Abstract
My starting point for this discussion of the relationship between treaties and soft law is the observation that the subtlety of the processes by which contemporary international law can be created is no longer adequately captured by reference to the orthodox categories of custom and treaty. The role of soft law as an element in international law-making is now widely appreciated, and its influence throughout international law is evident. Within that law-making process the relationships between treaty and custom, or between soft law and custom, are also well understood. The relationship between treaties and soft law is less often explored, but it is no less important, and has great practical relevance to the work of international organizations.
This chapter is reproduced from (1999) 48 ICLQ, p. 901.
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References
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UNEP,, Report of the 8 Meeting,Decisions VIII/22–25 (Latvia, Lithuania, Czech Republic, Russia) UNEP/OzL.Pro.8/12 (1996);
UNEP, Report of the 9th Meeting,Decisions IX/29–32 (Latvia, Lithuania, Russia, Czech Republic) UNEP/OzL.Pro.9/12 (1997).
For the most recent position see Report of the Implementation Committee for the Montreal Protocol, 20th Meeting,UNEP/OzL.Pro/ImpCom/20/4 (1998).
See generally Jacob Werksman, “Compliance and Transition: Russia’s Non-Compliance Tests the Ozone Regime” (1996) 36 ZaöRV p. 750
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The problems are discussed in Jacob Werksman, Responding to Non-Compliance Under the Climate Change Regime (OECD, 1998); id. in James Cameron, Jacob Werksman, Peter Roderick (eds.), Improving Compliance with International Environmental Law,(Earthscan, 1996), pp. 85 et seq.
UNFCC Article 13; 1997 Kyoto Protocol Article 16. For details of the process see 6th Report of the Ad Hoc Working Group on Article 13 (1998) UN Doc. FCCC/ AG 13/ 1998 /2.
Martti Koskenniemi, “Breach of Treaty or Non-Compliance? Reflections on the Enforcement of the Montreal Protocol” (1992) 3 Yearbook of International Environmental Law,pp. 123–162.
See for example the Nuclear Weapons (Advisory Opinion),(1996) ICJ Rep. 226, in which some 40 States made written or oral submissions to the Court. In contentious cases involving the construction of a multilateral convention all parties to the convention have a right to intervene in the proceedings, and the construction so given will be equally binding on such States: Statute of the ICJ, Article 66. It should be noted, however, that an allegation of non-compliance is not necessarily a question of construction.
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Boyle, A. (2000). Some Reflections on the Relationship of Treaties and Soft Law. In: Gowlland-Debbas, V. (eds) Multilateral Treaty-Making. Nijhoff Law Specials. Springer, Dordrecht. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-94-017-6964-8_3
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