International Law - Essay Example

According to a school of thought, international law, in the modern sense of the term, does not exist in antiquity. This is because international law necessarily co-exists with a league of nations and in antiquity there were only empires and city-states but no formally organized association of states. A semblance of international law in antiquity was in Greece and Rome. Ancient Greece was made up of city-states forming a community with a common religion, language, and civilization. These city-states constantly dealt with each other commercially and diplomatically. Ancient Rome, it was an empire that absorbed many of the Western independent nations. When the empire fell, however, many of the rules and laws it imposed in commerce and in other areas also faded away. Nevertheless, many of the rules and principles of international law took root in the ancient Greco-Roman systems although such rules and principles were often employed as rules of religion and laws for international relations of one state with foreign states forming part of its municipal law.

1. Ancient Greece

Although the Greeks did not foster close relations with their neighbors, they had to deal with their components, the city-states, which are independent of each other. Each of the city-states (or polis) comprising Greece had their respective economic and political systems. Each was considered a religious community and the rules and laws that characterized their relationships were called religious obligations and not laws (Bederman 2001:33) Some of these were: the avoidance of war; if unavoidable, should be commenced only through a declaration; heralds or messengers not to be harmed; fallen soldiers in battles entitled to burial; in the event of a city’s capture, refugees in temples to be spared; prisoners of war cannot be killed, but only ransomed, enslaved or exchanged; priests and seers also to be spared (Kaczorowska 2010:8).

Moreover, it was Greece that first developed a highly sophisticated system of arbitration and proxeny (state hospitality), which is the basis of diplomatic immunity (Kaczorowska 2010:2). Associations and federations were also periodically formed among city-states for the purpose of establishing non-interference agreements, full citizenship grants, offensive and defensive alliances or for religious reasons. With respect to other states, however, ancient Greece was in a perpetual state of war due to its experience in the Persian Wars in 500-479 BCE, when Persia invaded and captured its colonies (Bederman 36-37).

1. Ancient Rome

Rome, which is considered the most influential of all ancient civilizations, entered into treaties with neighboring Latin states, but once it started to expand its empire it employed the principles of jus fetiale and jus gentium in conducting relations with foreign states. Jus female are religious laws that governed wars. Wars must be underpinned by a reason, otherwise, they are unjust. Jus gentium or the law of tribe, on the other hand, governed Rome’s conduct with non-Romans and the conduct of Roman citizens with non-Roman citizens. This body of laws was made up of norms and concepts that were believed to be common and acceptable to both Romans and non-Romans. It primarily regulated the relations between private individuals and was first crafted by the praetor peregrinus or special magistrate. Jus gentium has greatly influenced the European legal systems and public international law (Kaczorowska 2010:3). In addition, the doctrine of natural law, believed to have anteceded human rights, was first created by the Stoic philosophers of ancient Greece and was subsequently adopted by the Romans. This doctrine is underpinned by the existence of right reason as something inherent in man and nature and therefore, capable of being discovered (Kaczorowska 2010:9).

1. Conclusion: Greco-Roman Influence on the UN Charter

The avoidance of war as well as the principle of just war, which first appeared in ancient Greece as religious obligations and in ancient Rome embodied in the principle of jus female, have evidently influenced the general non-aggression doctrine adopted by the United Nations Charter. Moreover, these principles are also mirrored in Article 51, Chapter VII of the said Charter that sanctions war only as a last resort for individual or collective self-defense pending the action of the Security Council to impose measures for the maintenance of peace and order. The concept of diplomatic immunity was also adopted by the Charter particularly Articles 104 and 105 thereof, where host states are obliged to grant diplomatic immunity and privileges to state representatives to the UN necessary for the exercise of their functions as such. The principle of jus gentium or the general principles of law first crafted by the Romans is also evident in Article 38(1)(c) of the International Court of Justice (or ICJ). The ICJ is an international organ established by the UN Charter under Article 7(1) and Articles 92 to 96 thereof. The ICJ Statute enumerates international conventions as one of the sources of international laws under Article 38(1). Finally, the principle of human rights, a product of natural law adopted by the Romans, is a recurring theme of the Charter as evidenced by the Preamble, Article 1(3), and Article 68, among others.

1. Greece and Rome Today

Greece gained its independence from the Ottoman Empire in 1829 and has been a member of the EU (then EC) since 1981. In 2010, however, it failed to meet its euro-denominated debt and created a strain within the European Economic and Monetary Union raising the question of whether a member may voluntarily remove itself or be removed from the Union. Greece is a parliamentary republic and its legal system is based on codified Roman law. On the other hand, Rome is the capital city of Italy, a republic that follows the civil law system and is a member of the UN but has not accepted compulsory ICJ jurisdiction (The World Factbook 2010).