International Law

Good book came in good shape

Britain's top two university presses have competing texts on public international law (PIL): Brownlie's Principles, now written by James Crawford, from Oxford, and Malcolm Shaw's book from Cambridge. I've never taught PIL per se, though I teach some subjects that are adjacent to it (such as space law). For many years I've bought alternating editions of both books, so that I always have at least one up-to-date reference on my shelf. Shaw was always my go-to book, but I never thought about there being much difference between the two. That changed with the 2022 Russian invasion of Ukraine. I checked the most recent (9th) editions of both works (2021 for Shaw, 2019 for Brownlie) to see if there was precedent for the UN General Assembly having authority to send in peacekeeping forces. It was much easier to find the appropriate material using Shaw's index. And whereas Brownlie stuck mainly to a superficial "four corners" analysis of the words of the pertinent treaty (in this case, the UN Charter), Shaw also had an extensive discussion of historical practice. As a result, one gets very different conclusions: that the Security Council has a monopoly on sending peacekeepers (Brownlie) vs. that the General Assembly has at times taken on concurrent jurisdiction over such matters, dating back to the Suez Crisis in 1956 (Shaw). In retrospect, this shouldn't have been a surprise: Shaw's main text is 400+ pages longer than Brownlie's, and seems to have somewhat more text per page as well. Perhaps if you're teaching the basics of PIL, or learning it for the first time, Brownlie's more concise treatment is an easier choice for getting the main ideas across. But for a better idea of how PIL has actually worked in practice, Shaw is hands-down -- or hands-on -- superior as a general reference, before checking more specialized works.

) Great book and it came fast :)

Das erste Buch ging auf dem Versandweg verloren. Wie so viele Bestellungen in letzter Zeit. Das zweite exemplar, das ich bestellt habe, kam beschädigt an. Ziemlich enttäuschend! Die Rezension bezieht sich selbstverständlich nicht auf den Inhalt und Aufbau des Buches. Dieser ist großartig! Wer ein Buch in gutem Zustand will, sollte wohl eher auf den regionalen Handel zurückgreifen. Das werde ich zukünftig auch wieder machen.

英語圏における国際法の概説書です。日本だとおそらく岩澤先生の『国際法』が最厚で、比較的新しい物ですが、本書はより分厚く、新型コロナへの言及もある新しさです。 章立てが日本の標準的な国際法の概説書と違います。海外だと流れや力点が違うのかもしれません。 分厚い上、版も大きく重すぎて持ち運びはとてもムリですね。コンクリートブロックみたいなイメージ。

With tons of cases, examples, history and of course, doctrine, I consider this to be the most exceptional complete guide to international law there is.