The Role of Azerbaijan in the Non-Aligned Movement Through the Lens of International Law and Security

This research paper is an attempt to explain the role of Azerbaijan in the Non-Aligned Movement through a rarely used perspective or lens of international law and international security. In a scholarly discourse on Azerbaijan’s ascension to the full membership in the Non-Aligned Movement, there are two distinct camps that argue either from the perspective of the non-relevance of the Non-Aligned Movement in the contemporary international community and subsequent low significance of Azerbaijan’s move or from the perspective of the theory of international relations and present it as a foreign policy adjustment or a continued strategy. This study departs from the continued (albeit adjusted) relevance of the Non-Aligned Movement as a subject of international law and seeks to complement the existing theories proposed by the international relations scholars with an alternative view based on Azerbaijan’s paradigmatic perceptions of international law and international security. By taking an alternative viewpoint, this paper utilizes a multidisciplinary angle to tackle so far only narrowly researched topic.