George, Jane, and the gang from The Jetsons promised us the dream to soar with flying cars. Well, we move forward with self-driving cars. Robot maids? Well, we got a handy dandy Roomba. The Turn-off-the-Boss Button? Well, we have screen share toggling and the mute button. What each of these examples has in common is artificial intelligence (AI). According to some estimates, AI and its innovation have the potential to boost the global economy by trillions of dollars a year, revolutionizing society in the process. In this process comes progress, but also worry and questions, law and intervention, along with hopes for invention.

Treaties are an essential source of international law, and they are permitted to be terminated. The rules governing termination, namely the 1969 Vienna Convention on the Law of Treaties, highlight two main goals of treaties: the stability and flexibility of agreements. Brexit highlights these goals and illustrates the tensions that arise. When parties terminate their treaties, they are ultimately stuck in a goldilocks dilemma. Essentially, the parties have to balance a combination of factors to achieve just the right outcome. The United Kingdom and the European Union were caught in this goldilocks dilemma which Brexit depicts. In the end, the parties were unable resolve this dilemma in terms of trade, which caused trade to be negatively impacted for both parties. In the future, parties should try to strike a proper balance between stability and flexibility at the beginning of their relations, so when it comes time to terminate their treaties, certain variables such as trade are not negatively impacted.

Beijing’s growing global influence has led to increased Chinese participation in various international initiatives, many of which intersect with international law, from trade to climate change. This has prompted scholars to focus more on China’s engagement with international law, aiming to develop effective strategies for interacting with this emerging global power.

Any analysis of international law’s role in a domestic system must consider the relevant actors, their influences, the issues they address, and the prevailing legal regime. This article offers new insights into Chinese policy formation by examining how influential domestic groups impact decision-making on specific public international law issues, their policy preferences, and their level of influence. It focuses primarily on non-state actors operating independently from the formal establishment, including State-owned enterprises (SOEs), private sector firms, non-governmental organizations (NGOs), netizens, and media.

This article further examines the roles of these domestic actors within the internal policy-making process regarding matters of international law and how international law, in response, either constrains or empowers these actors.

Finally, this article evaluates how increased participation of non-state actors might impact government accountability. This evaluation considers the broader context of rivalries among ministries and committees within the State Council, the evolving distribution of responsibilities, power dynamics between central and local governments, and the ongoing legal capacity-building efforts of relevant agencies.