Publications /
Policy Paper

Back
Download PDF
Law as Provocation: the ICJ’s 2025 Advisory Opinion on the Obligations of States in Respect of Climate Change
Authors
Ferid Belhaj
April 17, 2026
Related topics: 
International Relations
International Law
Climate change and biodiversity
International Organisations

The International Court of Justice’s (ICJ) 2025 advisory opinion on climate change marks a significant expansion of international law into the governance of global public goods. By framing climate inaction as a potential violation of international law and human rights, the Court advances a progressive legal agenda that extends beyond existing political consensus and enforcement capacity. This article develops a realist critique of the ruling that avoids both legal romanticism and nihilism. It argues that the opinion cannot compel state compliance in an anarchic system characterized by sovereignty, power asymmetries, and strategic interests, and that excessive judicial ambition may risk undermining institutional credibility. 

At the same time, the article contends that, in the context of climate change as an existential risk, normative ambition by international courts can be strategically consequential. The ICJ’s climate opinion functions less as enforceable law than as a mechanism for reshaping legitimacy, empowering litigation and civil society, and increasing the political costs of inaction. The ruling thus reveals a central paradox of international law under realism: law cannot govern without power, yet it can still influence power by redefining the terms of political contestation.

RELATED CONTENT

  • The New Flexi-Lateralism: International Cooperation in an Era of Raw Power Politics
    Authors
    Len Ishmael
    Stephan Klingebiel
    Andy Sumner
    September 4, 2026
    This Paper was originally published on cgdev.org. Escalatory attacks on multilateral rules and institutions in this era of raw power politics have plunged international politics into uncharted territory. Traditional alliances have been fractured and new partnerships between unlikely bedfellows are emerging. No longer in transition, the post-World War II world order is in rupture. This paper examines international cooperation under these conditions and argues that a new "flexi-l ...
  • Download PDF
    The Secretary-General of Everything and the United Nations of Nothing: How Mission Inflation Has Weakened the UN and Why the Next Secretary-General Must Put Peace First
    Authors
    Ferid Belhaj
    August 25, 2026
    The next Secretary-General should begin with an act of institutional rebellion: refuse to become the Secretary-General ofeverything. Over three decades the office's political and administrative reach has spread across sustainable development, climate, health, migration, digital governance, financing, gender, food systems, and a still-growing list of global priorities. These issues are not unimportant; the trouble is that institutional ambition has simply outrun institutional capabil ...
  • The European Parliament Resolution and the Moroccan-Spanish Crisis
    Authors
    Abdallah Saaf
    August 13, 2026
    The Resolution adopted by an overwhelming majority of elected European officials in Strasbourg on June 10, 2021, on "the violation of the UN Convention on the Rights of the Child and the exploitation of minors by the authorities in the migration crisis in Ceuta" (2021/2747/RSP), could not fail to leave its mark.Decoding the ResolutionThe Resolution shocked Moroccans to such an extent that it was quickly set aside at the time, as if there were a wish to forget it as fast as possible. ...
  • The Mecca Agreement: A First Step Towards a New Regional Security Architecture?
    Authors
    Bilal Mahli
    August 11, 2026
    The Mecca Agreement: A First Step Towards a New Regional Security Architecture? On 7 August, Saudi Arabia, Türkiye and Pakistan signed the Mecca Agreement, a trilateral defense pact aimed at strengthening collective security and defense cooperation between the three countries. At its core lies a collective defense commitment under which an attack on one member is considered an attack on all three. While many details concerning its practical implementation remain unclear, the agreeme ...
  • Download PDF
    Global South Agency: From Victimhood to Systemic Architecture
    Authors
    Marcus Vinicius de Freitas
    July 10, 2026
    For much of the post-war period, the Global South was framed as an object of history, defined by dependency, constrained by structural asymmetries, and confined to the margins of global decision-making. That narrative, once empirically grounded, is now no longer adequate. A profound yet uneven transformation is underway. The Global South is no longer only reacting; it is increasingly shaping rules, institutions, and narratives.This Policy Brief argues that the Global South is thus t ...
  • Download PDF
    Law as Provocation: the ICJ’s 2025 Advisory Opinion on the Obligations of States in Respect of Climate Change
    Authors
    Ferid Belhaj
    April 17, 2026
    The International Court of Justice’s (ICJ) 2025 advisory opinion on climate change marks a significant expansion of international law into the governance of global public goods. By framing climate inaction as a potential violation of international law and human rights, the Court advances a progressive legal agenda that extends beyond existing political consensus and enforcement capacity. This article develops a realist critique of the ruling that avoids both legal romanticism and ni ...
  • Download PDF
    Tensions Between Fundamental Freedoms and Fundamental Rights: A Comparative Study of the European Union Court of Justice, the American Supreme Court, and the African Court on Human and Peoples’ Rights
    Authors
    Abdessalam Saad Jaldi
    March 27, 2026
    Human rights are central to the legitimacy of legal systems, not only through their recognition but also through the manner in which courts resolve conflicts between rights. Judicial decisions require well-founded reasoning, drawing on interrelated legal sources to ensure coherence, legitimacy, and predictability while minimizing non-legal influences. In EU law, the Court of Justice employs grammatical, contextual, comparative, and teleological methods of interpretation, alongside p ...
  • Download PDF
    The United States and Venezuela: Beyond the Bilateral Dimension
    Authors
    Nizar Messari
    December 19, 2025
    The U.S. military buildup in the Caribbean—the most significant since the Cuban Missile Crisis—comes at a moment when a new world order is taking shape, its contours still unclear, and in which the U.S. seeks to be more assertive in the Western Hemisphere. This disposition toward South America and the Caribbean was underscored by the recent publication of the new U.S. National Security Strategy, in which the Monroe Doctrine is explicitly invoked. This Policy Brief situates the devel ...
  • "Chronos" and "Kairos" in Case Management Moroccan Sahara: Mastering Time in the Royal Strategy
    Authors
    Abdelhak Bassou
    December 3, 2025
    Resolution 2797 of the United Nations Security Council does not mark the end of an issue, but the culmination of masterful time management. Morocco has not only won support, it has won the tempo. By combining the Chronos of constancy and the Kairos of opportunity, it has demonstrated that a foreign policy can be based on the philosophy of time as much as on geopolitics.This diplomacy of controlled time can today be seen as an implicit doctrine of the Kingdom: a strategy in which pat ...