With
the previous cases covered by the series TERRITORIAL DISPUTES (Kashmir, the
Falkland/Malvinas islands, and Gibraltar) we explored an ideal solution called
EGALITARIAN SHARED SOVEREIGNTY in what has to do with population, territory,
government and law.
The Israel-Palestine
difference did not follow that approach. Why? Because before going into any
negotiations we had to determine who may be a legitimate party. That issue
maintains the Israel-Palestine difference in a status quo. The claiming parties do not recognise reciprocally
complete legitimacy to go into any negotiations about the disputed territories.
Moreover, as yesterday’s post (post 54) showed, there are many “peoples”
involved (people living in Israel, people living in Palestine, diaspora,
refugees and settlers).
We introduced the concept
of “colourable claim” and explored three different grounds (posts 45 to 49):
historical entitlement, legal basis and moral standing. For one reason or
another, both Israelis and Palestinians have grounds to introduce a claim (this
is different from saying they have the right to be sovereign over these
territories). It only means both Israelis and Palestinians ought to be part of
any negotiation concerning the sovereignty (de
jure and de facto) over the
disputes territories.
We discussed (post 48) whether some external populations
might be seen as a third party (diaspora, refugees, settlers). We concluded
they are not a third party as that would be a misconception. Rather, they would
be part of any of the claiming parties (Israel or Palestine).
With
all this in mind, and assuming that Israel and Palestine have finally decided
to settle the difference by applying the EGALITARIAN SHARED SOVEREIGNTY it
means:
The
allocation of sovereignty will be given by: a) equal right to participate
(egalitarian consensus principle); b) the nature and degree of participation
depends on efficiency of accomplishing the particular objective/area/activity
at issue (principle of efficiency); c) each party receives a benefit (in terms
of rights and opportunities) that depends on what that party cooperates with
(input-to-output ratio principle); and d) provided the party with greater
ability and therefore greater initial participation rights has the obligation
to bring the other two parties towards equilibrium (equilibrium proviso). I
call this way of dealing with sovereignty conflicts or disputes the EGALITARIAN
SHARED SOVEREIGNTY.
In
terms of PEOPLE, many questions need an answer. Amongst them: How does it apply
to Israel and Palestine, the disputed territories, and their population? The
answer has two parts: a) the qualitative differences amongst the parties; b)
the real concerns of the inhabitants.
The
next posts on this blog series about TERRITORIAL DISPUTES will cover these
questions.
NOTE: based on Chapters 6 and 7, Núñez, Jorge Emilio.
2017. Sovereignty Conflicts and International Law and Politics: A Distributive
Justice Issue. London and New York: Routledge, Taylor and Francis Group.
Previous posts of the
TERRITORIAL DISPUTE series (only about the Israel-Palestine difference below):
11th
May 2018
No comments:
Post a Comment