After the break-up of western Christendom following the Treaty of Westphalia of 1648, a number of historical changes took place in customary international law. One of the most important changes, if not the most important, was the emergence of the nation-state and the political philosophy to which it gave rise, that is to say, the theory of political sovereignty as the cornerstone of the rights and duties of the various states that came into existence. The political sovereignty of states resulted in the gradual replacement of the old international relations within Christendom, which were based upon a theocratic system of law, by a wider legal system that later embraced nations outside Christendom and engendered a universalization of international relations and, therefore, of international law.

For more than two decades, historians of the United States have energetically debated the relative importance of liberalism and republicanism in the 1770s and 1780s. Was the late eighteenth century a time of progress, and events culminating in the ratification of the Constitution a triumph for individual rights and liberal society, as convention held? Or was it a time of decay, and the events of the founding a renewal of citizen virtue in defense of the common good? Political theorists and constitutional scholars joined the debate, extending it beyond the founding and noting its relevance to our own time. Everyone agreed that liberalism eventually prevailed, more or less completely, for better or for worse. Just when it did so, and why, were questions always asked but never satisfactorily answered as the debate ran its course.

The second substantive session of the Third United Nations Conference on the Law of the Sea was held at Geneva from March 26 to May 10, 1975. It was decided at the outset that this would be a negotiating session. There was no general debate. Few formal meetings were held. Even informal working groups of the whole tended to rely on smaller groups the work of which was necessarily removed from public view. Progress, in many respects substantial progress, was made toward producing generally acceptable texts in this way. However, the Conference did not complete the negotiation of a new Law of the Sea Convention or approved texts.

The entry into force of the 1982 United Nations Convention on the Law of the Sea1 and its widespread ratification2 have renewed interest in the remaining gaps and ambiguities in its provisions on the control of shared marine resources. The discussion has recently focused on die regulation of common or transboundary fishing stocks3 and migratory species,4 a problem that was considered serious enough to merit the adoption of another multilateral convention. The 1995 Agreement on the Conservation and Management of Straddling Fish Stocks and Highly Migratory Fish Stocks5 was designed to resolve the increasing number of disputes on this issue.6

Recent research has shown that state reporting to human rights monitoring bodies is associated with improvements in rights practices, calling into question earlier claims that self-reporting is inconsequential. Yet little work has been done to explore the theoretical mechanisms that plausibly account for this association. This Article systematically documents—across treaties, countries, and years—four mechanisms through which reporting can contribute to human rights improvements: elite socialization, learning and capacity building, domestic mobilization, and law development. These mechanisms have implications for the future of human rights treaty monitoring.

Commenting on the papers in this symposium is paradoxically a difficult task. The authors are remarkably distinguished and one can only learn from what they write. Indeed, I have learned much from them (especially from Dean David Leebron’s splendid clarification of several aspects of linkage, a paper that shows that he should have been an Oxford philosopher if only he had not been such a successful legal scholar). Yet it is easy for an invited commentator to be overwhelmed by despair because the authors write for the most part as if in a research vacuum. There is little attempt at relating what they write to the enormous literature on the problem of linkage.

The International Law Commission’s articles on reparations restate the existing law on remedies, but they also innovate in significant ways to reinforce broader community interests in international legality. Given the dearth of precedents on reparations, both aspects can be helpful to tribunals and parties engaged in traditional interstate litigation, but the progressive elements, if they are accepted by states, could have wider application in supporting mechanisms to enhance implementation and observance of international obligations. The combination of codification and progressive development, however, is sometimes an uneasy fit and leaves unanswered several important questions about the theoretical foundation and practical application of the law of reparations. Even the seeming clarity of the articles is deceptive because some of the concepts included in the broadly drafted provisions can be difficult to apply in practice.

A strange thing about the International Criminal Tribunal for the Former Yugoslavia (ICTY) is that for most of its life, it has thought about its death. The Tribunal, of course, kept getting a reprieve. But today it seems more likely than not that the ICTY will indeed close down sometime in 2017, after the conclusion of the two cases it currently has at trial. Yet even after its closure, the ICTY will continue in a sort of un-death, through the unfortunately named Mechanism for International Criminal Tribunals, which will complete retrial and appellate proceedings in the cases currently tried before the ICTY.

European Communities—Measures Concerning Meat and Meat Products. WTO Doc. WT/DS26/AB/R & WT/DS48/AB/R.

World Trade Organization Appellate Body, January 16, 1998.

This report of the Appellate Body of the World Trade Organization (WTO) is both the most recent development in a long-running trade battle between the United States and the European Communities and the first dispute to be addressed under a new Uruguay Round agreement concerning food safety measures.

The United Nations Sub-Commission on the Prevention of Discrimination and the Protection of Minorities has an interest which is belied by its subordinate position in the international hierarchy. Apart from the intrinsic interest of the work in which it is engaged—work at the very heart of some of the most hotly debated issues in the United Nations—the Sub-Commission, because of the manner of its composition, possesses certain characteristics which differentiate it significantly from most other United Nations organs. Like the now defunct Sub-Commission on Freedom of Information and of the Press which was created at the same time, it consists, in theory, at least, of experts acting in their individual capacity, an arrangement which—because it gave its members a degree of independence not possessed by representatives of governments—would, it was hoped, permit them to contribute to the solution of certain problems in ways not possible to the latter. How has this arrangement worked in practice, if at all? Does the Sub-Commission really act as a body of independent experts, or are its decisions motivated by the same kind of political considerations which motivate its superior bodies? Why has it so singularly failed to make any contribution towards the protection of minorities? “What have been its successes and what is its future?

It is time for a fresh look at the norm of nonintervention in domestic affairs, as applied to nonforcible efforts to influence another state’s internal politics. The existence of such a norm is widely proclaimed, and it is commonly assumed to be a legal obligation rather than a mere practice of comity or aspirational objective. For governments, scholars and international organs alike, the “rule” against interference in internal politics seems to be an article of faith; but despite the frequency of its incantation in international discourse, how the norm applies to nonforcible conduct is inadequately understood.

The object of the present article is to survey the problems and to assess the achievements and prospects of the codification of international law within the United Nations in the light of the experience of the first five years of the activity of the International Law Commission. The Charter, in Article 13, imposes upon the General Assembly the obligation to “initiate studies and to make recommendations … for the purpose of encouraging the progressive development of international law and its codification.” In pursuance of that article the General Assembly set up the International Law Commission and adopted a Statute regulating its functions and organization. The first session of the Commission took place in 1949. Since then, it has been meeting in yearly sessions lasting between eight and eleven weeks.

The contributors to this symposium, both principal authors and commentators, ably demonstrate that there are indeed “overarching constructs” linking the subdisciplines of international law. All of the writers here assume that linkage issues arise for the World Trade Organization, as they have with respect to a number of other intergovernmental organizations, precisely because centralized, quasi-autonomous institutions maybe relatively effective vehicles for the promotion of interstate cooperation between rational, egoistic state actors. All of them assume, as scholars of international relations and economists have long recognized, that many international regimes are linkage machines by their very nature. It is important to recall why this is so in order to consider when or how an organization’s attempts at linkage may fail.

Retribution for the shocking crimes and atrocities committed by the enemy during World War II was made imperative by the overwhelming demands emanating from the public conscience throughout the civilized world. Statesmen and jurists realized that another failure to vindicate the law such as followed World War I would prove their incapacity to make progress in strengthening the international law of the future.1

That a wrong done to an individual must be redressed by the offender himself or by someone else against whom the sanction of the community may be directed is one of those timeless axioms of justice without which social life is unthinkable. The most primitive form of redress which insisted on an eye for an eye and a tooth for a tooth was not really reparation at all, but retaliation pure and simple, treated as a substitute for reparation. Measures of individual retaliation are no longer permissible in municipal law and impartial tribunals are entrusted with the duty of determining the nature and the extent of the reparation for a given wrong according to the law of the land.

International law has tried to follow parallel lines of development in this respect but has failed to keep pace with municipal law, largely because of its inherent difficulties. Reprisals, which are no better than individual retaliation, continued till even the other day to be acknowledged as a legitimate mode of reparation. The Covenant of the League of Nations, while imposing restrictions on resort to war, left uncertain the right of nations to make use of force short of war, suggesting thereby that the legality of reprisals might remain untouched. The Charter of the United Nations forbids the use of force except in certain contingencies and the implication of the relevant provision may well be that reprisals are still legal as long as they do not involve the use of force.