The ICJ’s significance and controversies – an interview with Dr. Vincent Feeney
Written by: Emily ZADAVIL
Dr. Feeney with Emily Zavadil - Credits: ILYMUN Press
At this year’s ILYMUN conference, we have the honor of welcoming Dr. Vincent Feeney as one of the many guest speakers. Dr. Feeney, currently a chemistry teacher at the International School of Lyon, studied at Newcastle University in England. He has an intriguing past, having been part of the British navy as a principal war officer in 1982. At that time, a conflict between the UK and Argentina arised, and Dr. Feeney was sent away to operate in the South Atlantic. He started his early career in 1978 at Newcastle University, conducting research and working as a junior lecturer. From the UK to France, Malaysia, Vietnam and to the Philippines, he has taken his teaching career all around the world.
Having witnessed many of the world’s wrongdoings, Dr. Feeney delivers interesting thoughts on how diplomacy can be extremely fragile and hard to maintain. With his extensive knowledge of the International Court of Justice (ICJ), he brings valuable insight on the ICJ through his presentation to our very own ICJ committee, speaking up about its significance, credibility, relevance, and future.
Emily: Could you give us a quick overview of the ICJ’s origins and purpose?
Dr. Feeney: It came into being in 1945, which was the end of the Second World War, when it was realized that there had to be a replacement to a similar court that had dated from the 1890s, and had never really worked. What the world wanted was to get to a stage where that [WW2] wouldn't happen again. There were many things going on, like the Marshall plan, a plan to rebuild Europe- Marshall correctly identified the fact that the punitive sanctions put on Germany after the 1918 war were largely responsible for the buildup to the 1939-1945 war. If people wouldn’t be so poverty-stricken, maybe there wouldn't have been such a rise in extremism. 1945 saw the formal forming of the ICJ, which started off by giving advisory ideas on the UN charter.
Emily: So it was just ideas and suggestions at first?
Dr. Feeney: They did quite a lot of legal opinions. One of the first instances where one country was saying “you can't do this” and another said “oh but we want to” was with the UK and Iran. Iran had wanted to nationalize its oil fields, but the UK was opposed to the idea. And so they just went back and forth. The ICJ wanted to solve this by creating a board of governors with two representatives from Iran and two from the UK, which would put in place “fairness”. But the UK never really went along with it.
And that has been the story of the ICJ- people say: “yes we’ll sign up for it, justice is justice. Unless it happens to interfere with our aims.”
Dr Feeney delivering his speech to the ICJ committee - Credits: ILYMUN Press
Emily: So do you think the ICJ might’ve been some sort of “cover-up” for nations to have some semblance of justice?
Dr. Feeney: What the ICJ does is bring the cases to the world’s attention. So I think it’s done in good faith. I don't think there’s deliberate cover-ups. Clearly small countries can nominate for the ICJ and have representatives as judges, but there's the background of how much the bigger countries lead them to tie what they are saying to another country’s interpretation. [And so one of the most famous awful cases that came before the ICJ was involving the Iran contra- scandal, and that was where America was selling arms, would you believe it, to Iran, then siphoning off the money from that to actually fund the contras who were against the Sandinista regime at the time. And, you know, clearly that was morally awful, particularly given the open lack of relationship between Iran and the United States. But they were quite happy to cohabit on this particular thing] and the ICJ did see through it and did make a ruling, and the result of that is that there was embarrassment. And embarrassment is one of the tools of diplomacy. You know, do countries want to look that awful for that long?
Emily: You said that the ICJ had nearly no credibility, or not a lot. Has this always been the case?
Dr. Feeney: It has, really. People have been very ready to pick and choose what they will abide by. Many countries simply say “no, we're having nothing to do with it”. And they will cite that the ICJ is corrupt but usually they're hiding behind the fact that the ruling doesn't happen to suit them. Because they could be found to be wrong, and countries don't like being found to be wrong. They've got their electorate to... well, in some cases they've got their electorate. Other countries don't have an electorate to worry about at all. Vietnam would not be bothered about anything that the ICJ had to say about them, because they have no elections. So you don't really worry about what your people are feeling. And one of the ways you make sure that people feel more or less alright is to very carefully control their diet of news.
Emily: What measures are put in place to ensure that the cases are judged fairly?
Dr. Feeney: Well, the idea is that the court has got a very broad spectrum of judges on it. And as was suggested by the members of the committee, that somehow, if you have enough people, you will end up with some sort of consensus that is overall right. My argument to that, and I'm not saying it's all wrong, is that consensus can end up with nobody being
happy. And in fact, consensus can end up making decisions that are, quite frankly, wrong, because there have been too many compromises. If you want a piece of string, and you end up with a knot of tie, then that wasn't what you wanted.
Emily: So considering that there can be wrong decisions, do you think in the history of the ICJ's rulings, have they made mostly good or bad decisions?
Dr. Feeney: I think their decisions have, generally speaking, been well-meaning. I don't think there are any decisions where they willfully set about suggesting that something blatantly wrong was right. But I think their judgments have been sufficiently watered down that, because of consensus, you don't end up with something that is satisfactory in any way. Tricky. But then you could say the same about the United Nations. And you could say the same of the European Union.
Emily: You talked about the future of the ICJ, and you said that there are many “awful” things happening in the world right now. Do you think that the ICJ is going to manage to stay relevant in the future, even with the existence of the ICC (which, on the other hand, can ensure its rulings are carried out)?
Dr. Feeney: I think the ICJ has been relevant and I would like to think that it shines a very bright light on some things that are wrong, which then come to everybody’s attention. Just by doing that, it is relevant.
Journalists might write a very important piece about the wrongs of something. But they do not have the same weight of a formal legal background as ICJ does. In a rule run world, it works just fine. As I've said to the committee, what I have seen in a matter of months is 80 years of diplomacy thrown out. And that, from my perspective, is really scary. I was thinking about it this morning over breakfast and thought, well, the people here weren't even born when I saw all of these things that were going wrong. They haven't had my experience of how the world was and how I see it being now. You can't. You're younger than me. I certainly don't want young people to become terrified to the point where they feel that they've got no power whatsoever. Because that would be counterproductive. I would like your generation to be extremely wary and realise just how fast something we took as a basic norm can vanish overnight.
Emily: You were considering options about the ICJ's future, if it would be better to remodel it or just remake it. What are your ideas on how it could improve its credibility and be less “corrupt"?
Dr. Feeney: Well, I think there's a perception of corruption.
Emily: Like biases towards powerful nations?
Dr. Feeney: Well, to be honest, in the current climate, you ask me for ideas, I'm all out of them. And I think the ICJ feels the same way: powerful nations are definitely going to impose their will. If you try and say this is wrong, they'll say “la la la la, I can't hear you” or “we'll cut off your gas, your steel, your aid” and so it goes on. All you can do is try and depend on basic decency. That seems to be something of a premium these days. It does.
Emily: Do you have some sort of conclusion you want to make?
Dr. Feeney: No, I came here to sort of set out the stall, give some sort of historical background, and ask questions of a younger generation. It's all going to be yours to look after.
Emily: So you think it's the younger generation's responsibility to fix?
Dr. Feeney: It has to be now. It's all out of my hands. So that is, and unfortunately, every generation has handed on a bunch of problems to the next one. Mine was told that we would be able to fix the whole business of looking after nuclear waste. Well, we didn't, because we can't. And we are handing it to you, including all of the ones that we failed to deal with. Now you are going to have to deal with climate change for real. I've been talking about it and writing about it for 40 years. Did that do much good? At some stage, somebody's going to have to face up to the fact that it's here, here to stay. You are going to have to be living with it. And try to mitigate it as best you can. It just wasn't very bright and cheery. I'm sorry. It's not.
Emily: Well, I guess that's the end of the interview. Thank you for coming here and answering all my questions.