Mediensammlung, | 25.06.2025 : Decolonize Law!

Colonialism is omnipresent in international law. The three-part film series Decolonize Law! shows how international law has been used in many areas from the beginning of colonialism to the present day to secure domination and reproduce power relations.

The three short documentary films were conceived by the Rosa Luxemburg Foundation in cooperation with the European Center for Constitutional and Human Rights and realized by VAYM Productions. The book on which the films are based, Dekoloniale Rechtskritik und Praxis, highlights key weaknesses in international law from a post-colonial perspective. In their volume, Wolfgang Kaleck and Karina Theurer combine theoretical approaches with practice while incorporating the perspectives of activists and lawyers. The films make clear that the violence and arbitrariness of colonization has been formally legitimized in international law since the sixteenth century, rendering it“invisible” as injustice. A reappraisal of the colonial past and the visualization of the racist traces that ithas left behind in law are therefore urgently needed for a long-term decolonization of the legal system.

With the films, the Rosa Luxemburg Foundation aims to raise awareness of the far-reaching and complex consequences of colonialism and at the same time highlight solutions to combat persistent inequalities.