Review: International: The Future of Law in a Multicultural World
| Author | W.R. Lederman |
| Published date | 01 March 1973 |
| Date | 01 March 1973 |
| DOI | 10.1177/002070207302800112 |
| Subject Matter | Review |
REVIEWS
161
All
three
books
illustrate
in
different
ways
a
fundamental
dilemma
of
normative
studies on
world
order:
whether
the
primary
criterion
is
to
be
the
creation
of
world
government or
the
promotion
of
human
welfare.
The
long
essay
by
David
Mitrany
in Mr
Twitchett's
book
shows
some
of
the
contradictions
between
these
priorities.
Mitrany
restates
the
doctrine
of
functionalism
which he
articulated in
the
1940s
as
being
the
surest
path
towards
the creation
of an
international
authority.
Now
a
quarter
of
a
century
later,
he
explicitly
rejects
na-
tional
economic
planning
and he
criticizes
the
nation-building
efforts
of
leaders
in
newly
independent
countries
-
both
tendencies which
he
sees as
strengthening
nationalism
and
obstructing
international
func-
tionalism.
Yet
to
those
concerned
primarily with
welfare,
the
nation-
state
and
national
planning
seem
to
be
the
most
potent
available
instruments
for
human
betterment.
For
Mitrany,
nationalism
is
a
priori
an
evil,
and
'the
purpose
of
the
UN
is
to advance
a
liberal
inter-
nationalist
policy'
(p
169).
This
is
esoteric
doctrine,
remote
from
some
of
the
most
powerful
forces
of
world politics
whose
legitimacy
it
denies.
In
the
same
volume,
Susan Strange
points
to the
failure
in
practice
of
functionalist
doctrine
-
the
international
bureaucracies
'have
not
been
able
to
filch
power
by
stealth' (p
116).
Nor
has developmentalism,
suc-
cessor
to
functionalism
as
a
central
doctrine
attempting
to
give
purpose
and
strategy
to
international
organization, proved
to
be
entirely
cred-
ible.
The
UN
Development
Decade has
been
a
disappointment.
Susan
Strange
concludes:
'The
reason
for
the
current
malaise and
world-
weariness
in
the
UN
is
precisely
because
no
third
contender
has
appeared
to
take
the
ideological
lead
and
to
give
inspiration
for
effort.'
These
three
books
leave
the
field
open
still.
R.W.
Cox/Columbia
University
THE
FUTURE OF
LAW
IN
A
MULTICULTURAL
WORLD
Adda
B.
Bozeman
Princeton:
Princeton
University
Press
[Toronto:
Saunders],
1971,
xviii,
229pp,
$2.70
Professor
Bozeman
has
provided
a
deeply
penetrating
analysis
of
the
nature
of
international
law
and
organization
in
the
modern
world.
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