{"title":"Regional Organizations in International Law: Exploring the Function-Territory Divide","authors":"Catherine Brölmann","doi":"10.1163/15723747-21010007","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.1163/15723747-21010007","url":null,"abstract":"<p>Regional international organizations have a problematic image among international lawyers (in contrast to IR scholars and international practitioners generally). In this paper I argue how this is due not to a systemic problem but rather to an ideological tension in international law. While according to received knowledge states are based on ‘territory’ and organizations are based on ‘function,’ it is true that the legal identity of regional organizations appears to have an uneasy combination of both. Yet, the contrasting notions of ‘territory’ and ‘function’ relate especially to the legal origin of states and organizations. The contrast does not as such ruffle the general mechanisms of international law. What is difficult, on the other hand, is to square the territorial (in truth geographical) dimension of regional organizations with the universalist aspirations of international law and with the claims of functionalist, a-political neutrality projected onto international organizations. Regional organizations challenge the vision of a universally applicable body of law as well as the vision of a world without territorial boundaries, where authority is segmented by specific issues or ‘functions.’ This ideological challenge is arguably a prime reason for the limited presence of regional organizations in international law narratives and in international (institutional) law scholarship.</p>","PeriodicalId":42966,"journal":{"name":"International Organizations Law Review","volume":"34 1","pages":""},"PeriodicalIF":0.7,"publicationDate":"2024-05-06","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"140935065","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":0,"RegionCategory":"","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
{"title":"The Distinctiveness of Regional International Organization Law","authors":"Damian Chalmers","doi":"10.1163/15723747-21010003","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.1163/15723747-21010003","url":null,"abstract":"<p>This article argues that there is a distinct regional international organization law which derives from that law’s concern with the institution, management and cultivation of qualities identified with regions. This concern gives this law four qualities. First, it seeks to institute the region into being, with the region identified as somewhere that combines a place and a mission-based association. Secondly, it characterises regions as fissile so that the provision of trust and security are central features of this law. Thirdly, it sees emancipation and solidarity as central ideals of both the region and its Member States. Fourly, this law contains an account of national inadequacy. This essay concludes by arguing for inclusion of a fifth quality, an account of regional inadequacy. This would problematise more extensively both what the regional international organization does and the concentrations of power it often facilitates.</p>","PeriodicalId":42966,"journal":{"name":"International Organizations Law Review","volume":"134 1","pages":""},"PeriodicalIF":0.7,"publicationDate":"2024-05-06","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"140934983","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":0,"RegionCategory":"","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
{"title":"Between Functionalism and Hegemony: Regional International Organizations in the History of International Law","authors":"Guy Fiti Sinclair","doi":"10.1163/15723747-21010004","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.1163/15723747-21010004","url":null,"abstract":"<p>This article examines the changing practice and theorisation of regional international organizations (<span style=\"font-variant: small-caps;\">rio </span>s) since the early nineteenth century. It argues that the identity and place of <span style=\"font-variant: small-caps;\">rio </span>s in international law have been continuously shaped and reshaped by the relational practices of particular entities, understood and enacted as more or less ‘regional’ and ‘organizational’, at different times and places. The article focuses on two axes of tension in particular: the positioning of <span style=\"font-variant: small-caps;\">rio </span>s between <em>functionalist</em> and <em>territorial</em> logics; and the possibility of <span style=\"font-variant: small-caps;\">rio </span>s being used for <em>hegemonic</em> or <em>counter-hegemonic</em> purposes. The article traces these two lines of tension through the practice of <span style=\"font-variant: small-caps;\">rio </span>s and doctrinal and theoretical reflections on that practice, over four periods of uneven lengths: the late nineteenth and early twentieth centuries; the interwar period; the four decades following the Second World War; and the period since the end of the Cold War.</p>","PeriodicalId":42966,"journal":{"name":"International Organizations Law Review","volume":"35 1","pages":""},"PeriodicalIF":0.7,"publicationDate":"2024-05-06","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"140934984","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":0,"RegionCategory":"","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
{"title":"The European Union and Other Regional International Organizations: Tales of Solidarity","authors":"Eva Kassoti","doi":"10.1163/15723747-21010010","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.1163/15723747-21010010","url":null,"abstract":"<p>Regional International Organizations (<span style=\"font-variant: small-caps;\">rio </span>s) are an important part of the modern international legal landscape. Yet, thus far, they have largely remained at the margins of scholarly attention. This contribution argues that, <em>inter alia</em>, the <span style=\"font-variant: small-caps;\">rio </span>s’ lens provides valuable insights since <span style=\"font-variant: small-caps;\">rio </span>s’ law casts in legal terms regional narratives of emancipation and solidarity that are central to bringing into existence and sustaining the legitimacy of new regional (legal) orders. The article then proceeds to trace the development of the principle of solidarity in international law and in the legal orders of two <span style=\"font-variant: small-caps;\">rio </span>s, namely the European Union (EU) and the African Union (AU) with a view to providing concrete examples of the potential and limits of <span style=\"font-variant: small-caps;\">rio </span>s to act as vehicles for realising regional narratives of solidarity. The article concludes by emphasising the importance of taking regional (legal) space seriously by highlighting the potential of <span style=\"font-variant: small-caps;\">rio </span>s’ law to increase accountability and pluralise the geographies of international law.</p>","PeriodicalId":42966,"journal":{"name":"International Organizations Law Review","volume":"41 1","pages":""},"PeriodicalIF":0.7,"publicationDate":"2024-05-06","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"140935066","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":0,"RegionCategory":"","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
{"title":"Virtual Voting in rfmos: A Procedural Odyssey at the Indian Ocean Tuna Commission","authors":"Valentin Schatz, Maia Perraudeau","doi":"10.1163/15723747-20030003","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.1163/15723747-20030003","url":null,"abstract":"<p>This article examines, from the perspective of international institutional law, the variety of procedural problems which arose following an online vote by secret ballot taken by the Indian Ocean Tuna Commission (<span style=\"font-variant: small-caps;\">iotc</span>) in 2021. By providing a detailed case-study of this novel instance of practice and the challenges it represents, this article aims to contribute to a better understanding of the institutional governance and procedural legal framework of regional fisheries management organizations (<span style=\"font-variant: small-caps;\">rfmo</span> s). It first analyses the vote and the challenge to its validity. This article then constructs a taxonomy of the various procedural irregularities that were found to have occurred, the responsibility of institutional actors for their occurrence, and their legal consequences. The final substantive sections of this article examine how the <span style=\"font-variant: small-caps;\">iotc</span> ultimately dealt with the situation and what potential role the available dispute settlement procedures could have had in addressing the discussed procedural irregularities.</p>","PeriodicalId":42966,"journal":{"name":"International Organizations Law Review","volume":"1 1","pages":""},"PeriodicalIF":0.7,"publicationDate":"2023-12-20","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"139022392","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":0,"RegionCategory":"","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
{"title":"The United Nations Security Council and Global Health Threats","authors":"Adam Kamradt-Scott","doi":"10.1163/15723747-20030006","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.1163/15723747-20030006","url":null,"abstract":"<p><span style=\"font-variant: small-caps;\">covid</span>-19 has prompted a range of new suggestions to reform the existing international system. One recommendation garnering political support has been to create a new Global Health Threats Council, comprised of heads of state, to facilitate sustained political commitment and investment in pandemic preparedness and response. A question that currently remains unanswered, however, is how and where this new body aligns to existing governance arrangements. Some observers have suggested the new body should report the United Nations Security Council on the basis it is charged with maintaining international peace and security. This paper evaluates the UN Security Council’s engagement with health crises over recent decades to consider the legal, political, and practical feasibility of the body assuming a larger role in responding to future disease events, and the appropriateness of the proposed Global Health Threats Council falling under the authority of the UN’s principal organ for international security.</p>","PeriodicalId":42966,"journal":{"name":"International Organizations Law Review","volume":"309 4 1","pages":""},"PeriodicalIF":0.7,"publicationDate":"2023-12-20","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"139022390","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":0,"RegionCategory":"","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
{"title":"Acquiescence and the Immunity of UN Peacekeepers; Implicit Acceptance?","authors":"Steven van de Put","doi":"10.1163/15723747-20030005","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.1163/15723747-20030005","url":null,"abstract":"<p>In general States have not responded when faced with violations of international law committed by United Nations (UN) peacekeepers. This article aims to explore if such inaction, or silence, by States can be construed as legally significant. Relying upon the concept of acquiescence within international law, this article analyses if this specific situation can be seen as States implicitly agreeing to the UN not being bound to provide means of redress.</p><p>This article argues that it would be difficult to consider the practice of States to amount to acquiescence. In international legal terms, it cannot be established that this inaction satisfies all the conditions for acquiescence for either interpretation purposes or consent. Likewise, the host State might also not always be the relevant actor when considering redress. These arguments ultimately make it challenging to consider the current non-responsiveness of States to signify a form of acquiescence.</p>","PeriodicalId":42966,"journal":{"name":"International Organizations Law Review","volume":"19 1","pages":""},"PeriodicalIF":0.7,"publicationDate":"2023-12-20","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"139022551","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":0,"RegionCategory":"","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
{"title":"The United Nations’ Obligation to Provide Access to Remedies to Third-Party Claimants Under International Law","authors":"Doris Uwicyeza Picard","doi":"10.1163/15723747-20030004","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.1163/15723747-20030004","url":null,"abstract":"<p>The perceived impunity of the United Nations peacekeeping missions has been the subject of numerous reports and studies. These studies are in agreement that the legal accountability of the UN is strongly challenged by the UN’s absolute immunity coupled with a lack of or inadequate alternative dispute resolution mechanisms. This situation has led to what is referred to as a ‘remedy gap’ whereby third-party claims against the UN are extinguished due to a lack of forum with jurisdiction over the UN. This article is a study into the second component of the remedy gap, namely, the lack of or inadequate alternative dispute resolution mechanisms. This is a study on the underlying obligation to provide access to remedies as a potential component of the remedy gap. It seeks to assess the legal framework of the UN’s obligation to provide access to remedies and the scope thereof. This is to establish whether the lack of or shortfalls of the UN’s alternative dispute resolution mechanisms are imputable to an inadequate legal framework which does not provide sufficient legal tools to ensure the suitable adjudication of claims or whether the issue lies in the implementation phase through the UN’s policies and practice. In essence, this article seeks to determine the basic rules that form part of the UN’s obligation to provide access to remedies. This is done through a comprehensive analysis of all the possible sources of this obligation to determine its scope.</p>","PeriodicalId":42966,"journal":{"name":"International Organizations Law Review","volume":"17 1","pages":""},"PeriodicalIF":0.7,"publicationDate":"2023-12-20","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"139022552","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":0,"RegionCategory":"","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
{"title":"unops and the Rise of Entrepreneurial International Organizations: A Case Study","authors":"Ukri Soirila","doi":"10.1163/15723747-20030002","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.1163/15723747-20030002","url":null,"abstract":"<p>This article provides an introduction to the United Nations Office for Procurement Services (<span style=\"font-variant: small-caps;\">unops</span>), which is an interesting entity because it is financially entirely self-reliant, and has thus become extremely business-minded, at times resembling a private company. Through the case study of <span style=\"font-variant: small-caps;\">unops</span>, the article also seeks to draw attention to a broader development, namely the increasing entrepreneurial activities of international organizations. As the article argues, this trend provides a challenge to the theory of international organizations law, which has traditionally focused on relations between international organizations and their member states, while imagining the former as acting in public interest and the latter as principals (rather than clients).</p>","PeriodicalId":42966,"journal":{"name":"International Organizations Law Review","volume":"112 1","pages":""},"PeriodicalIF":0.7,"publicationDate":"2023-12-20","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"139022389","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":0,"RegionCategory":"","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
{"title":"“What the Secretariat Makes It”: United Nations Civil Servants between Administrative Function and Contemporary International Lawmaking","authors":"Hannah Birkenkötter","doi":"10.1163/15723747-20030007","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.1163/15723747-20030007","url":null,"abstract":"<p>As the only international organization that aspires to be unviersal both in terms of its membership as well as in terms of the policy fields in which it intervenes, the United Nations (UN) occupies a unique position in international lawmaking. Focusing on the UN’s political and judicial or quasi-judicial organs does not, however, fully capture the organization’s lawmaking activities. Instead, much of the UN’s impact on international law today can be traced back to its civil servants. In this paper, I argue that international lawmaking today is best understood as processual and fluid, and that in contemporary lawmaking thus understood, the UN Secretariat plays an important role. I then propose two ways in which international civil servants add to international lawmaking: they engage in executive interpretation of broad and elusive norms, and they act as an interface between various actors on different governance levels. This raises novel legitimacy challenges for the international legal order.</p>","PeriodicalId":42966,"journal":{"name":"International Organizations Law Review","volume":"29 1","pages":""},"PeriodicalIF":0.7,"publicationDate":"2023-12-20","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"139022397","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":0,"RegionCategory":"","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}