Most Interesting 2021: Kravik, An analysis of stagnation in multilateral law-making – and why the law of the sea has transcended the stagnation trend

The fifth in our series "Most Interesting 2021":

Andreas Motzfeldt Kravik, An analysis of stagnation in multilateral law-making – and why the law of the sea has transcended the stagnation trend, Leiden Journal of International Law, Vol. 33, no. 4, pp. 935-956, December 2021

As an environmental governance advocate, I have at times (over the last few years especially) given over to despair at the seeming end of multilateralism. An article from Andreas Kravik: An analysis of stagnation in multilateral law-making – and why the law of the sea has transcended the stagnation trend (33:4 Leiden J. Int’l L.) offered a welcome and urgent counter-narrative. Kravik, a Norwegian lawyer and diplomat, gives a brief but compelling view of the trenches in multilateral policymaking in an effort to explain why more progress is not being made. My sole critique is that the article may be mistitled – what Kravik finds is not stagnation, but rather a dogged, weedy flowering of law-making in spite of ongoing realignments in great power politics. Some of this may indeed be attributable to the unique context of the law of the sea as the article insightfully suggests, particularly noting its empowerment of smaller and developing states with large ocean territories and the regime’s flexible and institution-based decision-making. But Kravik’s experience suggests that just as much may be due to the gravitational pull of cooperative links in our inter-connected world. The article is worth reading if only for its overview of some critical ongoing negotiations both within and beyond the ocean realm, including in the arms trade, space, and human rights arenas. But for lawyers practicing outside of the so-called “great powers,” it may be equally valuable as a reminder that multilateralism is not a choice for the rest of the world, but the proverbial water in which we all continue to swim. Those who tread water risk being left behind.

Andrew Friedman
Project Lead, Seabed Mining
The Pew Charitable Trusts