Contract Theory and the Enforcement of International Law

One of the best things to happen to the international law academy in recent years is the introduction of methodological insights from other parts of the academy. Professors Jack Goldsmith and Eric Posner, for instance, introduced a long overdue application of rational choice theory to international law in their recent book “The Limits of International Law.” Similarly, in an important new book, Professors Robert Scott and Paul Stephan offer some insights on the nature of international law enforcement drawing upon the developments in domestic U.S. contract law theory. Here is the publisher’s synopsis of their book, entitled “Limiting Leviathian: Contract Theory and the Enforcement of International Law.”

Much of international law, like much of contract, is enforced not by independent sanctions but rather through cooperative interaction among the parties, with repeat dealings, reputation and a preference for reciprocity doing most of the enforcement work. The Limits of Leviathan identifies the areas in international law where formal enforcement provides the most promising means of promoting cooperation, and where it does not. In particular it looks at the International Criminal Court, the rules for world trade, efforts to enlist domestic courts to enforce orders of the International Court of Justice, domestic judicial enforcement of the Geneva Convention, the domain of international commercial agreements, and the question of odious debt incurred by sovereigns. This book explains how international law, like contract, depends largely on the willingness of responsible parties to make commitments.

Click here to download an order form for the book, which will be available from Cambridge University Press starting in August.

This book is going to be a big contribution from scholars who are already quite big. Robert Scott is the former dean of UVA Law School as well as a noted contract law theorist. Paul Stephan, as many of the readers of this blog know, is a leading scholar of private international law as well as a recent author of key and important amicus briefs to the Supreme Court in cases like Medellin and Sanchez-Llamas. As Professor Laurence Helfer of Vanderbilt writes, “Scholars of international cooperation and treaty design would do well to give The Limits of Leviathan the careful attention that it deserves.”