International law and the politics of history

A proficient book review should begin with a pithy statement (better yet, an epigraph) that conveys to readers a general idea of the kind of review they are about to read and an economical summary of the debate in which the author is intervening, preferably all within the first paragraph. This mise-en-scène should then give way to a methodical march through the argument, giving enough of a précis that a graduate student may reasonably consider the book ‘read’, or for a professor to cite the author in support of this or that proposition. Only after this general summation will the reviewer engage with the work critically, sometimes as a major problematic, but more often taking the form of a minor methodological or empirical quibble, before dutifully concluding with a reiteration of why the book is important even if the reviewer has some qualms here or there. This is the general template of a book review, the substance of which readers may expect to fill a particular function. But this conventional form says nothing about the heterogeneity of the content one finds in reviews – while some are tediously formulaic, a few push academic discourse in fruitful directions. The best open important debates, sometimes with lofty rhetoric and theoretical discourse, more often in tones of pugnacious defiance and grievance-airing. But in assuming that a book review is such-andsuch because it conforms to such-and-such convention – as most readers do – is to ignore the diversity inherent to the genre, thereby foreclosing many avenues of productive engagement. Such is the problem with Anne Orford’s assessment of the state of historical-legal research in her recent philippic, International Law and the Politics of History, wherein she tends to conflate the substance of recent historical scholarship with its form. By reducing the field of professional history to a few essential features in the service of fulfilling a polemical function,