This article has a simple hypothesis: Selectivity in international law increases as international relations become more symmetrical. Conversely, international law becomes more universal as asymmetry grows. This relation holds true during the modern period. Its existence in turn supports the...

The old understanding of international law as something created solely by and for sovereigns is defunct. Today the production and enforcement of international law increasingly depends on private actors, not traditional political authorities. As with other public services that we used to take for...

Assessing the legitimacy of any legal system is hard, but especially if the system in question is the volatile and contested field of international law. Recognizing limits of space and my capabilities, I reframe the task for this chapter. Rather than defending or attacking the legitimacy of...

In this paper, forthcoming in the Virginia Law Review, I explore the role of litigation as a policy-making and rule-generating process in the context of a democratic republic. In democracies, legislatures redistribute wealth, rights, and privileges; debate rages over the direction of this...