Unit 8: Law of Outer Space (Part II)
8.1 Meaning, Sources, and Subjects of International Law of Outer Space
The space law = the international law of the space-beyond-the-airspace — the activities’ regime in the exploration-and-use of outer space, the Moon-and-celestial bodies. The sources: the five UN treaties (8.4) — the OST’s constitutional core + the four implementing conventions; the GA resolutions-and-principles (8.5’s set: the soft-law’s classics); the custom (the non-appropriation’s-and-the-free-exploration’s pre-treaty life); the technical-and-ITU regime (the orbit-spectrum law — the Radio Regulations’ world); the national space laws (the licensing-and-the property statutes of the space powers — the US-and-Luxembourg laws); and the contractual private ordering (the launch-and-insurance contracts). The subjects: the states (the responsibility’s-and-liability’s bearers), the international organisations (the intergovernmental-agency party status — ESA’s faces), and the private actors’ problem — the Article VI OST’s rule: the non-governmental entities’ activities require the state’s authorisation-and-continuing supervision — the commercial era’s central tension.
8.2 Importance of International Law of Outer Space
The importance’s case (the exam’s list): (1) the order’s provision (the lawless commons’ prevention — the sovereignty’s avoidance in space: the OST’s genius); (2) the peace’s keeping (the WMD’s exclusion; the demilitarisation’s partial regime — the Moon-and-celestial bodies’ peaceful use); (3) the responsibility-and-liability’s allocation (the damage’s-and-the rescue’s conventions — the falling-object’s justice); (4) the cooperation’s engineering (the rescue-and-return, the registration’s transparency, the information-sharing); (5) the commercial revolution’s governance (the satellites-and-telecom, the launch services, the new space economy — the $-trillion’s regulation); and (6) the global South’s stakes (the benefits’ sharing — the common-province principle; the remote-sensing-and-education for the developing states; Nepal’s own satellite-and-data interests — 8.8’s faces).
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