Will the International Criminal Court look judicial?

Will proceedings in the International Criminal Court preserve even the appearance of judicial decency? It’s hard to create something as evanescent as judiciousness in an institution without a network of relationships, expectations and traditions to support it, and such things seem lacking in the case of the ICC. “World society” is somewhat of a fiction, so raw power and crude interest and ideology inevitably play a leading role in international affairs. How can they be kept out of an international court? Judges and prosecutors will represent either their own countries or an international class of apparatchiks attempting to increase their power by whatever means come to hand. Prosecutions and trials will be intensely politicized. Modern wars are usually presented as struggles between good and evil, and the ICC could easily become an extension of the same sort of self-righteousness. For what to expect consider the Milosevic trial: The case against the Hague court.
Posted by Jim Kalb at June 14, 2002 10:31 AM | Send