Resumen de Editorial note

Linos-Alexandre Sicilianos, Thomas Skouteris

• This symposium on interwar international law jurist Nicolas Politis is part of EJIL�s long-standing project to reappraise the European tradition of international law. This brief Editorial Note has two aims. First, it casts an inward � if furtive � glance at the enterprise of intellectual history1 in international law at large. Secondly, it explains the choice of Nicolas Politis as the focus of this symposium as well as the part played by the five essays featured therein.

  The desirability of revisiting the intellectual history of European international law appears self-explanatory. The allure of intellectual history often rests in the perception that there is an intrinsic value in turning to the history of ideas, doctrines and institutions of international law and to the work of scholars involved in their development. The study of the origin, evolution and achievements of the discipline is considered to enhance our knowledge which can be put to multiple constructive uses. Preventively, this knowledge can help us learn from our mistakes, by identifying instances when European international law �took the wrong turn� or may have been part of the problem instead of the solution. More positively, this knowledge can also help to revive overlooked aspects of the tradition and discern the constants in the European intellectual toolkit that connect our distant disciplinary past to the present and, inevitably, the future.

  The intrinsic value of doing intellectual history forms the backdrop to much of the recent �turn to history� in international law over the past two decades.2 Numerous symbolic gestures exemplify this turn. The European Society of International Law, for instance, identified the study of the European tradition as one of its primary institutional goals.3 The turn to history, however, has not been accompanied by an equally animated scrutiny of the ways in which �