Legitimacy of International Law and the Exercise of Administrative Functions: The Example of the International Seabed Authority, the International Maritime Organization (IMO) and International Fisheries Organizations

2008 ◽  
Vol 9 (11) ◽  
pp. 2039-2060 ◽  
Author(s):  
Rüdiger Wolfrum
Keyword(s):  
Executive Functions ◽  
International Law ◽  
Mineral Resources ◽  
Exploration And Exploitation ◽  
Legal Regime ◽  
Public And Private ◽  
Administrative Functions ◽  
International Seabed Authority ◽  
Settlement Of Disputes ◽  
Private Actors

It is possible to speak of international administration only if an international entity is truly exercising functions equivalent to States. While such cases are rare, as Joseph Weiler emphasized in a different context, they do exist. One such case is the International Seabed Authority, which exercises legislative as well as executive functions concerning the international seabed (Area) and its resources. Furthermore, the legal regime on the international seabed comprises a fully elaborated system for the settlement of disputes available to public and private actors involved in the exploration and exploitation of mineral resources in the Area. The functions assigned to IMO and some fisheries organizations have not quite reached this level. Nevertheless one can observe that these organizations, too, prescribe binding rules, at least de facto. However, they lack the jurisdiction to enforce such rules directly; in that respect they are relying on the enforcement of States to enforce such rules acting under different capacities such as flag States or port States. One may consider these legal regimes as belonging to a multilevel system (Mehrebenensystem) where the prescriptive and executive functions are being vested in different entities.

The law of the sea and the deep seabed

1978 ◽  
Vol 290 (1366) ◽  
pp. 21-31
Keyword(s):  
United Nations ◽  
International Law ◽  
Mineral Resources ◽  
Law Of The Sea ◽  
International Agreement ◽  
Exploration And Exploitation ◽  
The Third ◽  
Sea Bed ◽  
The Law ◽  
Work Done

It is the object of the third United Nations Conference on the Law of the Sea to obtain broad international agreement on the limits to the territorial sea, on that area beyond these limits within which the coastal state may exercise rights over living and non-living resources and on the nature and manner of exercise of those rights. The Conference is also required to establish an international regime to deal with the exploration and exploitation of the deep seabed beyond the limits of coastal states’ rights. The work done by the Conference in five sessions since 1973 will have its effect on international law and practice but, partly owing to differences between the view-points of less industrialized and the more industrialized states (not confined to marine matters), the global solution essential for the orderly regulation of movement of shipping, scientific research and development of fisheries and sea-bed mineral resources may yet elude the Conference, to the detriment of the participating states and of the international community as a whole.

scholarly journals The Issue of Immunity of Private Actors Exercising Public Authority and the New Paradigm of International Law

Global Jurist ◽  
2020 ◽  
Vol 0 (0) ◽  
Author(s):  
Alberto Oddenino ◽  
Diego Bonetto
Keyword(s):  
International Law ◽  
Public Authority ◽  
New Paradigm ◽  
Public And Private ◽  
State Immunity ◽  
State Actors ◽  
Extension Of State ◽  
Private Actors

Summary1. The changing image and structure of international law – 2. The exercise of public authority through delegation – 3. The question of state immunity in the context of hybridisation between public and private – 4. The content of the activity as a paradigm to guide the extension of state immunity – 5. The issue of limiting the immunity of delegated non state actors – 6. Conclusions

Deconstructing the Conflict in Ukraine: The Relevance of International Law to Hybrid States and Wars

2015 ◽  
Vol 16 (3) ◽  
pp. 452-478 ◽  
Author(s):  
Outi Korhonen
Keyword(s):  
International Law ◽  
Rule Of Law ◽  
State Level ◽  
Current Situation ◽  
The State ◽  
Public And Private ◽  
The Rule Of Law ◽  
Economic Control ◽  
Before And After ◽  
Private Actors

In Ukraine, spheres of political, military, and economic control are contested, non-transparent, and shifting. As the Ukrainian government lost control over the rebellious Eastern oblasts (regions) of the country, Russia denies its authority over various pro-Russian separatists and vigorously rejects any responsibility for the abuses by the unidentified “green men,” both before and after the annexation of Crimea. Even during the decades before this conflict, the rule of law in Ukraine was “thin” at best. Meaningful political control was sporadic and dispersed, often wielded by the mix of public, private, and other shady actors occupying the grey area between a functional and a dysfunctional state. If state actors never effectively took control over the events at the state-level during peaceful times, it is not surprising that it is more difficult once a “hot” conflict breaks out. It is not unreasonable to assume that Minsk agreements—signed in an effort to stop the hemorrhaging of the conflict—will not hold if the signatories do not effectively control the diverse public and private actors who possess the actual capacity to influence the dynamic on the ground. Before rendering any kind of juridical judgment, the complicated political and socioeconomic configuration of the conflict in Ukraine forces us to first confront a factual puzzle: Who and what influence the current situation? Which concrete actors really drive the conflict and what interests animate them?

scholarly journals Rules and Monitoring Systems – Complementary or Conflicting Logics?: A Response to Fleur Johns

AJIL Unbound ◽  
2017 ◽  
Vol 111 ◽  
pp. 187-192
Author(s):  
Grégoire Mallard
Keyword(s):  
Human Rights ◽  
International Law ◽  
Environmental Law ◽  
Monitoring Systems ◽  
Legal Regime ◽  
Member States ◽  
Trade Law ◽  
Formal Authority ◽  
Private Actors

In the last century, international law expanded to new domains that had traditionally fallen under exclusive governmental authority—such as human rights, environmental law, nonproliferation law, trade law, etc. This expansion of international rules coalesced into transnational legal fields, which not only include norms, rules, and procedures, but also monitoring systems designed to ensure compliance by member states and private actors. By assuming that all levels of a legal regime (from norms to rules and procedures, and then to monitoring systems and sanctioning mechanisms in case of observed violations) function in a harmonious and complementary way—as the apparatus of international law is supposed to—, some international law scholars may be tempted to avoid spending time analyzing the technical operations of monitoring agencies. The perusal of inspection and compliance manuals is less rewarding and more taxing than the analysis of preambles of treaties and conventions, where norms of good conduct, allocation of rights, and formal authority between institutions are usually delineated.

Part XI of the Law of the Sea Convention and Third States: Some General Observations

1989 ◽  
Vol 48 (1) ◽  
pp. 85-97 ◽  
Author(s):  
Stephen Vasciannie
Keyword(s):  
International Law ◽  
The United States ◽  
Regulatory Control ◽  
Law Of The Sea ◽  
Exploration And Exploitation ◽  
The Law ◽  
International Seabed Authority ◽  
Deep Seabed Mining ◽  
Seabed Mining ◽  
Near Future

On 30 April 1982, after almost a decade of careful negotiations at the Third U.N. Conference on the Law of the Sea, the Law of the Sea Convention was adopted by the positive votes of 130 States. In one of its main sections, Part XI, the Convention sets out a detailed regime for the exploration and exploitation of the deep seabed and its resources and firmly places deep seabed mining under the regulatory control of the International Seabed Authority, to be established in Jamaica. However, as is well known, the United States and certain other Western countries have adopted a negative posture towards various aspects of Part XI and, for this reason, they are unlikely to ratify the 1982 Convention in the near future. Against this background, the question whether the provisions in Part XI may be binding evenvis-à-visnon-parties to the LOSC has assumed considerable importance in contemporary international law.

scholarly journals Rival Worlds and the Place of the Corporation in International Law

2019 ◽  
pp. 141-174
Author(s):  
Sundhya Pahuja ◽  
Anna Saunders
Keyword(s):  
International Law ◽  
Transnational Corporations ◽  
Marshall Plan ◽  
Public And Private ◽  
Unsuccessful Attempt ◽  
Proper Understanding ◽  
Slowing Down ◽  
Private Actors ◽  
The Relationship ◽  
North And South

Struggles ‘over’ international law in the period between 1955 and 1974 should be understood not as a battle to control a pre-existing international law, but as marking a series of encounters between rival practices of world-making, each travelling with rival accounts of international law. The question of how to conceptualize the corporation, and its proper relation to law and state, was a key element of those rival accounts. In this chapter, we trace the (successful) effort to establish the UN Commission on Transnational Corporations, and the (unsuccessful) attempt to draft a binding convention. In this telling institutional moment, the struggle over the proper understanding of the relationship between international law, the state, and the corporation, which travels was also a struggle over the authorship of worlds, and the authority to govern them. Paying attention to such practices shows us that the battle lines were drawn in ways that upset the comfortable rehearsal of a North-South divide. Anti-colonial struggles, the incipient ‘Cold War’, the invention of ‘Development’, and the implementation of a (Marshall) plan to (re)construct Europe produced unexpected commonalities that included coalitions across North and South and instructive alliances between ‘public’ and ‘private’ actors. Slowing down our study of this moment reveals that much of what was at stake then remains so today, and that other worlds are still possible.

Public Administration in the Field of Subsoil Use and Protection in Ukraine

2019 ◽  
pp. 169
Author(s):  
Nadiia Maksimentseva
Keyword(s):  
Public Administration ◽  
Phenomenological Study ◽  
Inductive Reasoning ◽  
Mineral Resources ◽  
Selling Price ◽  
Administrative Functions ◽  
The People ◽  
European Court ◽  
And Performance ◽  
Incoming Energy

Laws and regulations backing and governing public administration in subsoil use and protection in Ukraine is gradually gaining priority and importance given incoming energy security and resource self-sufficiency risks alerts for the State as one of the warrants for political and economic independence and guarantees for the people of Ukraine to enjoy and plenipotentiary implement its propitiatory rights set forth in the Constitution of Ukraine with regard to natural resources and benefits that constitute the genuine wealth of the nation. The article is written with the application of inductive reasoning and performance of various research methods, such as case studies, phenomenological study with some focus on nature and source of laws and administrative functions, grounded theory study; also a deep comparative analysis of domestic and overseas legal patterns is carried out. The article is devoted to the research of problems with regard to public administration in the field of subsoil use and protection in Ukraine. The author emphasizes that determination of public administration in the field of subsoil use and protection is a form of public managerial activities of public administration authorities (state authorities, local self-government bodies, self-governing public organizations with the respective competence). It is suggested that these activities are aimed at implementation of the policies in the field of geological exploration of mineral resources, mineral extraction, construction of underground and terrestrial facilities not related to the extraction of minerals, subsoil and environmental protection and they are based on the principles of interaction between subject and object of public administration, discretion, mutual responsibility, self-governance and decentralization when public services are provided. Also, the article presents many judicial practice of the European Court of Human Rights and Citizen, the Supreme Court in the field of public administration in the field of subsoil use and protection. In concluding notes amendments to Subsoil Code of Ukraine, methodology for calculating the initial selling price for the sale of special permit, selection procedures for open special permit tender bid winners and responsibility for subsoil use abandonment costs are suggested by the author.

International Law in Chinese Courts

2019 ◽  
pp. 547-564
Author(s):  
Congyan Cai
Keyword(s):  
International Law ◽  
Foreign Relations ◽  
Professional Competence ◽  
National Courts ◽  
Major Development ◽  
Chinese Perspective ◽  
The Status ◽  
Major Factors ◽  
Private Actors ◽  
The Comparative Study

This chapter adds a Chinese perspective to the comparative study of how national courts treat international law. The chapter finds that the application of international law in Chinese courts is influenced by several major factors, including China’s ambivalence toward international law, the role that the judiciary plays in China’s national governance, and the professional competence of Chinese judges. In particular, the failure of China’s Constitution to specify the status of international law makes secondary laws less likely to embrace international law: many secondary laws do not mention international law at all; only a modest number of secondary laws automatically incorporate international law. This also means that Chinese judges are discouraged from invoking international law in adjudicating disputes. However, in line with and in support of China’s economic opening policy since the late 1970s, Chinese judges regularly apply those treaties that deal with commercial relations between private actors. A major development is that, as China rises as a great power, Chinese courts have begun to prudently become more involved in foreign relations by applying international law.

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