Publication Type: Conference Paper/Unpublished Manuscript
Abstract: How did commercial ships gain sovereign status in the international state system, and is this sovereignty under threat? One element of the U.S. effort to combat the proliferation of weapons of mass destruction has been the Proliferation Security Initiative, an activity undertaken by the United States and other interested state to track and interdict shipments of weapons-related materials to states or groups of concern for proliferation. Questions have been raised about whether this initiative conforms to international law, since it calls for boarding of sovereign ships at sea. Although the United States has argued that the threat of proliferation overrides concerns about sovereignty, it has also sought to negotiate ship-boarding agreements with the states that provide “flags of convenience” for international shipping. These agreements give U.S. forces the right to board commercial ships bearing that states’ flag at short notice in international waters.U.S. activities under the PSI raise several important theoretical questions. First, how did commercial ships attain sovereign status in the first place, and how inviolable has this status been over time? Why has this status persisted, at a time when commercial shipping has become increasingly globalized, and the “flagging” of ships has been disconnected, in most cases, from the country of origin of either the ship owners or crews? Second, current U.S. efforts to negotiate ship boarding agreements appear to mirror British actions during its effort to quell the international slave trade in the 19th century. How close are these parallels, and what lessons does the British experience provide? Third, what we can learn from this for efforts to strengthen the nonproliferation regime? The international community holds a range of views of the principle of non-intervention. How have international attitudes toward sovereignty and intervention, and toward the U.S. use of force, complicated U.S. efforts to quell the spread of materials related to weapons of mass destruction?