| Abstrakt: |
Every legal system contains a rule or principle as to the binding force of judgments. The salience of such a rule is found not in its existence, but in its scope and the extent to which it enables, constrains, or otherwise shapes judicial decision-making. In this piece, some reflections on the doctrine of precedent as understood by the icj will be laid out, both with respect to its potential law-making role and the theory of argumentation evinced by it. The core argument laid out here is that systematic reliance on previous decisions is not merely some form of judicial law-making, but a strategy of legitimation through which the Court puts forward its own claim to systemic authority. With a particular focus on the Court's 2022 judgment on preliminary objections in the dispute between The Gambia and Myanmar in relation to the application of the Genocide Convention, some reflections on the nature of precedent-based reasoning and its consequences for the icj, and for the international legal system, will be advanced. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR] |
