The extent of the advisory jurisdiction of the International Court of Justice

Abstract

This thesis is an attempt to determine the scope of the advisory jurisdiction of the International Court of Justice. The empowering treaty texts, decisions of the Court and its predecessor, the Permanent Court of International Justice, and, where relevant, the practice of international organisations and States will be discussed. The emphasis will be primarily negative; that is to say, the outer edges of the Court's competence will generally be considered rather than its substantive centre. This results inevitably from the fact that opinions may be requested on "any legal question". Charter of the United Nations Article 96(1), Statute of the International Court of Justice Article 65(1) (emphasis added). This phrase covers a very wide field and obviously in a large number of cases there can be little doubt that the Court may give an opinion. Further, setting out all the fields in relation to which questions could be asked would not in itself be very instructive and would certainly not be exhaustive. As will be shown it would involve establishing the competence of the United Nations and its organs and twelve of its specialised agencies (that is all except the Universal Postal Union); See Chapter 3. Again much The major exception is the procedure adopted by the Court in advisory cases; see Chapter 5. of the relevant material relates to cases where doubts as to competence have been raised, and not to cases where the Court clearly has competence.