International law is really a law?

This is a question often discussed between the students

of law of other scientist interested in politics. Why all this students and scientific doubt
about the validity of international law? International law is a game in which every state is
a player. The rules of the game are set in two different ways. Several laws were written as
treaties and others are already understood without the necessity of being written these
laws are also called customary law.
Customary Laws are laws that every state that conforms the international community
knows that they exist. This costumes become law after many years of being use in the
international relations. The diplomat protection, for example, is the oldest customary law
used in international law. On the other hand, international law also has written law called
treaties. Treaties are formal written agreements between states. We can find many kinds
of treaties like unilateral and multilateral agreements.
However, how you enforce all this laws and treaties. People in obey laws in a society,
Rochester claims, because of coercive motives, utilitarian motives. Coercive motive is the
threat of punishment for illegal behavior. It can be physically or economically. In
addition, utilitarian motives can be describes as two or more individuals have a mutual
interest in seeing that laws are obey.
However, an important variant in international law is the lack of enforcement. The lack of
enforcement can occur for many reason for example, the absence of centralized
government in the international system. However, the United Nations resembles a world
government at least in their division of powers. The UN has a branch that resembles the
legislative branch of a state government called General Assembly. The General Assembly
is composing of 192 countries. Each country has one vote. In this assembly, the ideas and
concerns of each state are exposed and discusses. After expending valuable time and
energy all the drafting are made and international agreements, multi-bilateral agreements
between other are made. After this first stage the five countries with veto power that in a
regular democratic state system will be the executive branch revise the treaty and passed
or rejected in a vote 4 to 1. In addition, the third part will be the Security Council formed
by 15 countries. It will be the branch in charge of the compliance and enforcement of
international law. However, it is not a real police or militia. This permanent council just
responds to immediately casualties but just for a determinate period. Then with this
background how international law can be enforce, “International law gets enforced in its
own way” Rochester. International law does not need to be enforced by force,
punishment or threat, but it can be enforced by a mutual agreement between states. These
agreements are “consented” after hours of deliberation and extensive decision-making.
The world Health organization, for example, with it health assembly had been working to
prevent the spread of the H1N1 virus. All the countries in the international community
have consent to accept their regulations in the control of airports and other human traffic
ways to prevent the virus to spread around the world and create a pandemic. Another,
way to enforce laws in International arenas is the principle of self-help, lets give the
example of one country attacking another, the aggravate state can retaliates by various
means like economical retaliation. Also the aggravate state can make an alliance with
other states to harm the aggressor. The North Atlantic treaty Organization also called
NATO was created in 1949 after the all world war. This treaty is meant to help a country
that is attack. If you attack one of the countries in the treaty, all the other countries will
attack you. In addition, reciprocity is a fundamental principle in the enforcement of
international law. Reciprocity between states mean in Sean Murphy explanation the need
of a state to maintain its obligations other wise it can have a possible retaliation of other
countries. On the other hand, Anthony D, Amato and Jennifer Abbasid claim that
reciprocity means a mutual agreement to respect the “entitlements” of each state. In other
words do not do others what you do not want that they do with you because the
consequences can be worst. However, there are several powerful countries like U.S.A,
China, Russia that has enough power and resources to have a little or not fear of
retaliation. The Al- Maida afghani-Saudi attacks to the empire state in September of 2001
killed more than 1366. The international community condemn this terrorist acts. In
consequence, the U.S.A took a severe retaliation. They overwrought the fundamental
Islamic regime, and declare war to Afghanistan. At the end the United States an allies
like Britain and Salvador leave the country in shambles and killing more than 800000
dead. The United States killed more people than Afghanistan and his terrorist group Al-
Qaeda did, however the international community accept the action took by the United
States because it was an act of reciprocity.
Furthermore, the sate reputation is very important in the international community. All the
sates that conform the international community like individuals of a state want to be
trusted and well label. States are international actors, in stage, all the other countries are
looking at your way to behave and as any country in the world, and it does not want to be
isolated. At the same time, any of these states want to appear in the international
community as a cheater or a liar and then be isolating from the rest of the community.
This fear of isolation makes states to collaborate and meet all their obligations in the
international community.
Anthony D’Amato and Jennifer Abbasid propose in their book “International Law
Today” that the main factor that influences the enforcement of international is the
principle that each state has to preserve their “entitlements”. Entitlements means rights
that each state has such as: sovereignty, diplomatic immunity sanctity of boundaries, the
entitlement to enter into binding treaties, free use of high seas. At the same time all, this
entitlements and the recognition of the international community come with reciprocal
duties that meant to be respect. If their entitlements are not respected it can take away by
the international community. The case of Iran and the U.S.A in 1979, for example, when
the Iranian took captive the American diplomats. The United States felt that the action
that Iran took was a violation of their customary law of diplomatic immunity. In
response, the united sates “freeze” $ 13 billions that were in international banks. The
international community agrees with the United States because they defend their
“entitlement”.
International law is really a law. Yes is a law is not enforced like the regular state law but
had show that it is as effective as the state law.