Classical authors on international law tended to understand it as an immanent system of norms, emerging from natural reason, self-interest, and\/or customary state behavior. This view largely kept hold well into the Vienna System era of multilateral diplomacy, indeed becoming more conceptually clear even as the language of natural law grew increasingly marginal. By the early twentieth century, however, international law had turned into a domain for intentional legislative projects on a global scale. Ultimately, this new legislative function of international law was endowed to permanent organizations focused on norm-development in specialized areas.<\/p>\n
With this transformation, international law\u2019s forms of legislation and, later, also of interpretation and adjudication transitioned from assuming \u201cunwilled\u201d to \u201cwilled,\u201d intentional norms. This Article traces the conceptual history of this shift in the self-understanding of legal actors. It also argues that the now-prevalent epistemic model of international law as a collective project necessarily raises questions, including those rooted in Third World critique, as to whose project it is in practice. Finally, it suggests that further attention to international law\u2019s \u201cproblem of authorship\u201d can aid in understanding the way that legal discourses\u2014such as those concerned with norms of freedom of navigation, trade, or international human rights\u2014 produce specific forms of knowledge and political possibilities.<\/p>\n