Revisiting the New Haven methodology from an international law and policy perspective

This chapter aims to review the New Haven School approach, a policy-oriented jurisprudential school that combines legal and social scientific methodologies to form a human-centric system of thought and seeks to promote the international order of human dignity. The New Haven School approach is then applied to the right to self-determination conflict in Kashmir to understand locally-specific social processes that looks beyond black-letter legal technicality, and emphasizes the non-static nature of law. It demonstrates that how the New Haven methodology empowers decision makers with a set of tools to address multi-valent global concerns. After addressing the New Haven School’s major critiques, this chapter concludes that criticisms have only facilitated to refine the New Haven School’s approach, and that the methodology holds merit given its ability to address myriad social and cultural factors underlying complex international law issues.