Brownlie's Principles of Public International Law. By JAMES CRAWFORD AC, SC, FBA.

Abstract

Most international lawyers, I assume, have some kind of a personal relation to Brownlie’s Principles of Public International Law . In my own case it is to the third edition from 1979 in which I have been examined twice – once for an intermediary degree in law at my home university (Turku) in 1980 and another time by Brownlie himself for a Diploma in Law in Oxford in 1982. Ever since then, that thickly marked copy has accompanied me in my travels; now it sits on the shelf of my Helsinki study, with the sixth and (now) eighth editions. I take it up every now and then, less to imbibe the details of a technical point than to check Brownlie’s attitude to it. No other English-language textbook comes in my mind even close to Brownlie . It is the only one with which I have had an emotional relationship. I...