Le statut juridique contemporain du passage du Nord-Ouest : bilan, enjeux et perspectives en droit international et comparé (The Contemporary Legal Status of the Northwest Passage: Assessment, Issues and Perspectives in International and Comparative Law)
Bibliographic record
Abstract
French Abstract: Notre memoire est intitule « Le statut juridique contemporain du passage du Nord-Ouest : bilan, enjeux et perspectives en droit international et compare ». Ce theme a deja ete aborde par la doctrine et, en soi, la problematique n'est pas recente puisqu'elle remonte somme toute a la crise du petrolier S.S. Manhattan en 1969. Aujourd'hui, elle prend une dimension plus preoccupante avec le rechauffement planetaire, la fonte de la banquise glaciale, la course a l'exploitation des ressources naturelles de l'Arctique et le developpement technologique en matiere de navigation maritime dans les eaux glaciales. Il s'agit la d'enjeux qui impliquent une reflexion sur le statut juridique present et futur du passage du Nord-Ouest. Les considerations economiques, ecologiques et geopolitiques incitent au debat sur le statut juridique des eaux du passage du Nord-Ouest. Parmi les normes juridiques encadrant la navigation et les autres utilisations du passage, l'entente americano-canadienne de 1988, en vertu de laquelle une permission est accordee aux navires americains empruntant le passage, risque de connaitre une evolution importante. Dans le cadre du contentieux maritime opposant ainsi les Etats-Unis et le Canada, les deux parties expriment el maintiennent des positions contradictoires depuis plusieurs annees, voire decennies, quant a la qualification precise du statut juridique du passage du Nord-Ouest. D'un cote, le Canada pretend detenir une souverainete historique sur la terre et les eaux du passage. De l'autre, les Etats-Unis revendiquent un droit de passage au nom de la liberte des mers (Mare Liberum). Aussi, le Canada affirme-t-il que les eaux du passage sont des eaux interieures sur lesquelles il a pleine souverainete et qu'incidemment toute navigation dans ces eaux devra repondre aux dispositions du droit canadien. A l'inverse, les Etats-Unis qualifient le passage de « detroit international » et considerent que le droit applicable est bien le droit international et non le droit canadien. A ce jour, compte tenu de l'importance des enjeux geostrategiques, economiques et militaires associes au passage du Nord-Ouest, le sujet a davantage ete analyse par les politologues, les diplomates et les militaires. Or, si nous avons effectivement l'intention de tenir compte de la doctrine non juridique, notre etude sera specifiquement axee sur la question de la qualification juridique du passage du Nord-Ouest en droit international et compare. Ainsi, meme si notre etude nous conduit a mettre l'accent sur les normes internationales, l'analyse des droits canadien et americain relatifs au passage du Nord-Ouest apparait pertinente et incontournable. Au demeurant, le statut juridique du passage du Nord-Ouest ne peut etre determine qu'en tenant compte de tous les elements touchant la pratique dans cette region et on ne peut se limiter exclusivement a une analyse des rapports bilateraux entre le Canada et les Etats-Unis, meme si ces derniers sont au cœur du differend etudie. Ce memoire est structure autour de deux parties. Dans la premiere, nous etudierons le differend international opposant le Canada et les Etats-Unis relativement au passage du Nord-Ouest. Tout d' abord nous analyserons l'evolution historique du statut juridique du passage du Nord-Ouest, ainsi que ses aspects plus contemporains (Chap. I). Nous allons par la suite determiner les principaux acteurs etatiques et non etatiques associes au conflit (Chap. II). Dans la deuxieme partie, nous presentons les positions respectives des Etats-Unis (Chap. III), et du Canada (Chap. IV) et incidemment, nous etudierons leurs arguments a la lumiere du droit international et du droit compare. English Abstract: Our thesis is entitled Contemporary Legal Status of the Northwest Passage: Assessment, Issues and Perspectives in International and Comparative Law. This theme has been discussed in similar texts and, as such, appears to be nothing new at all, dating back to the S.S Manhattan Tanker Crisis of 1969. Today, it takes on a greater concern in terms of global warming, the melting of glacial ice, the race for natural resources in the Arctic and technological development in shipping in icy waters. These are considerations that call for a reflection on the present and future legal status of the Northwest Passage. The economic, ecological and geopolitical aspects encourage debate on the Northwest Passage legal status. Among the legal standards governing navigation and other uses of the Passage, the United States-Canada Agreement of 1988, whereby permission was granted to American ships to sail through the passage, may experience significant changes. Forming part of the maritime dispute between the United States and Canada, both parties have expressed and maintained contradictory positions for several years, even decades, as to the precise nature of the Northwest Passage’s legal status. On one hand, Canada claims to have a historic sovereignty over the land and of the Passage. On the other, the United States claims a right of passage in the name of freedom of the seas: Mare Liberum. Consequently, Canada declares that the Passage are internal waters of which it has full sovereignty and that all navigation in these must comply with the provisions made by Canadian law. In contrast, the United States calls the Passage «an international strait» and considers that the applicable rules are those of the international law, and not those of Canadian law. To date, given the importance of geostrategic economic and military issues associated with the transition of the Northwest Passage, political scientists, diplomats and the militaries further analyzed the subject. Since we do intend to take into account the non-legal doctrine, this study will focus specifically on the issues surrounding the legal characterization of the Northwest Passage both in terms of international and comparative law. Although our study leads us to focus on the international standards, the analysis of Canadian and American law pertaining to the Northwest Passage is most relevant and compelling. In any event, the legal status of the Northwest Passage can only be determined by taking into account all factors affecting the region and cannot be limited to an analysis of bilateral relations between Canada and the United States, even if this is at the heart of the dispute. This thesis is structured in two parts. Firstly, we will study the international dispute between Canada and the United States on the Northwest Passage; we will analyze the historic development of the legal status of the Northwest Passage, and more contemporary aspects (Chapter I). We will then determine the key state and non-state associated with the conflict (Chapter II). In the second part, we will present the position of both the United States (Chapter III) and Canada (Chapter IV), and study the two parties’ respective arguments, in light of both international and comparative law.
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How this classification was reachedexpand
Full frame machine prediction
Teacher imitationNot calibrated prevalence, not ground truth. Human validation pending. The Gemma side is a direct model label for every work in the frame, read from the title-only record. The Codex side is a classifier learned from the 10,348 direct Codex labels and calibrated to design-weighted sample rates; fields without enough sample support carry no Codex call. Candidate is the union of the two sides; consensus is their intersection. These outputs are machine_predicted_unvalidated and are not human labels.
Distilled classifier scores by category (both heads)
| Category | Codex | Gemma |
|---|---|---|
| Metaresearch | 0.001 | 0.002 |
| Meta-epidemiology (narrow) | 0.000 | 0.000 |
| Meta-epidemiology (broad) | 0.000 | 0.000 |
| Bibliometrics | 0.003 | 0.006 |
| Science and technology studies | 0.007 | 0.007 |
| Scholarly communication | 0.007 | 0.003 |
| Open science | 0.001 | 0.004 |
| Research integrity | 0.001 | 0.002 |
| Insufficient payload (model declined to judge) | 0.006 | 0.000 |
Machine scores (provisional)
The two teacher heads of the student model, read on this work. A score orders the frame for review; it never asserts a category, and the validation status ships verbatim with every row.
Baseline scores from an immature model (maturity gate not passed, 7 training rounds). Scores rank; they never assert a category.
score_only:v0-immature-baseline · verbatim from the scoring run: score_only means the number may rank works, and no category label ships from itClassification
machine, unvalidatedMachine predicted; a candidate call from one source (direct Gemma or distilled Codex), not a consensus.
How this classification was reached, model by model and score by score, is at the end of the page under "How this classification was reached".