Offers a new framework for analysing international law and presents a theory of international legal change.

Paul F. Diehl is Henning Larsen Professor of Political Science and University Distinguished Teacher/Scholar at the University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign. He also serves as Director of the Correlates of War Project, the largest data-collection effort on international conflict in the world. His areas of expertise include the causes of war, UN peacekeeping, and international law.

1. Introduction; 2. A new framework for analysis and a model for legal change; 3. The influence of normative change on the operating system; 4. Extra-systemic adaptations to systemic imbalance; 5. The influence of the operating system on normative change; 6. Implications and future directions.