Chapter 2: Sources of international law

View the transcript here.

Key points for reflection:

• Identifying sources within and beyond Article 38
• Primary sources: themselves establish the validity of a rule
• Secondary/material sources: provide evidence of the existence of a rule—but its validity depends on a further source
• Who is empowered to make, interpret, or change international law?
• Treaties: written agreements consented to between States
• Custom: the practices of States if consistent and uniform, if backed up by the requisite belief that they are required
• General principles: in fact cut across national legal orders, must be common across different legal traditions as well
• Other sources: often influential without being determinative:
• Judicial decisions
• Academic writings
• The work of bodies such as the International Law Commission
• Resolutions of international organisations