The Cold War and Soviet Law Author(s): Paul B. Stephan Reviewed work(s): Source: Proceedings of the Annual Meeting (American Society of International Law), Vol. 93 (MARCH 24-27, 1999), pp. 43-51 Published by: American Society of International Law Stable URL: http://www.jstor.org/stable/25659259 . Accessed: 13/09/2012 00:34 Your use of the JSTOR archive indicates your acceptance of the Terms & Conditions of Use, available at . http://www.jstor.org/page/info/about/policies/terms.jsp
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The Cold War
and the Rule
of Law
The panel was convened at 10:30 a.m., Saturday, March 27, by itsChair, Mark Janis, University of Connecticut School of Law, Storrs, CT, who introduced the panelists: Abram Chayes, Harvard University Law School, Cambridge, MA; Matthew Craven, School of Oriental and African Studies, University of London, London, England; Joel Paul, University of Connecticut School of Law; Paul B. Stephan, Percy Brown, Jr., Professor of Law, University of Virginia School of Law, Charlottesville, VA; and Ruti Teitel, New York Law School. The comments of one panelist, Professor Stephan, are presented here. The Cold War
and Soviet
Law
byPaul B. Stephan The Cold War did not have as clear or decisive an impact on Soviet legal institutions as it did on those in the United States. One needs to recall that, for the United States, the challenges and conflicts thatcoalesced into theCold War coincided with a strikingnew stage inU.S. history.The Soviet Union, however, experienced itsengagement and strugglewith the United States more as a continuation of issues that the Soviet state had faced since its inception.Within the Soviet Union, how one viewed these problems turnedmore on how one viewed the Soviet experiment and itsprospects, and less on the character of the adversary of the moment.
Some time between May 1945 and December 1946, theAmerican people recognized for the firsttime that theircountry could leave behind a state of open, unlimited warfare and still find itself engaged in an international struggle that cast doubt on the very possibility of its continued existence. The Soviet Union, by contrast, had known only existential doubt and the threatof baleful foreign influences since its inception. Not surprisingly, theUnited States responded to itsnew realization of itsplace in theworld by reexamining, and in some cases
transforming,many of its institutions. Although the details of the Cold War and the institutional changes it engendered varied considerably over the next two generations, the United States never lost its sense of thenewness and ongoing difficultyof itscompetition with the Soviet Union and its allies. During the same period, the Soviet Union underwent several institutional transformations,but none had a direct link towhat was officially perceived as the capitalist