Constructing the law of peoples

Abstract

Because of John Rawls’s constructivist procedure “The Law of Peoples,” he is unable to justify his claim that there is a relationship between limiting the internal and limiting the external sovereignty of states. An alternative constructivist procedure could work, but it augments the ideal theory of international justice so that it includes liberal democratic and egalitarian principles. The procedure and principles have important implications for nonideal theory also, insofar as they justify a principle of international resource distribution and weaken general prohibitions against intervention.