This chapter charts the evolution of green theorising within International Relations (IR) and situates the Middle East as integral to both the development of global energy regimes and efforts to create global environmental norms and institutions. The chapter shows how green IR theories build upon the study of global environmental politics, political economy, political ecology, and environmental security. The case study of the Yemen conflict highlights how an ageing offshore oil tanker, the Floating Storage and Offloading Safer, became a flashpoint in conflict dynamics between non-state armed actors, international organisations, and regional powers, given the risk of a massive oil spill into the Red Sea and Persian Gulf. The case study emphasises the usefulness of moving beyond conventional units of analysis in IR, such as states, to consider the role of multinational firms and voluntary systems of environmental compliance, as well as shifting analysis to ecological scales, such as watersheds and seas, to fully grasp the cumulative impacts and diverse sources of marine oil pollution. The chapter shows how green theories have questioned fundamental assumptions within IR and opened new avenues of research inquiry.

This chapter identifies and analyses the duty bearers responsible for realising the right to science, challenging claims that the inherently ‘unbounded’ nature of science is incompatible with the traditionally ‘bounded’ structure of human rights obligations. Instead, it argues that difficulties in assigning responsibilities arise from the complexity and diversity of the modern scientific ecosystem. The analysis categorises duty bearers into three main groups: states (and their agents, including universities and funding agencies), international organisations (particularly those influencing intellectual property and trade, such as WIPO and WTO) and non-state actors (comprising private corporations, individual researchers, publishers and private funding institutions). Employing a doctrinal approach rooted in international human rights law, the chapter clarifies the varying degrees of legal and moral obligations incumbent upon these actors.

The United Nations and its bodies have ‘opened up’ to a broad range of non-state actors over the last three decades, including for-profit actors and their representatives. The shift is reflected in the UN’s sustainable development goals and the Global Compact, emphasizing public-private partnerships; in greater participation of corporations at treaty conferences; in trade group roles as observers at organizations; and in multi-stakeholder projects. Yet international organizations have generally not developed robust responses to legitimacy concerns about businesses becoming closely involved in lawmaking and governance projects. These concerns focus on interest group capture, entrenchment of western economic elites, creeping privatization, and erasure of public deliberation. Indeed, the participation of for-profit actors and their representatives has largely been a ‘silent revolution’: under-heralded and under-examined. This chapter argues that responses to for-profit roles in the work of international organizations tend to express one of two logics, not yet reconciled. The logic of ‘representation’ values public authority, interest representation, transparency, and accountability. The logic of ‘expedience’ values pragmatic problem-solving, efficiency, knowledge, and progress. Each has different priorities and blind spots, encompasses an array of theoretical approaches, and would push the international system in a different direction.

This chapter focuses on the use of force by states. It begins with a brief survey of law and force from the era of the ‘just war’ to the rise of the United Nations. The relevant provisions of the UN Charter concerning the use of forces are then examined. In particular, the meaning of art. 2(4), which prohibits the threat or use of force against states, is discussed. The various categories of compulsion are noted, from retorsion and reprisals to the right to self-defence. The latter is carefully examined in the light of practice and art. 51 of the Charter. The use of force in self-defence against non-state actors is addressed, as is the concept of collective self-defence and intervention. The phenomenon of civil wars is noted, as is the theory of humanitarian intervention. The question of terrorism and international law is examined before the chapter turns to the issue of cyber warfare.

This chapter begins by introducing a number of foundational concepts, which serve as the starting point in the field of public international law. Section 1.1 begins with the notion that states are sovereign equals and must consent to be bound by international law. This section also introduces the critical distinction that international law makes between states and ‘non-state actors’. Section 1.2 discusses the inevitable comparison of public international law with domestic legal systems, and the significant limitations of this analogy as a means for understanding the field of public international law. Section 1.3 introduces the subject of the relationship between international and domestic law. Section 1.4 concludes by explaining this book’s overarching structure as well as the approach of this book to the introduction of public international law.

This chapter examines the employment of air and space power in the twenty-first century, considering possible future developments in air and space power out until the year 2040. It notes the growing role of commercialisation in the delivery of air and space power and how businesses such as SpaceX have become a part of military operations through contractorisation. The chapter notes how Western air power advantages have been eroded by developments in Chinese aerospace and the proliferation of increasingly sophisticated missile systems. The rise of drone warfare is covered, along with the procurement of a range of drone and missile systems by non-state actors such as Hamas and Hezbollah; the chapter concludes with considerations of the ways in which this presents challenges going forward and a repudiation of the suggestion, presented by commentators such as Van Creveld, that the ’age of air power’ had drawn to a close.

Chapter 3 engages with the thesis that transnationalisation of law has taken place in the development of Internet regulations, since it was invented in the 1990s. Is it true that a transnational law is developing that is largely free from state influence? What does a factual analysis reveal about the relationship between non-state governance and state regulation in addressing pressing social problems related to the ‘network of networks’? How do approaches to content and technology regulation differ between the United States and the EU? Net neutrality serves as a case study for an in-depth examination of the transnationalisation thesis in the context of the technological preconditions of free speech. In addition to the debates on net neutrality in the United States and the EU, this chapter also analyses the debate in India using the example of Meta Free Basics, which illustrates how the actions of large technology companies can lead to restrictions on freedom of expression. Does the history of net neutrality in these three jurisdictions, where regulatory solutions have been found along national territorial lines, confirm that there is a risk of developing a ‘splinternet’ and speak against a transnationalisation of the law?

This chapter examines how international relations (IR) scholarship has approached two central questions concerning international law and legalisation: why do states create international law, and what makes a particular norm ‘legal’ in nature? It then outlines the concept of legalisation as described in Abbott et al.’s well-known article of the same name. Under the classic legalisation framework, legalisation has three components: obligation, precision and delegation. The chapter argues that the classic OPD framework cannot fully capture the expanding role of non-state actors or conceptualise law as a process. It therefore proposes an adapted model for the transnational legal system that incorporates a crucial omitted dimension – implementation. Implementation refers to the concrete actions taken by agents to translate legal or law-like principles into practical, workable instructions for courts, governments, companies, and other non-state actors.

This chapter examines the philosophical and practical foundations for state regulation of the internet, focusing on the interplay between individual rights and societal interests. It argues that the digital realm introduces unique challenges that require state intervention to preserve the integrity of public discourse and democratic values. Drawing on legal theory, particularly the ideas of Lon L. Fuller, the chapter emphasises the importance of fostering trust, maintaining the rule of law, and balancing power between states, private actors, and users in internet governance. The chapter critiques the traditional view of rights as individualistic and argues for a more community-focused approach, emphasising that human rights should serve the common good. Trust is highlighted as a cornerstone of effective internet governance. The chapter underscores that moving online fundamentally alters the scope, impact, and mechanisms of regulation. Human rights law and governance frameworks must adapt to preserve trust, community, and the integrity of public discourse in the digital age.

This chapter introduces the problem of theorizing international organizations. It breaks down the problem to two parts: the structural relationship between international organizations and their members and conceptual relationship between these institutions and other entities in international law, including states and non-state actors. The first relationship concerns whether international organizations should be analyzed as legally distinct from their members. The second relationship relates to international organizations’ rights, obligations, and capacities in international law, assuming that they are legally distinguishable from their members. The chapter concludes by clarifying how advancing a doctrinal legal theory is understood by this book, as well as the methodology that will be employed in that regard.

This chapter critically examines how international lawyers have conceptualized the structural relationship between organizations and their members. First, it argues that popular accounts behind the notion that international organizations enjoy a personality that is opposable to non-members rest on problematic, and ultimately unproven, assumption. Next, the chapter explores the idea of volonté distincte. This is the notion that international organizations must exhibit a will of their own before they can be thought of as distinct from their members. The chapter zeroes in on the discipline’s most commonly employed test in this respect, namely checking the capacity of an organization to adopt decisions without the consent of all of its members. It argues that, on closer inspection, this test turns out to be incoherent and cannot serve the purpose it was devised for.

This chapter discusses the situation of contemporary disappearances in Mexico and explains how the heterogeneity of perpetrators and victims, especially the involvement of non-state actors in the commission of these crimes, poses conceptual challenges under the International Convention for the Protection of All Persons from Enforced Disappearances. It specifically addresses two legal questions: the state’s failure to identify dead bodies as a form of enforced disappearance and impunity as a form of acquiescence. Following this, it presents the Committee on Enforced Disappearance’s 2023 Statement on Non-State Actors and examines how the definition of acquiescence provided by the Committee could impact the categorisation of disappearances in Mexico. It is argued that the Committee’s definition could and should be applied in such a way as to consider a large number of disappearances in Mexico today as enforced disappearances, as well as that a presumption of acquiescence would be appropriate in Mexican context, as it places the burden of proof on the state, thereby potentially overcoming a seemingly arbitrary classification of victims into two categories.

In armed conflicts, when people massively go missing, enforced disappearance is prohibited both by the ICPPED and customary international humanitarian law (IHL). While IHL is the primary regulator in armed conflicts, ICPPED complements and reinforces IHL protection from enforced disappearance including by providing more direct legal basis for the State Parties then customary nature of the matching IHL provisions which are often elusive for national practitioners. Obligation under ICPPED to introduce enforced disappearance as an autonomous and continuous domestic crime should provide potentially strong accountability mechanism given the absence of enforced disappearance from underlying offences considered war crimes and the contextual limitations of enforced disappearance as a crime against humanity and may also help break the silence about the disappeared. Limitation of the ICPPED’s definition of enforced disappearance as state-sponsored crime may be overcome in armed conflicts by the commensurate IHL prohibition which applies to non-state actors too.

This chapter considers how resort to the use of force is addressed in the UN Charter, with particular reference to self-defence, including collective self-defence, and anticipatory self-defence. The contemporary right of self-defence is also assessed in light of the rise and influence of non-State actors. United Nations-sanctioned use of force is considered, with particular reference to the mechanisms that exist in Chapter VII of the UN Charter. The use of force by invitation, humanitarian intervention and the 'responsibility to protect' are also considered.