Chapter 7 considers how the framework proposed in Chapter 6 potentially contradicts international lawyers’ professional responsibilities. The chapter first considers different approaches to such questions in different countries and professional contexts. It then examines lawyers’ professional responsibilities when dealing with difficult jus ad bellum cases, reporting interviewees’ views of such responsibilities and of risk management techniques. By identifying and reducing risks of legal challenge to use of force, the framework potentially focuses lawyers only on their role as ‘counsellor’, helping governments do whatever they want, rather than their normative role of ‘conscience’, urging governments to change their behaviour to abide by law. Such a framework might even advise decision-makers to accept clearly unlawful force if there is little risk of an action facing legal challenge. The chapter nevertheless argues lawyers could use the framework developed in Chapter 6 while fulfilling their professional responsibilities, by seeking a form of Rawlsian ‘reflective equilibrium’ with their own personal professional judgement to address legal and factual uncertainty and extra-legal intuitions in hard cases engaging the jus ad bellum.

This chapter looks into the profile of the court adviser in the age of ecclesiastical reform and cultural renewal between c. 790 and c. 840. It explores the rise of the persona of the wise adviser, who spoke up for justice and orthodoxy and who used his familiarity with the ruler to mediate on behalf of others. Who were these counsellors who advocated and embodied frank speech and straightforward advice as agents of social and political change? What were the qualities and credentials that qualified them as competent advisers? And to what extent were advisers at liberty to express their admonitions, criticism and advice openly and directly? To answer these questions, this chapter investigates the advice literature of the late eighth and first half of the ninth century: that is, hortatory letters and mirrors for princes, written in response to, or as part of, attempts to create a well-organised, orthodox and just Christian society by educating its rulers.