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The Rules of Interpretation as Secondary Rules: The Perspective of Domestic Courts

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The Rule of Law in Global Governance

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Abstract

Aust’s chapter deals with the role of domestic courts in treaty interpretation. It analyses how domestic courts make use of the rules of interpretation set forth in the Vienna Convention on the Law of Treaties. These rules belong to the category of secondary rules of the international legal order. A diverging approach among domestic courts might undermine the consistency and coherence of international law. The chapter provides an overview of what the Convention sets out as ideal interpretative programme, how this question is related to notions of the international rule of law and how the process of interpretation is dealt with in domestic court decisions. It argues that adherence to the rules set forth in the Vienna Convention can strengthen the international rule of law.

Dr. iur., senior research fellow, Humboldt University Berlin/visiting professor, University of Konstanz (summer term 2016). I would like to thank my colleagues Alejandro Rodiles and Peter Staubach for many fruitful discussions about the issues of this chapter, which develops further some arguments, set forth in our joint contribution ‘Unity or Uniformity? Domestic Courts and Treaty Interpretation,’ (2014) Leiden Journal of International Law, 27 p. 75 as well as in my ‘Between Universal Aspiration and Local Application: Concluding Observations’ in H.P. Aust and G. Nolte (eds) (2016), The Interpretation of International Law by Domestic Courts—Uniformity, Diversity, Convergence (Oxford: Oxford University Press) p. 333. Thanks are also due to Monika Heupel, André Nollkaemper, Georg Nolte, Theresa Reinold as well as the other participants at the WZB workshop on the Rule of Law in Global Governance, Berlin, 28 and 29 June 2013 for constructive criticism. The text benefited further from fruitful discussions at the international law seminar of Anna Wyrozumska and Izabela Skomerska at Lodz University, March 2014. Responsibility for any errors or mistakes lies solely with me.

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Authors and Affiliations

  1. Faculty of Law, Chair for Public Law, Public International Law and European Law, Humboldt University Berlin, 6, Unter den Linden, 10099, Berlin, Berlin, Germany

    Helmut Philipp Aust

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Correspondence to Helmut Philipp Aust .

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  1. University of Bamberg, Germany

    Monika Heupel

  2. Leiden University, The Netherlands

    Theresa Reinold

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Aust, H.P. (2016). The Rules of Interpretation as Secondary Rules: The Perspective of Domestic Courts. In: Heupel, M., Reinold, T. (eds) The Rule of Law in Global Governance. Palgrave Macmillan, London. https://doi.org/10.1057/978-1-349-95053-9_3

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