FREE ESSAY ON INTERNATIONAL LAW

INTERNATIONAL LAW

International Law
International law is the body of legal rules that apply between sovereign 
states and such other entities as have been granted international 
personality (status acknowledged by the international community). The 
rules of international law are of a normative character, that is, they 
prescribe towards conduct, and are potentially designed for authoritative 
interpretation by an international judicial authority and by being capable 
of enforcement by the application of external sanctions. The International 
Court of Justice is the principal judicial organ of the United Nations, 
which succeeded the Permanent Court of International Justice after World 
War II. Article 92 of the charter of the United Nations states:
The International Court of justice shall be the principal judicial organ 
of the United nations. It shall function in accordance with the annexed 
Statute, which is based upon the Statute of the Permanent court of 
International Justice and forms an integral part of the present Charter.
The commands of international law must be those that the states impose 
upon themselves, as states must give consent to the commands that they 
will follow. It is a direct expression of raison d'etat, the interests of 
the state, and aims to serve the state, as well as protect the state by 
giving its rights and duties. This is done through treaties and other 
consensual engagements which are legally binding.
The case-law of the ICJ is an important aspect of the UN's contribution to 
the development of international law. It's judgements and advisory 
opinions permeates into the international legal community not only through 
its decisions as such but through the wider implications of its 
methodology and reasoning.
The successful resolution of the border dispute between Burkina Faso and 
Mali in the 1986 Frontier Dispute case illustrates the utility of judicial 
decision as a means of settlement in territorial disputes. The case was 
submitted to a Chamber of the ICJ pursuant to a special agreement 
concluded by the parties in 1983. In December 1985, while written 
submissions were being prepared, hostilities broke out in the disputed 
area. A cease-fire was agreed, and the Chamber directed the continued 
observance of the cease-fire, the withdrawal of troops within twenty days, 
and the avoidance of actions tending to aggravate the dispute or prejudice 
its eventual resolution. Both Presidents publicly welcomed the judgement 
and indicated their intention to comply with it. In the Fisheries 
Jurisdiction case (United Kingdom v. Iceland , 1974) the ICJ contributed 
to the firm establishment in law of the idea that mankind needs to 
conserve the living resources of the sea and must respect these resources. 
The Court observed:
It is one of the advances in maritime international law, resulting from 
the intensification of fishing, that the former laissez-faire treatment 
ofthe living resources of the sea in the high seas has been replaced by a 
recognition of a duty to have due regard of the rights of other States and 
the needs of conservation for the benefit of all. Consequently, both 
parties have the obligation to keep inder review the fishery resources in 
the disputed waters and to examine together, in the light of scientific 
and other available information, the measures required for the 
conservation and development, and equitable exploitation, of these 
resources, taking into account any international agreement in force 
between them, such as the North-East Atlantic Fisheries Convention of 24 
January 1959, as well as such other agreements as may be reached in the 
matter in the course of further negotiation. The Court also held that the 
concept of preferential rights in fisheries is not static.
This is not to say that the preferential rights of a coastal State in a 
special situation are a static concept, in the sense that the degree of 
the coastal State's preference is to be considered as for ever at some 
given moment. On the contrary, the preferential rights are a function of 
the exceptional dependence of such a coastal State on the fisheries in 
adjacent waters and may, therefore, vary as the extent of that dependence 
changes.
The Court's judgement on this case contributes to the development of the 
law of the sea by recognizing the concept of the preferential rights of a 
coastal state in the fisheries of the adjacent waters, particularly if 
that state is in a special situation with its population dependent on 
those fisheries. Moreover, the Court proceeds further to recognise that 
the law pertaining to fisheries must accept the primacy of the requirement 
of conservation based on scientific data. The exercise of preferential 
rights of the coastal state, as well as the hisoric rights of other states 
dependent on the same fishing grounds, have to be subject to the 
overriding consideration of proper conservation of the fishery resources 
for the benefit of all concerned.
Some cases in which sanctions are threatened, however, see no actual 
implementation. The United States, for example, did not impose measures on 
those Latin American states that nationalized privately owned American 
property, despite legislation that authorizes the President to discontinue 
aid in the absence of adequate compensation.
Enforcement measures are not the sole means of UN sanction. Skeptics of 
the coercive theory of international law note that forceful sanctions 
through the United Nations are limited to situations involving threats to 
the peace, breaches of peace, and acts of aggressiion. In all other 
instances of noncompliance of international law, the charter's own general 
provisions outlawing the threat or use of force actually prevent forceful 
sanction. Those same skeptics regard this as an appropriate paradox in a 
decentralized state system of international politics. Nonetheless, other 
means of collective sanction through the UN involve diplomatic 
intervention and economic sanctions.
In 1967 the Security Council decided to isolate Southern Rhodesia (now 
Zimbabwe) for its policy of racial separation following its unilateral 
declaration of independence from Britain. As in other cases of economic 
sanctions, effectiveness in the Rhodesian situation was limited by the 
problems of achieving universal participation, and the resistance of 
national elites to external coercion. With respect to universal 
participation, even states usually sympathetic to Britain's policy 
demonstrated weak compliance.
The decentralization of sanctions remains one of the major weaknesses of 
international law. Although international bodies sometimes make decisions 
in the implementation of sanctions, member states must implement them. The 
states are the importers and exporters in the international system. They 
command industrial economies and the passage of goods across national 
boundaries.
Furthermore, the UN is wholly dependent on its members on operating funds, 
so no matter what decisional authority its members give it, its ability to 
take action not only depends on its decision but also on means. Without 
the support, the wealth and the material assistance of national 
governments, the UN is incapable of effective sanctions. The resistance of 
governments to a financially independent UN arises principally on their 
insistence on maintaining control over sanctioning processes in 
international politics.
Despite sweeping language regarding threats to peace, breaches of the 
peace, and acts of aggression, the role of the United Nationsin the 
enforcement of international law is quite limited. Indeed the purpose of 
the UN is not to enforce international law, but to preserve, restore and 
ensure political peace and security. The role of the Security Council is 
to enforce that part of international law that is either created or 
encompassed by the Charter of the United Nations. When aggression occurs, 
the members of the Council may decide politically - but are not obliged 
legally - to undertake collective action that will have sanctioning 
result. In instances of threats to or breaches of the peace short of war, 
they may decide politically to take anticipatory action short of force. 
Moreover, it is for the members of the Security Council to determine when 
a threat to peace, a breach of peace, or an act of aggression has occured. 
Even thi determination is made on political rather than legal criteria. 
The Security Council may have a legal basis for acting, but self-interst 
determines how each of it members votes, irrespective of how close to 
aggression the incident at issue may be. Hence by virtue of both its 
constitutional limitations and the exercise of sovereign prerogatives by 
its members, the security council's role as a sanctioning device in 
international law is sharply restricted.
As the subject matter of the law becomes more politicized, states are less 
willing to enter into formal regulation, or do so only with loopholes for 
escape from apparent constraints. In this area, called the law of 
community, governments are generally less willing to sacrifice their 
soverein liberties. In a revolutionary international system where change 
is rapid and direction unclear, the integrity of the law of community is 
weak, and compliance of its often flaccid norms is correspondingly 
uncertain.
The law of the political framework resides above these other two levels 
and consists of the legal norms governing the ultimate power relations of 
states. This is the most politicized level of international relations; 
hence pertinent law is extremely primitive. Those legal norms that do 
exist suffer from all the political machinations of the states who made 
them. States have taken care to see that their behaviour is only minimally 
constrained; the few legal norms they have created always provide avenues 
of escape such as the big-power veto in the UN Security Council.
Despite the many failures and restrictions of international law, material 
interdpendence, especially among the states of equivalent power, may 
foster the growth of positive legal principles. In addition, as 
friendships and emnities change,, some bilateral law may cease to be 
observed among new emnities, but new law may arise among new friends who 
have newfound mutual interests. In the meantime, some multicultural law 
may have been developed. Finally, research suggests that the social 
effects of industrialization are universal and that they result in 
intersocial tolerances that did not exist during periods of disparate 
economic capability. On social, political, ane economic grounds, 
therefore, international law is intrinsic to the transformation and 
modernization of the international system, even though the law of the 
political context has remained so far.