Articles

• Jervis, Claire E M 1

Abstract

The International Court of Justice’s sclerotic approach to the interaction between substantive and procedural law in the Jurisdictional Immunities case need not and should not be the final word on the relationship between substantive and procedural law. While most lawyers would recognize the categories of substantive and procedural law, relatively few have considered the nature of the distinction between them. This article attempts to address that gap. It seeks to expose the flaws in approaching the distinction between substantive and procedural law in a binary way both as a matter of principle and in practice. In so far as it is helpful to use these labels at all, therefore, they should be the beginning rather than the end of the analysis.

• 1Assistant Legal Adviser, Foreign and Commonwealth Office, London, United Kingdom