The situated and bounded rationality of international courts: A structuralist approach to international adjudicative practices

Abstract

AbstractUnderstanding international judicial behaviour requires the development of a perspective that considers both individual and collective action. On the one hand, individual judges are influenced and shaped by their background and trajectory prior to their international judicial appointment; on the other hand, when appointed to international courts, they become part of a particular social setting and group dynamic. The article provides an interpretive, structural theory of judicial behaviour which allows for an understanding of international judicial action and the judicial institutional practices resulting from it. The article explains this double structuration of international judicial behaviour by first reconsidering and amending the notion of habitus, originally developed by Pierre Bourdieu, and secondly by applying this idea to the practice of the Caribbean Court of Justice.