ABSTRACT
The legal argument still depends on the formal and universalizeable character of Kuwait's statehood and not the substantive, particular quality of that statehood in the circumstances of the Gulf. This chapter examines these challenges to statehood, and to what extent they might or should contribute to the emergence of what some have called a "new world order". The practical effects of such international standards may still be rather small, but their existence means that a state may not claim that mere statehood justifies any internal activities. Moral critics have argued that the very notion of sovereign statehood strengthens the national egoism that has been responsible for so many of the cataclysms of the present century. Nationalism tends to work in a similar fashion, not only as a substantive aspiration threatening statehood but also as a remarkable instrument supporting statehood. The status of statehood can be associated with various sets of rights and duties. It carries no given, determinate, normative implications.
