The 10th annual Breyer Lecture: Matias Spektor on the US, the West, and international law in an age of strategic competition

Can Western countries uphold the rules-based international order, established during a time of U.S. hegemony, in a more contested era? Is the current international legal framework adequate to govern engagement and confrontation between nations? How can multilateral institutions help preserve international law and ensure accountability in instances of its violation? What aspects of the order need to change, and how? On April 5, 2024, Foreign Policy at Brookings hosted Matias Spektor for the 10th annual Justice Stephen Breyer Lecture on International Law. Spektor addressed the challenges faced by the United States, the West, and international law in an age of strategic competition against the backdrop of Russia’s continued war of aggression against Ukraine, conflict and humanitarian crisis in the Middle East, continued geopolitical shifts, and a year of pivotal elections around the world.

Spektor is a Brazilian foreign policy expert and founder and professor at the School of International Relations at Fundação Getulio Vargas in São Paulo. He specializes in international security, political violence, transnational repression, climate politics, and the history and theory of international order, with a focus on Brazil, Latin America, and the Global South.

After the keynote address, Constanze Stelzenmüller, director of the Center on the United States and Europe at Brookings, joined Spektor for a conversation on how Western institutions have responded to the wars in Ukraine and Gaza and how the Global South can help establish a more robust international order based on the rule of law, transparency, and accountability. A panel discussion with distinguished experts on these issues followed.

Viewers submitted questions by emailing [email protected] and via Twitter @BrookingsFP by using #InternationalLaw.

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