A legal realist critique of the new international law regime relating to the treatment of minority communities in Eastern and Central Europe : (a dialectical theoretical inquiry)

Rasulov, Akbar

Abstract

This thesis is a work written in the genre of the legal realist critique. Its main topic is the development of the new international legal regime relating to the treatment of minority communities in Eastern and Central Europe (ECE) following the end of the Cold War. The general methodological approach on the basis of which it was produced derives primarily from the traditions of American legal realism and the first-wave critical legal studies (CLS). On a more fundamental level, the philosophical sensibility underlying this thesis's inquiry can be described as a combination of a non-Hegelian dialectical theory and historical materialism.

The basic analytical project pursued in this thesis consists of two general investigative tasks each of which constitutes its own separate problematic. The first investigative task relates directly to the development of the new international law relating to the treatment of minority communities (ILTMC). Its main line of inquiry focuses primarily on that complex socio-historical transformation which has occurred in the ECE region in the last seventeen years and which has been marked on the plane of international law by the rapid emergence of the new ILTMC project.

The second investigative task addressed in these pages relates to a somewhat more abstract subject matter. Its main line of inquiry can be preliminarily summarized in the form of the following question: "How should the general problematic of the new ILTMC project be investigated from the point of view of international law? "

The theory of historical materialism practised in this thesis derives essentially from the works of the French Marxist philosopher Louis Althusser. Despite the terminological parallels, it differs quite considerably from the similarly-named theories practised by the orthodox Marxist schools from the Second International onwards. In particular, it rejects in every form and guise all versions of Hegelian teleologism, which it considers to be a variation of ontological idealism, and adopts a position of extreme suspicion with regard to vulgar economism.

In that context, for the purposes of the present thesis, the term "structural conjuncturalism" should be generally understood as the short name given to the basic analytical method developed in the framework of the historical materialist theory for the purposes of social sciences. Legal realism, in its turn, should be generally understood as the "local" variation of that method adapted for the specific purposes of juridical scholarship.

Citation

Rasulov, A. (2006). A legal realist critique of the new international law regime relating to the treatment of minority communities in Eastern and Central Europe : (a dialectical theoretical inquiry). (Thesis). University of Hull. Retrieved from https://hull-repository.worktribe.com/output/4213139

• Thesis Type: Thesis
• Deposit Date: Sep 28, 2012
• Publicly Available Date: Feb 22, 2023
• Keywords: Law
• Public URL: https://hull-repository.worktribe.com/output/4213139
• Additional Information: Department of Law, The University of Hull
• Award Date: Sep 1, 2006