Speichermedium der Konflikterinnerung. Zur osteuropäischen Prägung des modernen Völkerrechts
Storage of Conflict Memory. On the East European Imprint on Modern International Law

Summary/Abstract: This article promotes and tests two hypotheses: Firstly, that modern public international law has been decisively shaped by the conflict history of Eastern Europe in the 19th and 20th centuries. And secondly, that the law in general, and international law in particular, is a medium of first-rate importance for storing the memory of this meso-regional conflict history. The article covers impacts on international law of regional origin like the Soviet doctrine on a “socialist international law”, lieux de mémoire shaped by national or international legal developments – “Solferino 1863”, “Nuremberg 1945” –, innovations of East European origin in international law like minority protection, legislation against international terrorism or the paradigm change from “population transfer” to the ban on expulsion and ethnic cleansing. Also dealt with is the prosopographic dimension, that is the impact of international lawyers of East European origin like Martens, Schiemann, Lemkin or Lauterpacht. Finally, a six-stage analytical model of how regional conflicts can shape international law, based on a pattern of modern Eastern Europe’s conflict history, is proposed.

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