ABSTRACT
This chapter explains the cult of state sovereignty is inconsistent with the doctrine of leadership responsibility and the time has come for international law and the legal order to reassess its continued viability in light of the contemporary problem of indigenous spoliation. It tries to clear away the debris standing in the way of a full understanding of the nature of the State in an effort to show that its cognate doctrines Act of State and Sovereign Immunity arose in specific circumstances to address specific needs of a particular historical epoch. Michael Reisman has taken international lawyers to task for not paying enough attention to the historical incidents from which political advisers infer their normative universe. The Peace of Westphalia is generally viewed as a watershed in modern state history. Hersch Lauterpacht found the notion of granting immunity from jurisdiction, in order to avoid any affront to a foreign sovereign's prestige, offensive and archaic and recommended that it be abandoned.
