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Original Articles

Establishing the Argumentative DNA of International Law: A Cubistic View on the Rule of Treaty Interpretation and its Underlying Legal Culture(s)

Christian Djeffal PhD student, Humboldt Universität zu Berlin, Germany. The author thanks Dr Helmut Aust and Michael Fischer for their valuable comments. He is also grateful for the opportunity to present this paper at the conference ‘Transatlantic Debates in International Legal Theory’, organised by the Legal Theory Interest Groups of the American Society of International Law and the European Society of International Law and funded by the project Rechtskulturen of the Berlin Research Network Recht im Kontext. All websites accessed June 2014.
Pages 128-157 | Published online: 07 May 2015

  • Philip Allott, The Health of Nations (Cambridge University Press, 2004) 264.
  • For a list, see www.dgfr.de/forschungsnetzwerke/organisationen.
  • See, for example, the Fifth Biennial Conference of the European Society of International law in Valencia, which dealt with the issue of regionalism.
  • See eg the contributions concerning Russia's approach to international law in (2012) 12 Baltic Yearbook of International Law 1.
  • Anthea Roberts, ‘Comparative International Law? The Role of National Courts in Creating and Enforcing International Law' (2011) 60 British Yearbook of International Law 79, raising the question of whether there will be ‘judicial theories’ about international law attached to national jurisdictions such as Canadian international law or British international law. Another good example is the concept of Europeanisation that has the potential also to denote the influence of Europe on international law as defined by Jan Wouters, André Nollkaemper and Erika de Wet, ‘Introduction: The “Europeanisation” of International Law' in Jan Wouters, André Nollkaemper and Erika de We t (eds), The Europeanisation of International Law (TMC Asser Press, 2008) 1–16.
  • In 2007, for example, the German Yearbook of International Law asked whether there was a German approach to International Law: see (2007) 50 German Yearbook of International Law 15. In the same year, the Heidelberg Journal of International Law published papers emanating from a lecture series about the future of international legal science in Germany: see (2007) 67 Heidelberg Journal of International Law 583.
  • Jean Galbraith, ‘Comparing International and US Approaches to Interpretation', http://opiniojuris.org/2012/11/09/the-oxford-guide-to-treaties-symposium-comparing-international-and-us-approaches-to-interpretation.
  • Pierre Larouche, ‘A Vision of Global Legal Scholarship' (2012) 34 Tilburg Law and Economics Center Discussion Paper 2.
  • Vienna Convention on the Law of Treaties (1969) 1155 UNTS 331 (hereinafter VCLT or Vienna Convention).
  • Richard D Kearney and Robert E Dalton, ‘The Treaty on Treaties' (1970) 64 American Journal of International Law 495.
  • United Nations Treaty Collection, Ch XXIII Law of Treaties, treaties.un.org/Pages/ViewDetailsIII.aspx?&src=TREATY&mtdsg_no=XXIII∼1&chapter=23&Temp=mtdsg3&lang=en.
  • See ILC, Draft Articles on the Law of Treaties with Commentaries [1966] Yearbook of the International Law Commission, vol II, 187ff. On the whole process see Richard Gardiner, Treaty Interpretation (Oxford University Press, 2010) 69–72.
  • See eg Charles C Hyde, International Law Chiefy as Interpreted and Applied by the United States (Little, Brown, 2nd edn 1945) 1468-69; the delegate of Greece Mr Krispis, United Nations Conference on the Law of Treaties (New York First Session 1968–1969) (1969) A/CONF.39/11, 172 para 7.
  • See United Nations Conference on the Law of Treaties (New York First Session 1968–1969), ibid, xxii.
  • Ibid, 166–85.
  • The ILC Proposal as well as the drafted amendment can be found in the appendix below.
  • See Draft (n 12).
  • Ibid. Most of the differences are also outlined at the beginning of the statement: see Myres S McDougal, ‘Statement of Professor Myres S McDougal, United States Delegation, to the Committee of the Whole, April 19, 1968' (1968) 62 American Journal of International Law 1021. The statement is summarised in the Draft (n 12) at 167–8 paras 38–50. I thank Richard Gardiner who pointed me to the fact that a more complete version has been published in the American Journal of International Law. This essay uses the text reprinted in the American Journal of International Law since there is no difference in content apart from the fact that it is more explicit and more detailed.
  • The focus lies here on the differences between the approaches. An extensive description of both approaches is provided by John G Merrills, ‘Two Approaches to Treaty Interpretation' [1968–9] Australian Yearbook of International Law 55. See also Richard Gardiner, ‘The Vienna Convention Rules on Treaty Interpretation' in Duncan B Hollis (ed), The Oxford Guide to Treaties (Oxford University Press, 2012) 475–506; Gardiner (n 12) 67–68; Sandra Voos, Die Schule von New Haven (Duncker & Humblot, 2000) 121–8.
  • See McDougal (n 18) 1021 or the statement of the Delegate of the Republic of Viet-Nam, Mr Phan-Van-Thinh, United Nations Conference on the Law of Treaties (1968-1969 First Session, New York) (n 13) 168 para 51.
  • See the detailed argument in Gardiner (n 12).
  • Ibid.
  • See McDougal (n 18) 1022.
  • See Robert Kolb, Interprétation et création du droit international: esquisses d'une herméneutique juridique moderne pour le droit international public (Bruylant, 2006) 459–69.
  • See McDougal (n 18).
  • Ibid, 1021–2.
  • Ibid, 1022-3.
  • Ibid, 1024-7.
  • Ibid, 1021.
  • Ibid, 1021–2.
  • Ibid, 1024.
  • United Nations Conference on the Law of Treaties (New York First Session 1968–1969) (n 13) 177–8 paras 2–11.
  • Ibid, 177 para 6.
  • Ibid, 178 para 8.
  • Ibid.
  • Ibid, 184 paras 66–74; see especially paras 67–69 on preparatory works, para 70 on the ordinary meaning of words, para 72 on hierarchy, and para 73 on the distinction between the two articles.
  • Ibid, para 66.
  • Ibid, para 67.
  • Ibid, para 68.
  • Ibid, para 69.
  • Myers S McDougal, ‘The International Law Commission's Draft Articles upon Interpretation: Textuality Redivivus' (1967) 61 American Journal of International Law 992;on his critique see generally Ingo Venzke, How Interpretation Makes International Law: On Semantic Change and Normative Twists (Oxford University Press, 2012) 3–4.
  • Gerald Fitzmaurice, ‘Vae Victis or Wo e to the Negotiators! Your Treaty or Our “Interpretation” of It?' (1971) 65 American Journal of International Law 358.
  • As is the case with all narratives, theories will be simplified on several accounts to ft into the narrative structure.
  • See eg Martti Koskenniemi, The Gentle Civilizer of Nations: The Rise and Fall of International Law 1870–1960 (Cambridge University Press, 2008) 482–3, 500; Steven Ratner, ‘Legal Realism School' in Rüdiger Wolfrum (ed), The Max Planck Encyclopedia of Public International Law (Oxford University Press, 2012) 805 para 17.
  • See for this metaphor Robert Kagan, ‘The US-Europe Divide' Washington Post, 26 May 2002; Robert Kagan, Of Paradise and Power: America and Europe in the New World Order (Vintage, 2004).
  • [1966] Yearbook of the International Law Commission, vol II, 199.
  • 'La première Maxime générale sur l'interprétation est, qu'il n'est pas permis d'interpréter ce qui n'a pas besoin d'interprétation’: Emer de Vattel, Le Droit des gens (London, 1758) bk II, ch XVI, § 263.
  • Ibid, § 271.
  • See eg Robert Phillimore, Commentaries upon International Law (T & JW Johnson, 1855) 73; Henry Bonfls, Manuel de droit international public (Arthur Rousseau, 1894) 460.
  • Rudolph von Jhering, Scherz und Ernst in der Jurisprudenz (Linde International, 1884) 331.
  • Jan Schröder, ‘Begriffsjurisprudenz' in Albrecht Cordes (ed), Handwörterbuch zur deutschen Rechtsgeschichte: HRG (Schmidt, 2nd edn 2008) 501.
  • See eg Hyde (n 13) 1468–1502, Myres S McDougal, ‘International Law, Power, and Policy: A Contemporary Conception' (1953) 82 Recueil des Cours 133; Myres S McDougal, Harold D Lasswell and James C Miller, The Interpretation of Agreements and World Public Order (Yale University Press, 1967) 36.
  • Harvard Law School, ‘Harvard Draft Convention on the Law of Treaties' (1935) 29 American Journal of International Law, Art 19.
  • See Charles C Hyde, International Law Chiefy as Interpreted and Applied by the United States (Little, Brown 1922); Harvard Law School (n 53) 946.
  • Harvard Law School (n 53) 937.
  • Myres S McDougal, ‘Some Basic Theoretical Concepts about International Law: A Policy-Oriented Frame work of Inquiry' (1960) 4 Journal of Conflict Resolution 337; McDougal, Lasswell and Miller (n 52) 52–39.
  • See Tsune-Chi Yü, The Interpretation of Treaties (Columbia University Press, 1927) 37–38, 138; Harvard Law School (n 53) 956.
  • McDougal, Lasswell and Miller (n 52) xvii.
  • See Michael Martin, Legal Realism: American and Scandinavian (P Lang, 1997) fn 123; Ratner (n 44) 805–6 paras 20–23.
  • Ibid, 804 para 5.
  • Ibid, 804–5 paras 15–16.
  • The new terms as well as the general language of the book were criticised severely by Fitzmaurice (n 42) 42–359.
  • Detlev F Vagts, ‘Treaty Interpretation and the New American Ways of Law Reading' (1993) 4 European Journal of International Law 472;in relation to the practice of courts see Evan Criddle, ‘The Vienna Convention on the Law of Treaties in US Treaty Interpretation' (2003) 44 Virginia Journal of International Law 431 and the respective chapters by David Sloss, Michael D Ramsey and William S Dodge in International law in the US Supreme Court: Continuity and Change (Cambridge University Press, 2011).
  • Hersch Lauterpacht, ‘The So-Called Anglo-American and Continental Schools of Thought in International Law' (1931) 12 British Yearbook of International Law 31.
  • American Law Institute, Restatement of the Law Second: Foreign Relations Law of the United States (American Law Institute Publishers, 1965) 452 § 147.
  • Ibid, 452 § 147(2).
  • Arnold D McNair, The Law of Treaties (Oxford University Press, 1961) 411–12; Hartwig Blück, ‘Vertragsauslegung' in Karl Strupp and Hans-Jürgen Schlochauer (eds), Wörterbuch des Völkerrechts (de Gruyter, 2nd edn 1962) 550; Ludwik Ehrlich, ‘L'Interprétation des traités' (1928) 24 Recueil des Cours 118.
  • John Westlake, International Law (Cambridge University Press, 1904) 282–3.
  • For the so-called relaxed test see Pepper (Inspector of Taxes) v Hart [1992] UKHL 3, 28.
  • See especially Hersch Lauterpacht, ‘Les Travaux préparatoires et l'interprétation des traités' (1937) 62 Recueil des Cours 713.
  • Lauterpacht (1950) 43 Annuaire de Droit International 433 and (1952) 44 Annuaire de Droit International 222.
  • See eg McDougal (n 18) 1024.
  • Fitzmaurice (n 42) 370.
  • McDougal (n 18) 1025.
  • Fitzmaurice (n 42) 367.
  • The ILC has reconsidered the elements in Art 31(3). Under the heading of treaties over time, the ILC has dealt mainly with subsequent agreements and subsequent practice in a working group. See Georg Nolte (ed), Treaties and Subsequent Practice (Oxford University Press, 2013). After the third report of the chair person of the working group, a Special Rapporteur was called upon to issue further reports, the frst of which is First Report on Subsequent Agreements and Subsequent Practice in Relation to Treaty Interpretation by Special Rapporteur Georg Nolte, Reports of the ILC in its 65th session (6 May-7 June and 8 July-9 August 2013). The question of the relevant rules as contained in Art 31(3)(c) VCLT was dealt with in ILC, Fragmentation of International Law: Difficulties Arising from the Diversification and Expansion of International Law, Reports of the International Law Commission on the Work of its 42nd session (1 May-9 June and 3 July-11 August 2006), UN Doc A/CN.4/L.682.
  • McDougal (n 41) 41–992.
  • Brian Z Tamanaha, Beyond the Formalist-Realist Divide: The Role of Politics in Judging (Princeton, 2009).
  • Hermann F Kantorowicz, Der Kampf um die Rechtswissenschaft (Heidelberg, 1906); Ernst Stampe, ‘Gesetz und Richtermacht' [1905] Deutsche Juristen-Zeitung 1140; Ernst Stampe, ‘Rechtsfndung durch Interes-senserwägung' [1905] Deutsche Juristen-Zeitung 713; Ernst Stampe, ‘Rechtsfndung durch Konstruktion' [1905] Deutsche Juristen-Zeitung 417.
  • This is argument is developed elegantly by James E Herget and Stephen Wallace, ‘The German Free Law Movement as the Source of American Legal Realism' (1987) 73 Virginia Law Review 399.
  • See only François Gény, Méthode d'interprétation et sources en droit privé positif: essai critique, vol I (Librairie Générale de Droit & de Jurisprudence, 2nd edn 1919) and the volume's foreword by Raymond Saleilles.
  • See generally Stefan Vogenauer, Die Auslegung von Gesetzen in England und auf dem Kontinent: Eine vergleichende Untersuchung der Rechtsprechung und ihrer historischen Grundlagen (Mohr Siebeck, 2001) 331.
  • Gény (n 81) 300.
  • Ibid.
  • Ibid, vol II, 90–92.
  • See further Oliver Diggelmann, Anfänge der Völkerrechtssoziologie (Schulthess, 2000).
  • See Martin (n 59).
  • Interestingly, Brian Leiter in a paper soon to be published argues that those strands are totally different and cannot be compared. For a rather cultural approach outlining a shared legal tradition see Heikki Pihlajamäki, ‘Against Metaphysics in Law: The Historical Background of American and Scandinavian Legal Realism Compared' (2004) 52 American Journal of Comparative Law 469. Both the cultural similarities and the jurisprudential differences are dealt with in Gregory S Alexander, ‘Comparing the Two Legal Realisms—American and Scandinavian' (2002) 50 American Journal of Comparative Law 131.
  • Antonin Scalia and Bryan A Garner, Reading Law: The Interpretation of Legal Texts (Thomson/West, 2012).
  • Andrei Marmor, ‘Textualism in Context' (2012) 12–13 University of Southern California Legal Studies Research Paper Series; Stanley Eugene Fish, ‘Intention and the Canons of Legal Interpretation', http://opinionator.blogs.nytimes.com/2012/07/16/intention-and-the-canons-of-legal-interpretation/?_php=true&_type=blogs&_r=0; James R Maxeiner, ‘Scalia & Garner's Reading Law: A Civil Law for the Age of Statutes?' (2013) 6 Journal of Civil Law 1, who interestingly argues that continental jurisprudence today would also include extra-textual factors.
  • See the critical discussion by William N Eskridge, Jr, ‘The New Textualism' (1989) 37 University of California Los Angeles Law Review 621.
  • The richness of the American discourse is evidenced by a panel discussion summarised here: ‘Panel: Some Contemporary Problems in Treaty Law Suggested by the Draft Articles on the Law of Treaties of the International Law Commission: Comments' (1967) 61 American Society of International Law Proceedings 204.
  • His disciples and followers diligently omit to mention the word ‘theory’ for his thinking as he was very skeptical about the use of this word.
  • Benedict Anderson, Imagined Communities: Reflections on the Origin and Spread of Nationalism (Verso, rev edn 2006 [1983]); Ernest Gellner, Nationalism (New York University Press, 1997); John Breuilly, Nation alism and the State (Manchester University Press, 2nd edn 1993 [1985]); Eric J Hobsbawm, Nations and Nationalism since 1780: Programme, Myth, Reality (Cambridge University Press, 2nd edn 2012 [1990]).
  • Anderson (n 94) 4.
  • Ibid, 9–12; Hobsbawm (n 94) 94–9.
  • See eg Adrian Hastings, The Construction of Nationhood: Ethnicity, Religion and Nationalism (Cambridge University Press, 2007) 2–3.
  • Breuilly (n 94) 2.
  • Otto von Gierke, Das deutsche Genossenschaftsrecht (Weidmannsche Buchhandlung, 1868, 1873, 1881, 1913) 4–5.
  • Jan Thiessen, ‘Otto von Gierke (1841–1921) Rechtsgeschichte, Privatrecht und Genossenschaft in Briefen und Postkarten' in Stefan Grundmann, Michael Kloepfer and Christoph G Paulus (eds), Festschrift 200 Jahre Juristische Fakultät der Humboldt-Universität zu Berlin: Geschichte, Gegenwart und Zukunft (de Gruyter, 2010).
  • See very generally Niklas Luhmann, Die Wissenschaft der Gesellschaft (Suhrkamp, 2009); Dick Pels, Unhastening Science: Autonomy and Reflexivity in the Social Theory of Knowledge (Liverpool University Press, 2003).
  • Michael Haas, Polity and Society: Philosophical Underpinnings of Social Science Paradigms (Praeger, 1992).
  • For a general account of the problem See eg Alfred Schütz, ‘Concept and Theory Formation in the Social Sciences' (1954) 51 Journal of Philosophy 257. See also Peter L Berger and Thomas Luckmann, The Social Construction of Reality: A Treatise in the Sociology of Knowledge (Anchor Books, 1966) 53–61.This is for example the basic assumption of Searle which leads him to reconsider the concept of theory in natural science: see John R Searle, The Construction of Social Reality (Free Press, 1995) 4–9. For a similar theoretical approach that nevertheless tries to sustain the distinction between natural sciences and Geisteswissenschaften, see Johan A Schülein, ‘Soziale Realität und das Schicksal soziologischer Theorie' in Georg Kneer and Markus Schroer (eds), Handbuch Soziologische Theorien (VS Verlag für Sozialwissenschaften, 2009).
  • In relation to natural sciences, this was one of the major arguments made by Thomas Kuhn, The Structure of Scientific Revolutions (University of Chicago Press, 3rd edn 1996).
  • This does not of course apply if the theory is obviously based on false presumptions or is not coherently composed. This, however, is not often the problem.
  • See Peter V Zima, Was ist Theorie? Theoriebegriff und Dialogische Theorie in den Kultur- und Sozialwissen-schaften (UTB, 2004) 42–43; Edward A Tiryakian, ‘Tiryakian' in Wolf Lepenies (ed), Geschichte der Soziologie: Studien zur kognitiven, sozialen und historischen Identität einer Disziplin (Suhrkamp, 1981) 17–28.
  • Raimon Panikkar, ‘Is the Notion of Human Rights a Western Concept?' (1982) 30 Diogenes 75.
  • Georg Nolte, ‘Introduction' in Georg Nolte (ed), Treaties and Subsequent Practice (Oxford University Press, 2013) 1–12.
  • See eg Theodor Viehweg, Topik und Jurisprudenz (CH Beck, 4th edn 1969) 88.
  • Chaim Perelman and Lucie Olbrechts-Tyteca, The New Rhetoric: A Treatise on Argumentation (Notre Dame Press, 1969); Julius Stone, Legal System and Lawyers' Reasonings' (Stevens, 1964). For international law see Martti Koskenniemi, From Apology to Utopia: The Structure of International Legal Argument (Cambridge University Press, 2005) esp 566. For a general account of the process of interpretation see Venzke (n 41).
  • Friedrich V Kratochwil, Rules, Norms, and Decisions: On the Conditions of Practical and Legal Reasoning in International Relations and Domestic Affairs (Cambridge University Press, 1991) 234–6.
  • For an introduction to the notion of Aristotle's topics, see Christof Rapp, ‘Aristotle's Rhetoric', Stanford Encyclopedia of Philosophy (Spring 2010 edn), Edward N Zalta (ed), http://plato.stanford.edu/archives/spr2010/entries/aristotle-rhetoric (accessed 26 August 2013). An accessible table summarising the topics is provided by Douglas N Walton, Fabrizio Macagno and Chris Reed, Argumentation Schemes (Cambridge University Press, 2008) 281–2.
  • Aristotle, Rhetoric, Book II.22.
  • Ibid.
  • Antoine Arnauld and Pierre Nicole, Antoine Arnauld and Pierre Nicole: Logic; or, The Art of Thinking, JV Buroker (trans) (Cambridge University Press, 1996).
  • Ibid, ch XVIII.
  • Ian Brownlie, Principles of Public International Law (Oxford University Press, 2008) 636–8; Malgosia Fitzmaurice, ‘Treaties' in Rüdiger Wolfrum (ed), The Max Planck Encyclopedia of Public International Law (Oxford University Press, 2012) paras 22–28.
  • The picture can be accessed here: http://mathworld.wolfram.com/Rabbit-DuckIllusion.html. It frst appeared in Fliegende Blätter (23 October 1892) 147. It was then inquired into by Joseph Jastrow, ‘The Mind's Eye' (1899) 54 Popular Science Monthly, and was later taken up by Ludwig Wittgenstein, Philo sophical Investigations (Blackwell, 1958) 165–6. The use by Koskenniemi is reported by http://miriamaziz.wordpress.com/2014/05/01/max-planck-institute-masterclass-in-international-law-may-1–2014.
  • ILC, Draft Articles on the Law of Treaties with Commentaries, [1966] Yearbook of the International Law Commission, vol II, 218 para 1.
  • See American Law Institute (n 65).
  • Ehrlich (n 67) 67–95.
  • Pasquale Fiore, Le Droit international codifé et sa sanction juridique (A Pedone, 1911) 404 ff.
  • See for examples Marcelo Kohen's interesting discussion of the concept of desuetudo and obsolescence in international law, in which he draws much inspiration from the foundations of those doctrines in Roman law: Marcelo G Kohen, ‘Desuetude and Obsolescence of Treaties' in Enzo Cannizzaro (ed), The Law of Trea ties Beyond the Vienna Convention (Oxford University Press, 2011) 350–9.
  • Amendment A/CONF.39/C.1/L.156, United Nations Conference on the Law of Treaties, 1968–1969 Documents of the Conference, New York 1971, A/CONF.39/1 l/Add.2, 149.

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