Didn't international law evolve out of the rules that traders established
(lex mercatoria)?
On Tue, Jul 10, 2001 at 10:03:31PM -0700, Ian Murray wrote:
> < http://www.ejil.org/journal/Vol12/No1/art1.pdf >
>
> Abstract
> International trade is undergoing a transformation commonly referred
> to as 'constitutionalization'. Despite the ubiquity of the phrase, its
> meaning remains ambiguous and its significance underexplored. The
> purpose of this article is to suggest that one plausible
> interpretation of 'constitutionalization' in the international trade
> law context is that it refers to the generation of a set of
> constitutional-type norms and structures by judicial decision-making
> in the Appellate Body of the World Trade Organization. Unlike the work
> of John Jackson, Ernst-Ulrich Petersmann and Joseph Weiler
> (emphasizing institutions, rights and metaphysics respectively), this
> article will focus on judicial constitutionalization. Four trends will
> illustrate this: constitutional doctrine amalgamation, system
> constitution, subject matter incorporation, and constitutional value
> association. The identification of these trends reveals the underlying
> structure of the constitutionalization debate. Visible through the
> tribunal's carefully crafted formulations of rules and justifications
> are the mainstay principles of constitutional reasoning (democracy and
> governance, constitutional design, fairness, and allocation of policy
> responsibility). Ultimately the arguments presented here convert the
> discussion from a debate about whether the WTO is a constitution into
> a set of speculations on the
--
Michael Perelman
Economics Department
California State University
Chico, CA 95929
Tel. 530-898-5321
E-Mail [EMAIL PROTECTED]
