Lawfare and the International Criminal Court: A Legal, Political and Economic Analysis

Lawfare is an understudied subject in both international legal scholarship and political science. Broadly defined as the strategic and pragmatic use of the international law and international legal institutions, lawfare is viewed as an operational tool to better understand why some states, despite their inherent indifference to the international legal mechanisms, may develop strong interest in some legal proceedings. Lawfare, thus, appears to be a strategic foreign policy tool despite that its core discussion is inevitably relevant to legal issues. In this sense, it presents a dichotomy that deserves closer attention in order to grasp the constant interplay between power politics and legalist ideals. This Research Topic seeks to address the attempts by individual or collection of states to make use of the perceived benefits associated with lawfare within the contexts of the situations that are ideally within the scope of the jurisdiction of the International Criminal Court (ICC). Created to prosecute the most heinous international crimes, including genocide, crimes against humanity, war crimes and crime of aggression, the ICC carries high hopes and objectives towards achievement of global justice. The Court’s jurisdiction involves individuals, and not the states; and as such, instances, certain governments may become tempted to take cases where they see any political or economic opportunity, particularly to drag their adversaries into a difficult position, to make efforts to attract the Court’s attention. Potential themes and topics for inclusion in the Research Topic include, but are not limited to the following:• cases where lawfare is exercised to advance or abuse the involvement of the ICC• states or groups that seek to rely on lawfare, not for the sake of international justice, but their own strategic and foreign policy considerations• how the referrals by the states to the ICC have been framed with special reference to the premises of the lawfare• what are the weaknesses of the ICC that make lawfare a realistic and useful option for those states that attempt to use it?• what are the legal, economic and political constraints that make the use of lawfare obsolete and inconclusive within the context of the ICC jurisdiction? Topic editors: Cenap Cakmak, Murat Ustaoğlu, Muhammet Sait Bozik Source: https://www.frontiersin.org/research-topics/82042/lawfare-and-the-international-criminal-court-a-legal-political-and-economic-analysis