Law, morality and politics—the chaotic world

By Dr Y. Ratnayake

Developments in world politics and regime changes throughout the 2020s are reminiscent of the words of Charles Dickens, who observed that we live in a tragic era—yet people persist in refusing to acknowledge the stark truth of its tragedy. Inexperienced and egocentric politicians wreak havoc across the world.

The pressing question remains: has humanity learned from the chronic mistakes of the past, or do we continue to gamble with the future of nations by placing unknown and unproven individuals in positions of authority? A legally elected president of a sovereign state was hijacked in the dead of the night, mocking the international law and norms accepted by the UNO. Making mockery into injury, the hijacker claims the ownership of the petroleum resources of the subjugated country in addition to dictating that international trade should be conducted in agreement with the dictates of the bandit country. These developments in the geopolitical arena are characterised by the following unhealthy distortions in the handling of international issues that demonstrate regressive tendencies leading to the age-old system of rule of the jungle.

Hegemonic dominance: International law is shaped by the interests of dominant powers rather than neutral universality. Scholars argue it reflects geopolitical hierarchies more than collective justice.

Regional fragmentation: Instead of a unified global order, regional blocs (e.g., NATO, ASEAN, and BRICS) increasingly set their own rules, diluting the authority of UN-based frameworks.

Instrumental use of law: States invoke international law selectively—using it to justify interventions or sanctions when convenient, but discarding it when restrictive.

Weak enforcement: Institutions like the International Criminal Court (ICC) or UN Security Council lack teeth against major powers, creating a credibility gap.

Moral relativism: leaders substitute personal or national morality for global norms that undermine and negate the legality of international institutions, while the small countries are strictly required to adhere to international treaties which are made inapplicable to the strong nations.

The grotesque distortions in handling international affairs have paved the way for spillover effects such as unilateralism, institutional decay, moral relativism and power asymmetry, which undoubtedly contribute to the creation of a world that is filled with suspicion, endangerment and power-based rule.

Moral relativism is amply demonstrated by withdrawal or noncompliance with the ruling and selective enforcement of human rights treaties defining morality based on personal likes and dislikes, which have often been adopted in settling international disputes. For instance, Donald Trump claims that the only limit for him is his own morality. Furthermore, withdrawal or noncompliance with the rulings of international establishments and selective enforcement of human right treaties are axiomatic evidence to drive the relevant argument home without any doubt.

Political morality defined: Scholars conceptualise political morality as the set of genuine normative reasons guiding political interaction at the global level.

Conflict with law: Leaders may claim moral justification for actions that contravene international norms (e.g., military interventions and sanctions without UN approval).

Instrumental use of morality: Morality is sometimes invoked rhetorically to justify power politics, rather than to uphold universal principles.

Normative tension: International law seeks universality and predictability, while political morality is often subjective, context-dependent, and shaped by domestic pressures.

Political Morality in Sri Lanka: Sri Lanka today bears the consequences of entrusting governance to untested leaders, while globally we witness a buccaneer style of politics driven by the hegemony of a single world power. As George Orwell, a world-renowned writer, cynically narrates in his satirist novel, "1984". “The past was erased, the erasure was forgotten, and the lie became truth.”

Hoodwinking and deceiving the beguiled voters has not only been practised without an iota of embarrassment but also justified shamelessly by resorting to oxymoron logic and preposterous arguments filled with esoteric political expressions.

Subjective morality: Leaders often claim moral high grounds for actions outside legal frameworks (e.g., political interventions without legal sanction).

Power politics disguised as morality: Morality becomes a rhetorical tool to justify political idiosyncrasies of the ruling party honchos, undermining law’s neutrality.

Indoctrinating the masses with the moral philosophy and hankering of the party by using the sheer power of the overwhelming parliamentary majority and executive power like a steamroller in addition to the strong application of sophistry.

Discriminatory application of legal mechanism to suppress dissent

Degradation of honesty in politics is amply demonstrated in Sri Lanka during the last presidential and parliamentary elections in which the beguiled voters were herded into Alice’s wonderful land with whimsical promises given by power-hungry politicians who were masquerading as the saviours of the nation and paragons of virtue. In the eve of both presidential and parliamentary elections in Sri Lanka, a maverick political party urged the masses to elect them into power, boldly pledging to resolve every problem the country had faced over the seventy-six years since independence within just six months of their coming into power.

Their promises did not stop at that; they expanded into almost absurd magnitudes. The party trumpeted grand assurances: fishermen would be guided by daily SMS alerts to the very shoals of the sea, citizens forewarned of earthquakes and floods before disaster struck, and farmers armed with futuristic technologies—such as fortifying the stem of the silk banana to prevent its untimely fall from the comb and transforming seawater into sulphuric acid for the purpose of earning a bountiful of foreign exchange from the export market. These pledges, dazzling in their audacity, ensnared voters who swallowed them whole, hook, line, and sinker. Yet beneath the glitter of such promises lies a betrayal of the moral and social duty owed to the electorate. For what is offered is not governance but illusion—whimsical fantasies dressed as policy. And here lies the gravest injustice: those who peddle such mendacity face no reckoning, shielded by a legal system that permits them to deceive without consequence. Thus, the campaign becomes not a covenant with the people, but a calculated charade, where promises are currency and truth is expendable.

Duplicity and grotesquery have now been formally crowned as the dominant behavioural paradigm among the earthlings without exception of Sri Lankans.

History teaches that history does not teach!