21Received 20.05.2024. Revised 03.08.2024. Accepted 04.10.2024.
Abstract. The article is a reasoning conducted in the logic of a mental experiment. As an initial premise, we take the bold ideas of Immanuel Kant and Count Leonid A. Kamarovskii about the future establishment of “lawfulness” (the rule of law) not only within societies, but also between states, when conflicts are resolved by an international court backed by the solidarity of great powers. An effective rule of law in global geopolitics requires the following fundamental changes, even if they will be fully realized only in the distant future: the transfer to the Court of the current powers of the UN Security Council; universal jurisdiction (prosecution not only of states that have acceded to the Statute); the possibility of prompt adjudication, with the involvement of several regional courts (offices, branches) if necessary; a broad and streamlined set of peace measures, including sanctions, fines, trade terms, and effective enforcement of international courts’ decisions. Lasting peace will only be possible if rival great powers recognize the primacy of law and the need to obey the decisions of international courts in the area of war and peace. The aim of the article is to outline the possibilities and vectors of progress towards this ideal in the context of the new Cold War between the World of Rules (the “big West” with its satellites) and the World of Tradition (the major authoritarian powers and non-aligned states). The focus is on how far the major geopolitical centers of the West (the United States, the United Kingdom at the head of the Commonwealth, and the leaders of the European Union) are able to abandon their usual aspirations to consolidate their coercive hegemony (“hard power”). The alternative is to strive for moral and geocultural leadership in “soft power” on the way to a legal world order, i. e. the rule of law in geopolitics. The main barriers on this path are primarily related to the rejection of limiting one’s own sovereignty in foreign policy. The main stake is made on the interests of expanding international influence through legal self-restraint, as well as the inclusion of socio-evolutionary mechanisms of competition for international prestige and legitimacy.
Keywords: mental experiment, “eternal peace”, rule of law, I. Kant, sovereignty, legitimacy, international law, international court, legal world order
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