International Law Tips

What is International Law?

In the 21st century, a great deal of attention is paid to international law. You probably have heard reference to international law with some regularity on television or have read about international law on the Internet and World Wide Web. With that said, and with the frequency of the term of international law being used in this day and age, you may not yet understand exactly what international law is all about.

First of all, many people assume that the United Nations is the primary source of international law in this day and age. In point of fact, the United Nations really is not a law making body whatsoever. The United Nation does pass resolutions with some frequency. Resolutions that are passed by the United Nations become a part of the overall body of international law. However, in and of themselves, they are not legally binding in the same manner that a law passed by a national legislative body is within the borders of a given nation. Rather, they are advisory in most instances.

With that said, there are United Nations resolutions that call for a nation to take certain actions. Nonetheless, the United Nations itself does not maintain a military force per se. (A United Nations military deployment actually consists of military service people drawn from member nations.)

The primary part of international law in the 21st century are treaties and conventions that have been entered into between various nations in the world today. A prime example of a well known convention is the Geneva Convention that deals with how prisoners of war should be treated.

Another example of a treaty that is a part of international law is the nuclear nonproliferation treaty which theoretically prevents non-nuclear nations from obtaining or developing nuclear weapons. Naturally, the examples mentioned in this article are but a few of the thousands of treaties entered into through the years by various countries the world over.

There are a number of basic texts on the market today that can provide you with some essential information about international law. These books are available at most major booksellers. In addition, many community libraries now maintain books on the subject of international law. Further, colleges and universities generally do also maintain international law texts on their shelves. Finally, as with so many things in the 21st century, the Internet and World Wide Web can be helpful and useful resource for a person searching for basic information about international law and related topics.