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Article 11

Means of expressing consent to be bound by a treaty

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Vienna Convention on the Law of Treaties

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Abstract

Art 11 introduces a central subject of the law of treaties, namely the consent to be bound. It recalls the freedom of States under international law to conclude treaties or not. That flows from their sovereignty, as underlined in the ‘Wimbledon’ judgment of the PCIJ. Only if they express their consent to be bound, can they be subject to a treaty. In return, treaties to which they have not consented cannot create rights and obligations for them (Art 34). Exceptionally, consent to be bound is irrelevant for the conclusion of a treaty, namely when the latter violates a norm of ius cogens (Art 53).

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Notes

  1. 1.

    PCIJ SS ‘Wimbledon’ PCIJ Ser A No 1, 25 (1923). When referring to Art 380 Treaty of Versailles, according to which the Kiel Canal was to be maintained free and open to all vessels of commerce and of war for all nations at peace with Germany on terms of entire equality, the Court said: “No doubt any convention creating an obligation of this kind places a restriction upon the exercise of the sovereign rights of the States, in the sense that it requires them to be exercised in a certain way. But the right of entering into international engagement is an attribute of States sovereignty.”

  2. 2.

    d’Aspremont (2014), p. 263.

  3. 3.

    Reuter (1995), p. 67 para 92.

  4. 4.

    Bolintineanu (1974), p. 673.

  5. 5.

    ICJ Boundary between Cameroon and Nigeria [2002] ICJ Rep 303, para 264 (emphasis added).

  6. 6.

    Bradley (2012), p. 210.

  7. 7.

    PCIJ Territorial Jurisdiction of the International Commission of the River Oder PCIJ Ser A No 23, 20 (1929).

  8. 8.

    Harvard Draft 756.

  9. 9.

    Ibid 763.

  10. 10.

    Dehousse (1935), pp. 83–107.

  11. 11.

    McNair (1961), p. 139.

  12. 12.

    Fitzmaurice (1934), p. 129.

  13. 13.

    Blix (1953), p. 380: “it would appear […] that the following rule emerges, namely that treaties enter into force in accordance with the parties’ express or clearly implied intentions, or, in case of doubt, by signature.”

  14. 14.

    Frankowska (1969), pp. 78–81.

  15. 15.

    [1962-II] YbILC 157, 180 et seq.

  16. 16.

    Final Draft, Commentary to Draft Art 11, 204, para 7.

  17. 17.

    For an account of the discussions on the residual rule, see Bolintineanu (1974), pp. 676–677.

  18. 18.

    Sinclair (1984), p. 41.

  19. 19.

    Ibid 39.

  20. 20.

    UN Doc A/CONF.39/C.1/L.88 and Add.1, UNCLOT III 124. The text of the proposed Art 9 bis later became Art 11 VCLT.

  21. 21.

    UNCLOT III 267. Belgium’s proposed Art 12 bis on other means of expressing consent to be bound by a treaty stated: “in addition to the cases dealt with in articles 10, 11 and 12, the consent to be bound by a treaty may be expressed by any other method agreed upon between the contracting States”.

  22. 22.

    Villiger (2009), Art 11 MN 13.

  23. 23.

    Klabbers (2006), MN 8.

  24. 24.

    Fitzmaurice (1998), p. 64.

  25. 25.

    Brunnée (2010), MN 6.

  26. 26.

    1946 Trade Agreement between the United States and the Philippines 43 UNTS 136, 156. A similar clause was included in Art XVIII of the 1942 US-Mexican trade agreement 13 UNTS 231, 248.

  27. 27.

    47 UNTS 5, 7.

  28. 28.

    Detter (1967), p. 29.

  29. 29.

    Aust (2007), p. 80.

  30. 30.

    ICJ Aegean Sea Continental Shelf [1978] ICJ Rep 3, para 96.

  31. 31.

    Koskenniemi (1993), p. 103.

  32. 32.

    Press Release No 192 of the Finnish Ministry for Foreign Affairs, 4 September 1992, reprinted in (1992) 3 FinnYIL 610.

  33. 33.

    ICJ Passage through the Great Belt (Finland v Denmark) [1992] ICJ Rep 348.

  34. 34.

    Detter (1967), p. 26: “No international lawyer would deny that an agreement on armistice or on a brief truce can be concluded by displaying a white flag in war with a following act of acceptance of the other party.”

  35. 35.

    http://www.state.gov/p/eur/rls/or/dayton/52599.htm. Accessed 22 November 2017.

  36. 36.

    Aust (2013), p. 104.

  37. 37.

    European Council – Presidency Conclusions (Edinburgh, 11–12 December 1992), SN 456/92 Part A. Brussels: Council of the European Communities, December 1992, 6.

  38. 38.

    Aust (2013), p. 21.

  39. 39.

    European Council – Presidency Conclusions (Brussels, 18–19 June 2009), para 5 (iii), http://ec.europa.eu/regional_policy/sources/cooperate/danube/documents/council_conclusions.pdf. Accessed 22 November 2017.

  40. 40.

    For an overview, see Churchill and Ulfstein (2000), pp. 623–659 and Redgwell (2000), pp. 89–110.

  41. 41.

    Fitzmaurice (2005), p. 488.

  42. 42.

    Fitzmaurice and Merkouris (2014), pp. 356–357 with further examples.

  43. 43.

    Art 22 of the 1945 Constitution of the World Health Organization 14 UNTS 186.

  44. 44.

    Art 54 para 1, Art 90 lit a and Art 38 of the 1944 Chicago Convention 15 UNTS 295. On law-making in ICAO see generally Buergenthal (1969).

  45. 45.

    Fitzmaurice (2005), p. 490.

  46. 46.

    Sommer (1996), p. 635.

  47. 47.

    Art 2 of the 1983 Additional Protocol to the European Agreement on the Exchange of Therapeutical Substances of Human Origin ETS 109; Art 2 of the 1983 Additional Protocol to the European Agreement on the Temporary Importation, Free of Duty, of Medical, Surgical and Laboratory Equipment for Use on Free Loan in Hospitals and Other Medical Institutions for Purposes of Diagnosis or Therapy ETS 110; Art 2 of the 1983 Additional Protocol to the European Agreement on the Exchanges of Blood-Grouping Re-agents ETS 111.

  48. 48.

    For an account of the discussions preceding the adoption of Additional Protocols, see Imbert (1985), pp. 359–374.

  49. 49.

    See for example Art 2 para 9 of the 1987 Montreal Protocol on Substances that Deplete the Ozone Layer (1989) 26 ILM 1550.

  50. 50.

    See for example Art XIII lit b of the 1974 International Convention for the Safety of Life at Sea (SOLAS) 1184 UNTS 2, allowing the approval of amendments by majority, which then become binding on all SOLAS parties.

  51. 51.

    Sommer (1996), p. 653 characterizing the adjustment procedure under the Montreal Protocol as vesting legislative power into the Conference of Parties, which in her view is a “treaty-management organisation” (ibid 631). However, see Fitzmaurice (2005), p. 502, finding the mechanism to adopt amendments by majority voting with legal effect on the dissenters “new and unusual”.

  52. 52.

    However, see Fitzmaurice (1998), p. 79 for the opposite proposition.

  53. 53.

    Szurek (2011), Art 11 MN 26–29.

  54. 54.

    For a reproduction of the discussion in that respect see Ben Achour et al (2011), Art 14 VCLT II MN 4–5.

  55. 55.

    See for example Art 13 of the 1985 Vienna Convention for the Protection of the Ozone Layer: “This Convention and any protocol thereto shall be subject to ratification, acceptance or approval by States and regional economic integration organizations.”

  56. 56.

    Manin (1987), p. 468.

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Authors and Affiliations

  1. Head of Unit of the Directorate for Trade Defence, European Commission; Professor of Law, Institute for European Studies, Free University of Brussels, Brussels, Belgium

    Frank Hoffmeister

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  1. Frank Hoffmeister
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  1. European Legal Studies Institute, University of Osnabrück, Osnabrück, Germany

    Oliver Dörr

  2. Faculty of Law, Department of Public Law/International Law, University of Salzburg, Salzburg, Austria

    Kirsten Schmalenbach

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Hoffmeister, F. (2018). Article 11. In: Dörr, O., Schmalenbach, K. (eds) Vienna Convention on the Law of Treaties. Springer, Berlin, Heidelberg. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-662-55160-8_13

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