Challenges to International Law in the 21st Century [2/4]
Since the 1940s, States have been guided on what is considered appropriate when faced with threats to international and domestic security. In the 21st Century however, the nature of war has shifted considerably; new threats in the form of non-state actors and advanced technology means state centric laws are no longer as pertinent. This four part blog will discuss the various challenges international law is being faed with following the changes to nature and security. A considerable challenge faced by international law is the one brought by asymmetric warfare. Defined as: “strategies and tactics adopted by a force when military capabilities… are so significantly different that they cannot make the same sorts of attacks on each other,” asymmetrical warfare is the modern style of conflict due to the changing characters of war and state responses. This new style of warfare has only thrown more challenges at the legal principles of war as they now must respond to the question of non...