US Foreign Policy and international law

Résumé du document

The United States has been the main supporter of the development of international rules since the end of World War II. The US sought to rebuild an international system that would promote international cooperation in various areas to avoid conflicts: economic (through the creation of an International Trade Organization), financial (the International Monetary Fund), development (the International Bank for Reconstruction and Development), maintenance of international peace (the United Nations), and all characterizing US attachment to "legalism." Although it is undeniable that the US has always been trying to influence this international legal system and to use it to achieve its national objectives (and that is understandable since the US has been a hegemonic for 60 years), US policy has recently changed.

Extraits

[...] The US seems more inclined in negotiating about climate change, did not block a Security Council Resolution deferring the situation in Darfur to the ICC and seeks international support to deal with the nuclear proliferation issue (to reduce the threats in Iran and North Korea, and to set up a legal framework for lawful nuclear cooperation with India). The rise of potential threats and future (China and India) could ponder the strength of exceptionalism and the need for cooperation. Christopher Joyner, “International in Encyclopedia of American Foreign Policy, 2nd edition p.264. [...]

[...] The Department of Justice tried also to justify the use of new interrogation techniques that could be seen as torture. The problem is the definition of torture, but under the 1949 Geneva Conventions, the International Covenant on Civil and Political Rights (ratified in 1992) and the Convention against Torture and Other Cruel, Inhuman or Degrading Treatment or Punishment (ratified in 1994).[xviii] The US has also overridden international rules in an area that is paradoxically one it has always sought to develop: international trade. [...]

[...] US Foreign Policy and International Law The United States has been the main supporter of the development of international rules since the end of World War II. The US sought to rebuild an international system that would promote international cooperation in various areas to avoid conflicts: economic (through the creation of an International Trade Organization), financial (the International Monetary Fund), development (the International Bank for Reconstruction and Development), maintenance of international peace (the United Nations), and all characterizing US attachment to “legalism.”[i] Although it is undeniable that the US has always been trying to influence this international legal system and to use it to achieve its national objectives (and that is understandable since the US has been a hegemonic for 60 years), US policy has recently changed. [...]

[...] Bush's administration implies the rejection of all international rules. The US has always respected international rules, but what is specific since 2001, is that the US has been trying to use international law when it serves US interests, sometimes in a paradoxical way. The first example of this strategy is the policy adopted so far by the US towards Iran and North Korea, with regard to their nuclear program. The US, Iran and North Korea are parties to the Non Proliferation Treaty, and thus bound to international legal rules. [...]

[...] It will thus be interesting to see what the effect of the Biden-Lugar Resolution S.Res will be. It would indeed the 1997 Byrd-Hagel Resolution, “expressing the sense of the Senate” that the US should negotiate another international agreement. That resolution was approved in the Foreign Relations Committee and might be sent to the floor in the coming weeks. UN Security Council, Resolution 1422, July [xii] Joyner, “International p.260. [xiii] Christopher Joyner, “Gulliver Unbound: US Foreign Policy and Its Implications for International New Zealand Yearbook of International Law, Vol [xiv] William H. [...]