The Monroe, Calvo, Drago, Tobar, and Estrada Doctrines as Global Ordering

Abstract This chapter explores international legal doctrines as modes of global ordering from the mid-19th century to the early 20th century in the Americas. The Monroe, Calvo, Drago, Tobar, and Estrada Doctrines will be assessed as argumentative strategies and blueprints of the world, employed by international lawyers, politicians, and diplomats in the continent to address issues of sovereignty, non-intervention, and recognition in a regional context marked by stark power asymmetries between the U.S. and the Latin American republics. From the mid-19th century to the first decades of the 20th century, international legal doctrines played a consistent role in the Americas’ practice and legal imagination.