Dialoguing in multiplication: an approach

Abstract

Th is article aims to shortly get close to a bunch of issues that demonstrate the complex quality of today’s dialogue among international courts. Th e piece starts from a key statement made by Hersch Lauterpacht in the thirties of the twentieth century that overcoming the doctrine of non-justiciability of certain issues before courts was a prerequisite to the achievement of a “peaceful organization of the international community”. Although such doctrine is hardly invoked today, the “peaceful organization” – even if we take into account the idealist and abstract tone of such term – was barely achieved within the international community. Taking into consideration that existent international courts are inserted in a context of multiplication, one can realize that the institutionalization of a hierarchy among them is unattainable; rather, the idea that they should dialogue is more feasible. However, an appeal to the need for dialogue brings in itself a number of complex issues that some authors, such as Anne-Marie Slaughter, seem not to pay due regard. Th e eff ort to make international courts dialogue demands from international lawyers a greater commitment to understand the empirical reality in which courts are entailed, something not easily found in the present generation of experts. In the end, the article claims that it is necessary to enhance an agenda more focused on empirical issues within the chapter of the peaceful settlement of international disputes.