Application of international law in international relations

It is a matter of common knowledge that international law is a part of domestic and foreign policies of states. The public authority establishes the extant of its implementation. Despite the widely recognized advantages of realization the international law, there are some negative effects. It can intentionally fade the differentiation of state, public, and private interests, which leads the latter to privatize the awry state and public means. The public authority adopts numerous legal norms and treaties to conform to international law, but it is necessary to keep in mind that such a legal framework in some way reflects the aspiration of individual states and international community to influence on the power of a certain state. From this consideration, it may be deduced that the effectiveness of the national rule of law is not essentially proportional to the extent of realization of the international normative guidelines and, thus, its respect and enforcement power is not automatically developed.

The role of international organizations is also increasing, although some of them, e.g. the UN, and in particular the Security Council, require some adjustments or current changes. However, the principles of international law, which play or should play an important role in international relations in the process of change and development, also need to be addressed. They themselves can also develop, change and create new principles, or old principles can acquire new accents. The question of the principles of international law should be addressed first and foremost because they are of great importance in international relations.

Dealing with this issue are many authors, namely Jan Azud, who elaborated in detail the principles of international law, Peter Vrsansky with questions of international security, authors J. Klucka, P. Sturma, V David, O. Krejci and many others.

It is also confirmed that the effectiveness of existing law, its enforceability is directly proportional to the will of individual states and the international community as a whole to actually enforce it, and inversely proportional to the number of legal norms adopted in the form of laws or international treaties. In other words, with the stagnating or diminishing will of the ruling power to enforce effective rule of law, the mere fact of increasing the number of laws adopted does not automatically mean that the respect, application and protection of law as a regulatory means of national or international relations is also increased.

Is international law losing its primacy in international relations?

The historical, linguistic, systematic, logical and legal analysis of the creation and application of important international law documents in interstate practice suggests that the following phenomena occur in the field of the creation, application and interpretation of international law, in particular following the breakdown of the “bipolar world” as a result of changing states' attitudes towards international law. The power dimension of the foreign policy of individual states or groups of states is strengthened. The process of codification and progressive development of international law seems to have been ahead of real developments. It has been in conflict or has disproportionately exceeded the anticipated expectations formulated by individual states. This is confirmed by the stagnation of the process of codification and the progressive development of international law in the Commission for International Law, as well as by the outcome of the negotiations of the 6th Committee of the UN General Assembly.

The above mentioned and also other negative manifestations disproportionately favoring the protection of the national interests of states in current international relations jeopardize the importance and position of international law as a universal legal and ethical basis on which the foreign and internal policies of each sovereign state and the international community of states as a whole should behave in achieving the goals and the principles of the UN Charter. As a result, international law is gradually losing the position of primary regulator of international relations and is becoming not the first, but only one of many equivalent regulatory instruments of international policy.

In other words, instead of the traditional thesis that any state policy relating to an area governed by international law must strictly respect international law, as if more attention has shifted towards the idea that only some state policy must strictly respect international law, or that some state policy may not strictly respect international law or even the nihilistic thesis that no state policy may strictly respect international law.

If the significance of the content, subject matter and purpose of international law were further unduly relativized in a similar way, international law would very soon find itself one of the many means of foreign and international policy which states could, if necessary, dispose of or not utilize and which states may or may not have respected as appropriate to their individual or group national interests, whether or not it is in line with the interests of the international community as a whole, expressed in the preamble, objectives and principles of the UN Charter.

Relativization of the importance and position of international law in interstate practice would open the door for exercising arbitrary power of states, including the right to unrestricted use of force to solve international problems.

Some states tend to deviate from the collective principle based on the primacy of international law for a variety of reasons, at different levels and to varying degrees, and to favor the protection of their individual or group interests in situations where they consider their strategic security, economic or foreign policy interests being at risk.

The rationale for such a procedure can be found in the changing view of the main players in the international scene of the importance, role, and position of international law in a globalizing world.

While, on the one hand, none of the 200 sovereign states we currently find on the political map of the world, in principle doubt the importance of international law to regulate relations between states during their friendship, cooperation, rivalry or hostility, on the other hand many countries are aware in specific situations that current international regulation is not sufficiently effective in responding effectively and rapidly to the current challenges of the present. They therefore prefer individual or group measures rather than lengthy collective measures within the meaning of the applicable international law.

As long as the states concerned, act to achieve the objectives and principles of the UN Charter, such a procedure is justified because those states pursue by it the attainment of universal justice to which international law is directed. However, when the states concerned act only in close individual or group national interest, they knowingly or by means of simulated procedures circumvent international law that does not meet their national interests, they jeopardize the international legal order.

One of the serious reasons for changing states' approach to international law may also be that the functioning of the international collective security system, the legal basis of which was created by the UN Charter, is severely paralyzed. The UN's inability to respond in a timely and effective manner to security challenges such as the rise in international terrorism, its support by some states, and other challenges is the best proof of this. Whether it is the problem of the former Yugoslavia, Kosovo, Afghanistan, Iraq, Libya, Syria, Yemen or other current international problems. The world has changed significantly since 1945, and it is possible that the legal bases created 74 years ago may not fully meet the current needs of interstate practice.

Of course, the current crippling of the United Nations collective security system is not due to the universal values, determination, goals or principles of the UN set out in the UN Charter. They remain equally constant and strategically important today, and no state openly challenges them. Therefore, as in 1945, the UN's main commitment remains:

- to save succeeding generations from the scourge of war, which twice in our lifetime has brought untold sorrow to mankind;