Article contents
An Empirical Look at U.S. Treaty Practice: Some Preliminary Conclusions
Published online by Cambridge University Press: 20 January 2017
Extract
The title of this Agora and the first question it poses both ask whether treaties are in decline. With respect to multilateral treaties to which the United States is a party, the answer is a clear yes.
According to the U.S. State Department’s Treaties in Force database, the United States became a party to a record number of 105 multilateral treaties between 1990 and 1999. As set forth in Graph A below, during the period 2000–2009, the number of multilateral treaties the United States joined dropped to just 62, the lowest number since the 1960s. The preliminary data from the first part of this decade beginning in 2010 suggests that this downward trend continues, but it is still too early in the decade to draw any definitive conclusions.
- Type
- Agora: The End of Treaties?
- Information
- Copyright
- Copyright © American Society of International Law 2014
References
1 Treaties in Force, U.S. Dep’t of State.
2 About the ICTY, U.N. Int’l Crim. Trib. for the Former Yugoslavia.
3 Urata, Shujiro, Globalization and the Growth in Free Trade Agreements, 9 Asia-Pacific Rev. 20 (2002)CrossRefGoogle Scholar.
4 North American Free Trade Agreement (NAFTA), Office of The U.S. Trade Representative.
5 What is the WTO?, World Trade Organization.
6 Security Council Resolutions-2001. United Nations.
7 Lionel Beehner, The ‘Coalition of the Willing’, Council on Foreign Rels. (Feb. 22, 2007).
8 It’s Official: 2001 Recession Only Lasted Eight Months, U.S.A. Today (July 17, 2003).
9 Frieden, Jeffry A., The Financial Crisis Was Foreseeable and Preventable, N.Y. Times (Jan. 30, 2011)Google Scholar.
10 U.S. Const. art. II, § 2.
11 Rule XXX: Executive Session-Proceedings on Treaties, Rules of the Senate, Comm. on Rules and Administration.
12 Treaties Pending in the Senate, U.S. Dep’t of State (Updated June 20, 2016).
13 President’s Statement on Advancing U.S. Interests in the World’s Oceans, The White House Under President George W . Bush (May 15, 2007).
14 Colman, Zack, Republican Senator Says Sea Treaty Might Pass After Election, The Hill (Aug. 17, 2012)Google Scholar.
15 Press Statement, Deputy Dep’t Spokesman Robert Wood, Thirtieth Anniversary of the United Nations’ Adoption of CEDAW, U.S. Dep’t of State Press Statement (Dec. 18, 2009).
16 Issues: Disabilities, The White House Under President Barack Obama.
17 Staff of S. Comm. On Foreign Relations, 106th Cong., Treaties and other International Agreements: The Role of the U.S. Senate, S. Prt. 106-71 (Comm. Print. 2001).
18 Convention on the Rights of Persons with Disabilities, S. Exec. Rep. No. 112-6 to accompany Treaty Doc. 112-7 (July 31, 2012).
19 See Reid v. Covert, 354 U.S. 1 (1957).
20 Vienna Convention on the Law of Treaties, art. II, May 23, 1969, 1155 UNTS 332
21 Glossary, Declarations, UN Treaty Collection.
22 Kennedy, Kevin C., Conditional Approval of Treaties by the U.S. Senate, 19 Loy. L.A. Int’l & Comp. L. Rev. 89 (1996)Google Scholar.
23 Krutz, Glen S. & Peake, Jeffrey S., Treaties and Executive Agreements: A History, in Treaty Politics and the Rise of Executive Agreements 24 (2009)CrossRefGoogle Scholar.
- 2
- Cited by