy (OUP 2008) is his latest book-length contribution to that genre.