Andre Nollkaemper

Biography

André Nollkaemper is Professor of Public International Law and Vice-Dean for Research at the Faculty of Law at the University of Amsterdam, and Academic Director at the Amsterdam Center for International Law (ACIL). He is also Member of the Advisory Committee for Public International Law of the Government of the Netherlands; and of-counsel for international law with Böhler, an Amsterdam-based law-firm specialising in transnational and international litigation. He has given legal advice on cases before the European Court of Human Rights, the Special Court for Sierra Leone, the International Criminal Tribunal for the Former Yugoslavia, the Extraordinary Chamber for the Courts of Cambodia and courts of the Netherlands. He is Editor-in-Chief of International Law in Domestic Courts and author of many publications on the relationship between international law and national law (including National Courts and the International Rule of Law, OUP, forthcoming 2011) and international responsibility. In 2010, he received a 5-year Advanced Investigator Grant by the European Research Council (ESR) for a project on Shared Responsibility in International Law. He is member of the Board of ESIL. He co-directs the research project; The Internationalisation of the Rule of Law of the Hague Institute for the Internationalisation of Law (HiiL).

Abstract

The Bifurcation of International Law: Two Futures for the International Rule of Law

The continuing quest for the international rule of law will not develop along a uniform path. The main divergence will be between two models. In the first model, the international rule of law is confined to the international level. Here, progress can be expected to be slow, and to vary between regimes. In the second model, the international rule of law mingles with the domestic rule of law. Here it will be much more powerful, as it can profit from national institutions. However, the development of this second model will be uneven across the world, as it depends on varying degrees of national legal empowerment. Moreover, it creates fundamental dilemmas, as the very international law which seeks to impose itself on the national legal order remains rooted in the international legal order with its relatively limited rule of law quality. Therefore, the two futures for the international rule of law are intrinsically connected. The international rule of law will be able to strengthen the national rule of law, and profit from its superior enforcement mechanisms, to the extent that the rule of law at the international level will be strengthened.