Significance of International Law in Contemporary World

Muhammad Shoaib Khan
We regularly witness or every so often even face violations of our essential human rights and freedoms and getting on the spot and effective legal recommendation is step one to address those violations and handle a huge range of diverse legal instances and matters. This is where the international law comes in. International law is something that can play crucial role in maintaining the law and order on the global level and can enable states to survive effectively in an anarchical world. Although, there is some constraint on the international law being a weak law as there is no sovereign body to govern the enforcement and to monitor the behavior of the states. Apart from this, the influence of major power can also play pivotal role in exhibiting the weakness of international law. Despite having certain weaknesses, it is still of immense importance for the states, their relations particularly in the ongoing century. International law is covering variety of aspects and encompasses rules for multi-dimensional phenomena. From individuals to states, state succession to recognition, from settlement of disputes to sea-based activities, it has got rules and regulations for issues arising in majority of the spheres. It also ensures basic human rights as well. It makes sure that the rights of every single subject of international law is protected, and in case any disagreement arises, it is resolved in a just manner. Following the end of World War II, the United Nations was established to preserve and promote worldwide peace. The United Nations is the regulatory body that monitors the behavior of states and have created specialized bodies like International Court of Justice and International Criminal Court to deal with matters. These entities are crucial for upholding the international legal guidelines and statutes put forth as a result of collaboration of states of the world. As already mentioned, owing to the factor of power politics and influences of the great powers in the decision making of security council, legitimacy of the body has been questioned several times. Despite that, there are certain achievements on the credit of the universal organization as well which include the improvement of a frame of international regulation, number of conventions, treaties covering large number of areas of influence, aiming to improve the situation of social development, as well as to advancing international peace and security International law particularly assumes great deal of importance if seen in the context of twenty first century where the world is highly globalized and is intertwined in web of complex interdependence. When states are highly dependent on each other for their basic needs and activities, it is quite predictable and easy to comprehend that the disputes and disagreements are inevitable. It becomes impossible or extremely difficult for states to deal with disputes in a coercive way since this approach is going to demand a huge price. It will have harsh set back to the economy of that state particularly and to some extent the economy of whole world. To settle such disputes in a peaceful way, it is extremely important for us to have set of rules and regulations that can enable states to settle the issue without inclining to opt for coercive measures. How the states are linked with each other and how bilateral issue between two states can have detrimental impact on the world economy can be seen in case of Russia-Ukraine War. Where the country being sanctioned is only Russia but the economy of whole world is suffering.