Throughout the nineteenth century, the code-of-conduct school of thought would have the doctrinal field largely to itself. But it continued to be a broad church, with the split between the deductive wing and the pragmatic line remaining very much in evidence. It was, accordingly, an age of diversity within this framework. More significant, though, was the fact that state practice was pushing the law in the direction of a certain uniformity, with a broad consensus for redressing the juridical 'balance of power' more in favour of the rights of neutrals than of belligerents. The high point of this trend was the adoption of the Declaration of Paris in 1856, when the world definitively resolved that the 'free ships-free goods' principle should become a rule of general law. In the nineteenth century, practice rather than theory continued to play the leading role in the evolution of the law of neutrality generally.

In 1907, at the Second Hague Peace Conference, was a major effort made to codify the entire law of neutrality. A provision on submarine cables was placed in the Hague Rules on War, barring belligerent occupiers of enemy territory from seizing or destroying cables connecting the occupied territory with a neutral state except in cases of 'absolute necessity'. In December 1911, the House of Lords voted against the draft legislation which would have enabled Britain to ratify both the Hague Convention on Neutrality at Sea and the Declaration of London. That was the death knell of the Declaration as a legally binding instrument. Without Britain's adherence, no other state troubled to ratify it. The Declaration of London, and indeed much of the traditional law of neutrality along with it, was soon to be subjected to a very much greater test.

Chapter 8 covers the tumultuous events of November 2020 to January 2021 – including the US presidential election and the storming of the US Capitol – arguing that there is a democratic deficit at the heart of nuclear weapons policy. Here, the twin forces of populist authoritarianism and the backsliding of democracy create, as the poet Amanda Gorman eloquently put it in her poem at the inauguration of President Biden, ‘a force that would shatter our nation rather than share it’. This chapter argues that authoritarian conspiracy theories that influence populist movements of the modern era pose a serious threat to the planet, especially in states that have leaders with the sole authority to use nuclear weapons. As the storming of the US Capitol made clear, democratic states such as the United States are not immune to instability and violence striking at the heart of state institutions. Beyond this, the author demonstrates how nuclear weapons undermine democracy itself, and shows that the Third Nuclear Age is wrought with exterminist dangers that threaten the social and political fabric of democracy itself.

The European Convention, which protects the right to life in Article 2, deals with liberty and security of person in Article 5. To decide whether someone has been deprived of his rights under Article 5(1) it is necessary to begin by establishing that he has been 'deprived of his liberty'. Article 5(2) requires a person to be informed about the reasons for an arrest and is intended to enable someone who is arrested to admit or deny the alleged offence and make effective use of the judicial safeguards of Articles 5(3) and 5(4). Article 5(4) provides that when a person is deprived of his liberty by arrest or detention he 'shall be entitled to take proceedings by which the lawfulness of his detention shall be decided speedily by a court and his release ordered if the detention is not lawful'.

Chapter 4 covers the period from November 2019 to the end of January 2020. Taking its title from a song released by Sam Fender (Newcastle’s answer to a young Bruce Springsteen) and voted BBC Radio 1’s ‘Hottest Record of the Year’, this chapter argues that the norm around the non-use of nuclear weapons is further eroded by recent steps to develop and deploy new nuclear weapons technologies across the globe. The chapter focuses on the recent deployment of low-yield nuclear weapons as well as new technologies such as hypersonic missiles to show that such technologies present novel risks and dangers by facilitating a new arms race. The author then goes beyond the conventional account of new technology in the new nuclear age by arguing that popular culture is central to shaping how the world comes to know, think, and feel about technological developments and nuclear weapons. By engaging with the rise of doom-laden apocalyptic indie pop music by the likes of Sam Fender and Phoebe Bridgers, as well as media coverage of the UK General Election in December 2019, alongside the American assassination of the Iranian general Qasem Soleimani in January 2020, the chapter examines the salience that nuclear weapons are now once again gaining in the public imagination. In doing so the author illustrates how popular culture and the media construct representations of the world that enable certain policies and political actions in the new nuclear age.

The law of neutrality is the law regulating the coexistence of war and peace. Its history is the story of the competition between opposing rights, those of belligerents against those of neutrals. Belligerents claim a right to take whatever steps are necessary to bring their foes to heel, including, when necessary, interrupting their trade with neutral persons. The building of a law of neutral rights has been a sort of juridical guerrilla war. Neutrality encompasses the humanitarianism of the Red Cross but also the derring-do of the blockade runner. Historically, the blockade runner and the arms dealer were earlier on the scene, by a very considerable margin, than the humanitarian and the pacifist. More than perhaps any other area of international law, neutrality has been moulded far more by the struggles of the real world than by the expositions of commentators.

This chapter considers three important questions of principle raised by Article 1: the relationship between the European Convention and internal law; the beneficiaries of the Convention; and restrictive character of the list of rights guaranteed. Article 2 supplies another illustration of the difference between enumeration and definition. Because Article 2 includes a positive obligation, the right to life will be violated if someone is killed and there is no investigation to find the person responsible, or if the authorities themselves use force and create unreasonable risks for innocent bystanders. Article 3 states: 'No one shall be subjected to torture or to inhuman or degrading treatment or punishment.' Article 4 provides: no one shall be held in slavery or servitude and no one shall be required to perform forced or compulsory labour.

This chapter focuses on the United Nations. It covers the foundation and development of the UN, the objectives and principles of the UN, the UN organs, the relations between the different UN bodies, the powers and functions of the UN agencies, the voting procedures of the UN, the immunities and privileges of the UN, the responsibility of the UN, and the relationship between the UN and the development of international law.