This chapter discusses some legal issues that can arise in connection with the use of shared resources; the generation and use of energy and other uses of transboundary water resources; and other forms of transboundary co-operation, as well as issues specific to the polar regions and outer space.
Chapter
14. Common spaces and cooperation in the use of natural resources
Chapter
5. The Spatial Dimensions of State Activities
Paola Gaeta, Jorge E. Viñuales, and Salvatore Zappalà
This chapter begins with an examination of the related concepts of sovereignty, competence, and jurisdiction. It then discusses the international law governing territory, sea, the international seabed, and the concept of common heritage of mankind, air, and outer space. In traditional international law the physical dimension of State activity was regulated in fairly simple terms. The earth, portions of the sea, and the air were divided up into areas subject to the sovereign authority of States. The only exception to this partition was the high seas, which—since the seventeenth century—were subject to the principle that they were a thing belonging to everybody (res communis omnium): every State could sail its ships or use the high seas’ resources as it pleased, as long as it did not hamper their free use by other States. However, a nationalist, self-centred approach has displaced community interests and any idea of solidarity or joint utilization of resources.