Christie Justus Law — Research Papers · CJL-WP 2026/03
Naomi Eglantine Christie · LL.B. (Distinction) · L.E.C. (Honours) · LL.M., New York University, 2015 — International Legal Studies · Attorney-at-Law, admitted to the Bar of Guyana, October 2013, and to the Bar of Grenada, 2014.
September 2026 · 25 pages · 117 footnotes · PDF
This paper asks what the law of armed conflict is for, seen from a state that does not expect to fight. I argue that the three cardinal rules of the conduct of hostilities — distinction, proportionality and precaution — are for such a state a shield rather than a set of instructions to its own forces, and that this difference of position shows in what the state wants from the law. It shows in the sources the small state prefers: it ratifies universally and entire, and it reads the customary-law study as its library where the great power reads its own manual. It shows in the way the small state implements, thinly and through statutes applied from the colonial period, because implementation is priced against the expectation of use, so that the gap which results is one of capacity rather than of compliance. And it shows in the use the small state makes of the law adjacent to the law of armed conflict: the Charter's prohibition of force and the International Court's provisional-measures practice become, for the weaker party, a form of precaution before the attack. Guyana is the case study, through its implementation record, the Caribbean Community's practice under the Arms Trade Treaty, and the Court's Orders of 1 December 2023 and 1 May 2025 in Arbitral Award of 3 October 1899 (Guyana v Venezuela), which I read as the peacetime analogue of the precautionary rule. The merits of that case are pending and nothing in the paper predicts them. It closes with what a modern Geneva Conventions Act should contain and the institutions that should go with it.
Keywords: law of armed conflict; international humanitarian law; distinction; proportionality; precaution; small states; Guyana; provisional measures; Guyana v Venezuela; Arms Trade Treaty; CARICOM
Naomi Eglantine Christie · LL.B. (Distinction) · L.E.C. (Honours) · LL.M., New York University, 2015 — International Legal Studies · Attorney-at-Law, admitted to the Bar of Guyana, October 2013, and to the Bar of Grenada, 2014. Correspondence: naomi@christiejustuslaw.com.
© 2026 Naomi Eglantine Christie. This paper may be downloaded, printed and circulated without charge for personal, academic and teaching use, with attribution. It states the law as the author understands it at the date on the cover; it is not legal advice to any person. Pending matters are described as pending.