Demystifying the art of interpretation

European Journal of International Law

Volumn 22, Issue 2, 2011, Pages 571-588

  Waibel, Michael ^a  

^a DOWNING COLLEGE   (United Kingdom)

Author keywords

[No Author keywords available]

Indexed keywords

EID: 79959821042     PISSN: 09385428     EISSN: 14643596     Source Type: Journal    
DOI: 10.1093/ejil/chr046     Document Type: Review

References (52)

1. Cf. E. Cannizzaro (ed.), The Law of Treaties Beyond the Vienna Convention (2011).
2. O. Corten and P. Klein (eds), The Vienna Conventions on the Law of Treaties: A Commentary (2011).
3. O. Dörr and K. Schmalenbach, Vienna Convention on the Law of Treaties (2011).
4. M. Fitzmaurice, O.A. Elias, and P. Merkouris (eds), Treaty Interpretation and the Vienna Convention on the Law of Treaties (2010).
5. Symposium: 'The Interpretation of Treaties - A Re-examination', 21 EJIL 2010.
6. J.H.H. Weiler, G. Letsas, L. Grover, L. Lixinski, I. Van Damme, R. Pavoni, and L. Crema; Roberts, 'Power and Persuasion in Investment Treaty Arbitration', 104 AJIL (2010) 179.
7. M. Villiger, Commentary on the Vienna Convention on the Law of Treaties (2009).
8. F. Zarbiev, Le discours interprétatif en droit international: une approche critique et généalogique (thesis, 2010).
9. G. Letsas, A Theory of Interpretation of the European Convention of Human Rights (2007).
10. A. Qureshi, Interpreting WTO Agreements: Problems and Perspectives (2006).
11. M. Panizzon, Good Faith in the Jurisprudence of the WTO: The Protection of Legitimate Expectations, Good Faith Interpretation and Fair Dispute Settlement (2006).
12. Sir Michael Wood, Foreword to Gardiner, at xiii.
13. Gardiner and Orakhelashvili have already been reviewed in this Journal: J. Kammerhofer, 20 EJIL (2010) 1282.
14. M. Fitzmaurice, 20 EJIL (2010) 952.
15. P. Allott, The Health of Nations (2002), at 305.
16. I. Brownlie, Principles of Public International Law (6th edn, 2003), at 602.
17. A term coined by French, 'Treaty Interpretation and the Incorporation of Extraneous Legal Rules', 55 ICLQ (2006) 281.
18. UN Conference on the Law of Treaties: Official Records: Documents of the Conference, A/Conf.39/11/Add.2, 39, at para. 8.
19. Gardiner, at 9, n. 16.
20. Report of the ILC on the second part of its seventeenth and on its eighteenth session, in Yrbk Int'l Law Comm (1966), ii, 219.
21. Cf. also Abi-Saab, 'The Appellate Body and Treaty Interpretation', in G. Sacerdoti, A. Yanovich, and J. Bohanes (eds), The WTO at Ten - The Contribution of the Dispute Settlement System (2006), at 459.
22. '[I]l est frappant de constater que cette conception classique est en contradiction criante avec les faits les plus élémentaires de la vie juridique internationale... nulle part, d'avantage qu'en droit international, tout acte d'application comporte une grande part créative' (my translation).
23. '[U]ne extension du concept du droit... de rompre le mutisme des espaces dans lesquels le droit a cette particularité de ne pas se mouvoir seul, dans toute sa «pureté». L'analyse rationnelle peut permettre une pénétration progressive du concept juridique au-delà de ces nouvelles frontières et donc une constitutionnalisation plus large du processus interprétatif au sens large' (my translation).
24. '[P]as de texte sans context, pas de norme sans context (environment normative)' (my translation).
25. 'Context est le Jupiter de l'interpretation; mais il en est aussi le Lucifer' (my translation).
26. Cf. also Bianchi, 'Textual Interpretation and (International) Law Reading: the Myth of (In)determinacy and the Genealogy of Meaning', in P. H. Bekker, R. Dolzer, and M. Waibel, Making Transnational Law Work in the Global Economy: Essays in Honour of Detlev Vagts (2010), at 34.
27. Art. 3(2) provides: 'The dispute settlement system of the WTO is a central element in providing security and predictability to the multilateral trading system. The Members recognize that it serves to preserve the rights and obligations of Members under the covered agreements, and to clarify the existing provisions of those agreements in accordance with customary rules of interpretation of public international law. Recommendations and rulings of the DSB cannot add to or diminish the rights and obligations provided in the covered agreements.'.
28. AB Report, United States - Import Prohibition of Certain Shrimp and Shrimp Products, WT/DS58/AB/R, adopted 6 Nov. 1998, at para. 153.
29. Cf. Crema, 'Disappearance and New Sightings of Restrictive Interpretation(s)', 21 EJIL (2010) 681, at 694.
30. Cf. Lauterpacht, 'Restrictive Interpretation and the Principle of Effectiveness in the Interpretation of Treaties', 26 BYBIL (1949) 284.
31. Cf. Schreuer, 'Comments', in R. Hoffman and C. Tams (eds), International Investment Law and General International Law: From Clinical Isolation to Systemic Integration (forthcoming 2011), at 2.
32. Third Report of the Special Rapporteur, Sir Humphrey Waldock (Sixteenth Session of the ILC (1964)), Doc. A/CN.4/167 and Add.1-3, ILC Yb. 1964, II, 5, at 60-61.
33. cf. also Fitzmaurice, 'Vae Victis or Woe to the Negotiators: Your Treaty or Our "Interpretation" of It?', 65 AJIL (1971) 358, at 373.
34. Van Damme, at 281 ('the evaluation of an interpretation as restrictive or liberal is subjective') and 294.
35. H. Lauterpacht, The Function of Law in the International Community (1933).
36. Verdross, 'Entstehungsweise und Geltungsgrund des universellen völkerrechtlichen Gewohnheitsrechts', ZaöRV (1969), 635.
37. but see Roberts, 'Traditional and Modern Approaches to Customary International Law: A Reconciliation', 95 AJIL (2001) 757 as an example of influential scholarship with which Orakhelashvili does not engage.
38. C.J. Tams, Enforcing Obligations Erga Omnes in International Law (2005).
39. N. Stürchler, The Threat of Force in International Law (2007).
40. A.-M. Slaughter, A New World Order (2005).
41. A. Boyle and C. Chinkin, The Making of International Law (2007), at 268.
42. Roberts, 'Power and Persuasion in Investment Treaty Arbitration: The Dual Role of States', 104 AJIL (2010) 179, at 188.
43. Treaties over Time In Particular: Subsequent Agreement and Practice, in ILC, Report of the Work of the Sixtieth Session, Annex A. UN GAOR, 63d Sess., UN DOC A/63/10 (2008).
44. AB Report, EC - Chicken Cuts, adopted 27 Sept. 2005,WT/DS286/AB/R, at para. 259.
45. '[L]'interprétation ne peut se concevoir isolément. Elle n'est en définitive qu'une fonction d'autre chose. Cet autre chose est vraiment quelque chose d'essentiel, oui d'énorme: c'est la conception qu'on se fait du droit tout entier, de sa place dans la société et de ses fonctions propres. Il n'y a pas de théorie de l'interprétation purement technique' (my translation).
46. Cf. J. von Kirchmann, Von der Wertlosigkeit der Jurisprudenz als Wissenschaft (1848).
47. E.g., M.S. McCougal, H.D. Laswell, and J.C. Miller, The Interpretation of International Agreements and World Public Order - Principles of Content and Procedure (1967).
48. Vagts, 'Treaty Interpretation and the New American Ways of Law Reading', 4 EJIL (1993) 480.
49. Arsanjani and Reisman, 'Interpreting Treaties for the Benefit of Third Parties: The "Salvors' Doctrine" and the Use of Legislative History in Investment Treaties', 104 AJIL (2010) 597, at 597.
50. V. Lowe, International Law (2007), at 74, cited by Gardiner, at xv.
51. Crawford, 'Foreword' to Van Damme, at ix ('if interpretation describes what the DSU does all the time, then the schools can be left to their distinctions').
52. Arato, 'Book review of Treaty Interpretation by Richard Gardiner', 43 NYU J Int'l L & Politics (2011) 101 ('a truly greater reference work for the advocate, and a great start for the interpreter': at 106).