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This article aims at questioning frequently made claims that International Organizations (IOs) « depoliticize » international regulation. Based on a review of the literature in sociology, political science and anthropology on IOs, the goal of the paper is to provide a systematic analysis of the dialectic relationship between politicization and depoliticization in IOs. We identify the main processes through which depolitizisation occurs : the use of ethics and norms, the political neutralization of official rhetoric, and the mobilization of multiple forms of expertise as a tool of apolitical self-legitimization. We also explore the factors that may explain IOs’ tendancy to depoliticize, namely decision-making and diplomatic constraints linked to the intergovernmental structure of their managing bodies and the administrative and cultural constraints inherent to IO bureaucracies. Finally, we try to go beyond the concept of depoliticization and its shortcomings by stressing the politicization effects in some IOs stemming from resilient political rhetoric built into ethical norms and expertise mobilized by IOs.