A changing international law of the sea

Abstract

The legal régime of the sea has been a persistently important theme of the law of nations from the beginning; but it has probably never been more dominant than it is at the present time, touching as it does so many of the most vital interests of nations, such as the supply of food and of energy; politically sensitive questions like defence and immigration; and some of the most pressing aspects of pollution and conservation problems. With this renewed importance of the law of the sea have come also new doubts about its content and meaning, and even about the underlying legal principles. Half a century ago, the law of the sea was relatively simple, certain and stable, at any rate in time of peace. The classical dispute between the closed sea and open sea doctrines seemed at last to have been finally resolved on the basis of a kind of dualism by which the coastal state was to have sovereignty over a belt of territorial waters, subject to the general right of innocent passage, and the high seas outside that maritime belt were to be res communis, not subject to acquisition by title of sovereignty, but subject to an international régime which was spelt out in terms of the so-called “freedoms” to be enjoyed by the flags of all nations, the most important being the freedom of navigation and the freedom of fishing.