The Politics of International Economic Law: Legitimacy and the UNCITRAL Working Methods.

Claire R. Kelly, Brooklyn Law School

Abstract

Abstract The process of international lawmaking is, in part, a function of both politics and the attempt to engage in legitimate norms generation. States seek power through process in the international sphere. But States also use process enable representative, transparent, and effective rules. This paper considers how we might begin to deconstruct procedural proposals involving international norm generation by taking a look at a recent controversy over the methods of work at the United Nations Commission on International Trade Law (UNCITRAL). It will consider various paradigms to assess the legitimacy claims of international norms as applied to one particular controversy and consider specifically whether proposals to regulate decision-making as well as the participation of nonmembers serve legitimacy or politics or both.