A Study on Defeasibility and Defeaters in International Law: Process or Procedure Distinction Against the Non-Discrimination Rule

This is a paper on legal logic and defeasibility in international law. It argues that exceptions to rules are defeaters to such rules. The paper does that by using the World Trade Organisation’s (WTO) case law on the rule of non-discrimination and exceptions grounded on process or procedure method (PPM) distinctions. By arguing that rules have defeaters, this paper indirectly claims that legal reasoning is defeasible. Further, this investigation also serves as a criticism of accounts of legal reasoning as syllogistic deductive reasoning