Somek: Defective Law

Alexander Somek (Univ. of Iowa - Law) has posted Defective Law. Here's the abstract:

The article takes up the foundational challenge of public international law (“Is it really law?”) in a different key. It shifts the focus from exploring effectiveness or the rule of law to the question of what it takes for actors to participate in a legal relationship. A relationship of this type involves distance in compliance as well as distance in engagement. Law is defective, but nonetheless law, whenever a mismatch arises in the relation of one and the other. The article explains that core parts of public international law are constitutionally deficient. Doctrinal attempts to address this deficiency give rise to defective law.