RECONCEIVING ENGAGEMENT WITH INTERNATIONAL LAW IN A POPULIST ERA
Publications
by: Peter Danchin, Jeremy Farrall, Jolyon Ford, Shruti Rana & Imogen Saunders
This article proposes a conceptual framework for analysing contemporary patterns of state engagement and disengagement with international law and institutions amid rising populist backlash against the post-1945 liberal order. It examines how populist governments in constitutional democracies often challenge, delegitimise, or withdraw from treaty-based and other international bodies. Existing scholarship on the link between domestic populism and multilateral disengagement remains under-empirical; this article addresses that gap by developing an analytical framework to map and assess how states and other actors interact with international law and institutions. The framework moves beyond a binary of “engagement” versus “disengagement,” enabling closer evaluation of the relationship between rhetoric and action. It also provides a basis for future empirical studies of state–institution interactions over time and offers broader utility for analysing modes of engagement with international institutions regardless of the drivers involved.
by: Peter Danchin, Jeremy Farrall, Jolyon Ford, Shruti Rana & Imogen Saunders
This article challenges the view that populism is merely a reaction against law, arguing instead that it emerges from tensions within liberal constitutional democracy itself. It reveals how shifts in international legal thought have contributed to the rise of populism by clashing with competing visions of political authority and legal normativity.
by: Nina Araneta-Alana, Jeremy Farrall
Jo Ford & Imogen Saunders
Given President Duterte’s well-known critiques of the UN and other multilateral institutions, the article examines how the Philippine administration actually navigated international legal and institutional relationships. The study reveals a more complex dynamic than outright disengagement. Drawing on empirical work, it traces the divergence between rhetoric and institutional action, the instrumental use of international law to advance domestic political priorities, and the critical filtering role of domestic institutions in mediating international commitments. The article offers insights into the interplay between populism, foreign policy, and multilateralism.
by: Jolyon Ford and Imogen Saunders
This article explores James Crawford’s 2017 metaphor of the international legal system as a sedimentary geological formation: things laid and layered down over time, some parts hardening, some becoming ‘core’. Crawford’s remarks were made in the context of concerns about erosion of parts of the post-1945 system amid the rise, in liberal democracies, of populist critiques of supranational governance. Crawford suggested that erosion of ‘non-core’ aspects and artefacts of international law may not be cause for alarm, invoking Vattel’s distinction between the ‘necessary’ and ‘voluntary’ law of nations. The article critically assesses Crawford’s approach and the accuracy and utility of the geological metaphor.
by: Jolyon Ford
This book explores how populist politics have challenged the human rights movement and asks whether the movement itself bears some responsibility for its current crisis. It offers a provocative reimagining of human rights as tools for human flourishing and resistance to power in an age of ‘fake news’ and democratic backsliding.
by: Peter G. Danchin, Jeremy Farrall, Shruti Rana and Imogen Saunders
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This Essay examines a series of paradoxes that have rendered the international legal order’s mechanisms for collective action powerless precisely when they are needed most to fight COVID-19. The“patriotism paradox” is that disengagement from the international legal order weakens rather than strengthens state sovereignty. The“border paradox” is that securing domestic populations by excluding noncitizens, in the absence of accompanying regulatory mechanisms to secure adherence to internal health measures, accelerates viral spread among citizens. The “equality paradox” is that while pandemics pose an equal threat to all people, their impacts compound existing inequalities.
by: Peter Danchin, Jeremy Farrall, Jolyon Ford, Imogen Saunders and Daan Verhoeven
This article examines the global backlash against international law and institutions as a reaction to perceived overreach by liberal internationalism, globalization, and elite-driven governance. It argues that this backlash, driven by populist movements and national sovereignty concerns, is not entirely new but reflects longstanding tensions in the international legal order. The authors call for responses that either reform, retreat from, or reimagine global law, urging a more pluralistic and democratically grounded approach to international cooperation.
by: Jolyon Ford
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This Article assesses Prime Minister Morrison’s
rhetoric and action in light of the ‘populism + international law’ literature. Reinforcing the call for greater empiricism, the article argues that the Morrison example does not necessarily support prevailing literature’s assumption of ‘populism = multilateral disengagement’. The article further explores tensions between bureaucrats’ commitment to multilateralism and their imperative to be responsive to elected leaders.
by: Jolyon Ford
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This Policy Brief stems from an analysis of a 2019 cabinet process and reveals the resilience of diplomacy. Isolationist rhetoric failed to change foreign policy due to the persuasive efforts of public servants.
by: Nina Araneta-Alana
In this policy brief published by the ANU Philippines Institute, Dr. Araneta-Alana explores the challenge to human rights under the Duterte administration, with a focus on engagement with international institutions, specifically the United Nations Human Rights Council and the International Criminal Court.
by: Jolyon Ford
In this op-ed piece published in The Strategist, Professor Ford argues the rise of populism presents an opportunity to reform international institutions, making them more legitimate and effective by addressing long-overdue changes.
