Tams, Christian J. --- "Treaty breaches and responses" [2014] ELECD 751; in Tams, J. Christian; Tzanakopoulos, Antonios; Zimmermann, Andreas (eds), "Research Handbook on the Law of Treaties" (Edward Elgar Publishing, 2014) 476

Book Title: Research Handbook on the Law of Treaties

Editor(s): Tams, J. Christian; Tzanakopoulos, Antonios; Zimmermann, Andreas

Publisher: Edward Elgar Publishing

ISBN (hard cover): 9780857934772

Section: Chapter 16

Section Title: Treaty breaches and responses

Author(s): Tams, Christian J.

Number of pages: 29

Abstract/Description:

As a general rule, treaties are not concluded to be breached; but treaty breaches are quite common. They are bound to occur, as so much of international life is covered by international treaties (and hence there is so much treaty law to be breached), and as States, like other subjects of the law, are not perfect. None of this is particularly surprising or particularly problematic. No legal system can exclude non-compliance with accepted voluntary commitments (under treaties, under contracts, under pledges or promises, etc); and all legal systems anticipate non-compliance. It is in the way they deal with instances of non-compliance that legal systems differ. This chapter assesses how one particular legal system – international law – addresses one particular form of non-compliance – treaty breaches. It proceeds on the basis of two fairly straightforward questions. The first question is addressed to the substance of international law: what does international law have to say on treaty breaches and responses? For reasons of convenience, this question will be broken into two sets of issues. What amounts to a treaty breach? And what are the consequences of treaty breaches, and how other States obtain redress? The second question concerns the locus of regulation: what branches of international law address treaty breaches and responses? In assessing this second question, and in line with the overall focus of the Research Handbook, the subsequent contribution looks to the general law of treaties, as codified in the 1969 Vienna Convention on the Law of Treaties (VCLT).