ABSTRACT
The current notion of the State as a Subject of International Law is formal and confines the international lawyer to identify whether it has acted within the competencies accorded to it by the international legal order. That legal order, in turn, supposes that the State is competent to do whatever has not been prohibited by the legal order. However, that order regulates only a minimum of the issues of order which any social order, national or international, needs to regulate. Hence, in practice, disputes among States usually have aspects clearly regulated by law, but also aspects which are not. This incompleteness of the order – in a sociopolitical sense – leads frequently to accusations of double standards in relation to the parts of international affairs which are agreed to be already regulated by law. Yet the International Law Commission (ILC) confines itself, in its studies, to issues of the competencies of States as subjects of the international order. It does not have to do so, given its term of reference. So, the way is open for it to rethink the notion of the State with which it works, and to confront openly the sociopolitical demands which international law does not formally address at the moment. However, this will require a radical rethink of the intellectual skills which international lawyers need.
