International law is the body of legal rules that apply between sovereign
states and such other entities as have been granted international
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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
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.
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
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
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
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
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
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.