Polar territorial and maritime sovereignty in the twenty-first century

Polar sovereignty was a relatively dormant issue in the second half of the twentieth century. The disputes that had emerged in Antarctica over territorial claims, which at one point had made their way to the International Court of Justice, had been effectively resolved with the adoption in 1959 of the Antarctic Treaty. Article IV of the Treaty proved capable of suppressing sovereignty tensions between the seven Antarctic territorial claimants, and also keeping in abeyance the interests of potential territorial claimants including the United States and the Soviet Union/Russian Federation. In the Arctic, territorial claims had also been settled by the time of World War II and, while the Cold War introduced military and security tensions into theArctic, none of these directly related to contested territorial sovereignty. Nevertheless, there remain on-going sovereignty tensions, which if not properly managed have the potential to erupt into significant international disputes with implications reaching well beyond Antarctica and the Arctic. While Article IV of the Antarctic Treaty set aside sovereignty issues for the duration of the Treaty, tensions have been raised over recent submissions to the Commission on the Limits of the Continental Shelf (CLCS) over Southern Ocean outer continental shelf claims and by Japan’s refusal to acknowledge Australia’s proclaimed Whale Sanctuary offshore Antarctica and the on-going conduct of its Southern Ocean ‘scientific’ whaling programme. Arctic outer continental shelf claims are also a source of tension, placing a spotlight upon the CLCS as it reviews claims and how Arctic States resolve overlapping maritime claims. The status of certain waters also remains in dispute, including the Northwest Passage where the United States questions Canadian sovereignty over those waters. Melting ice means that the Arctic Ocean is also becoming more accessible to shipping, raising issues with respect to the freedom of navigation being exercised by non-Arctic States such as China. This chapter will review these issues and make observations as to how polar sovereignty may be understood in coming decades and, in doing so, will build upon some of James Crawford’s analysis of these issues.