ABSTRACT
At a 2016 meeting of the American Society of International Law, Benvenisti and Nouwen (2016) explored whether the system of international criminal justice faced a “crisis of legitimacy.” Building on an earlier debate in the European Journal of International Law in 2010, Nouwen and Werner argued that the deeply held, albeit erroneous, claim by legal advocates and academics that law is impartial renders it “a strong tool in political struggles” (Nouwen and Werner, 2011b, p. 1164). The authors were responding to a critique of their initial contribution, which argued that, while one may seek to “mobilise the law” in the context of a (violent) conflict, “the structure of the law itself escapes the logic of the political” (Schotel, 2011, p. 1154).
