Alternatives to “Legalization”: Richer Views of Law and Politics

TLDR

Legalization is defined as the degree of obligation, precision, and delegation of international institutions, but law is a broad social phenomenon embedded in practices, beliefs, and traditions, requiring attention to legitimacy, custom, rationality, and participatory processes to understand its political role. The authors argue that the definition of legalization is unnecessarily narrow and examine three applications of the concept to show that a fuller consideration of law’s role in politics yields more robust, empirically useful concepts. They examine three applications of legalization in the volume, demonstrating how a broader view of law’s political role can generate more robust concepts. The study finds that this broader perspective produces concepts that are intellectually robust and empirically useful.

Abstract

The authors of “Legalization and World Politics” ( International Organization , 54, 3, summer 2000) define “legalization” as the degree of obligation, precision, and delegation that international institutions possess. We argue that this definition is unnecessarily narrow. Law is a broad social phenomenon that is deeply embedded in the practices, beliefs, and traditions of societies. Understanding its role in politics requires attention to the legitimacy of law, to custom and law's congruence with social practice, to the role of legal rationality, and to adherence to legal processes, including participation in law's construction. We examine three applications of “legalization” offered in the volume and show how a fuller consideration of law's role in politics can produce concepts that are more robust intellectually and more helpful to empirical research.