Distribution by Region

Distribution by Organisation Type, Document Type, Region and Year

Sovereignty occurs mostly in documents published in Europe, followed by North America, Africa, MENA and Asia with comparatively smaller contributions. Overall, the top five contributors in terms of occurrences are IGO, NGO, RC, NGO_Fed and State organisations.

IGO documents provide the greatest number of occurrences, primarily from general documents published in Europe. Occurrences from NGO, RC and State were mostly obtained from activity reports published in Europe.

NGO_Fed documents mostly generated occurrences in activity reports published in Europe.

Sovereignty ...

• is a

  • notion

  • principle

  • right

• has three aspects in international law

  • internal

  • external

  • territorial

• can be respected, violated, disputed

• applies to varying scopes

  • nation, state

  • local, community (in some cases)

• applies to areas

  • food sovereignty, which is

    • a goal, objective

    • enhanced with gardening programmes, constitutional reform

    • not an absolute

    • beneficial for the world poor

    • affected by various harmful practices

  • energy sovereignty, environment, etc.

• is currently having a resurgence

• is affected by globalisation

  • while remaining a fixture of international relations

  • due to economic interdependence & information and communications technology

• affects humanitarian efforts

  • including legality

  • especially migration & displacement

  • restricting access

  • challenging partnerships, power dynamics

  • when used as a form of immunity

  • when used to refuse post-disaster assistance

  • limiting humanitarian progress, human rights

• is being recast in positive terms

  • responsible sovereignty

  • smart sovereignty

• is sometimes ignored by international actors

  • who instead work directly with local populations

• is closely related to

  • authority

  • power

  • independence

  • security

As a concept of international law, sovereignty has three principal aspects: external, internal and territorial. The external aspect of sovereignty is the right of the state freely to determine its relations with other states or other entities without the restraint or control of another state. This aspect of sovereignty is also known as independence. The internal aspect of sovereignty is the state’s exclusive right or competence to determine the character of its own institutions, to enact laws of its own choice and ensure their respect. The territorial aspect of sovereignty is the exclusive authority which a state exercises over all persons and things found on, under or above its territory. In the context of migration, this means the sovereign prerogative of a state to determine which non-citizens should be admitted to its territory subject to the limitations of the non-refoulement principle, human rights and provisions in bilateral or regional agreements (e.g. free movement or integration agreements).

Reaffirming the principle of sovereignty, it is important to continue working towards an early conclusion of the development- oriented Doha Round of trade negotiations, as well as mobilising development assistance and foreign direct investment to developing countries.

GRID 2017's closing reminder of the notion of national sovereignty as responsibility is the basis for our analysis of the need for political incentives in support of a new approach to internal displacement.

Canada continued to support the sovereignty of the Ukrainian government and its efforts to build a democratic, stable, pluralistic and prosperous country.

Southeast Asia is a hard region for anyone to straddle. There is no common language, sovereignty is strongly asserted, and there are multitudes of deeply-felt enmities.

It should continue to be guided by the principles of respect for national sovereignty, national ownership and independence, equality, non-conditionality, non-interference in domestic affairs and mutual benefit.

The boundaries, names and designations used in this report do not imply official endorsement, nor express a political opinion on the part of the ICRC, and are without prejudice to claims of sovereignty over the territories mentioned.

Other major recommendations included in the final communiqué addressed the need for Member States to pool their individual sovereignties on agreed priorities to achieve a stronger common good - an integrated Africa with a common socio-economic development agenda and infrastructure capabilities to harness its vast resources and EX.

At the 1996 World Food Summit, therefore, LVC called for ‘food sovereignty’ to be at the heart of global governance. In its own words:

“Food sovereignty is the right of peoples to healthy and culturally appropriate food produced through sustainable methods and their right to define their own food and agriculture systems. It develops a model of small-scale sustainable production benefiting communities and their environment. It puts the aspi- rations, needs and livelihoods of those who produce, distribute and consume food at the heart of food systems and policies rather than the demands of markets and corporations.

Food sovereignty prioritises local food production and consumption. It gives a country the right to protect its local pro- ducers from cheap imports and to control production. It ensures that the rights to use and manage lands, territories, wa- ter, seeds, livestock and biodiversity are in the hands of those who produce food and not of the corporate sector. Therefore the implementation of genuine agrarian reform is one of the top priorities of the farmer’s movement” (LVC, 2006).

Because, for us, food sovereignty means self-sufficiency and production independence, and control and sustainable management of natural resources, besides greater fairness in the distribution of resources.

KEEP GROWING DETROIT KGD promotes food sovereignty in Detroit so city residents will grow the majority of fruits and vegetables consumed. KGD teaches gardening, cultivates a network of gardeners, and invests in the growth of community leaders and food entrepreneurs.

Food sovereignty projects in South Africa and Cambodia are addressing this issue, with both projects focusing on assisting women to produce more, and more nutritional, food for their families using small household garden plots.

Legal frameworks such as Law 144 embed food security and food sovereignty issues in the Constitution, and recognize indigenous people as producers of food and formal recipients of public resources.

Responsible sovereignty includes taking steps towards collective endeavours–such as trade liberalization and climate change mitigation–that, if designed effectively, could greatly enhance global collective welfare.

Second, against the backdrop of the Soviet history of Central Asia, integration is still often approached with a sense of suspicion and the belief that it implies the loss of national independence and identity. Examples in other regions show that cooperation and integration do not mean that national borders need to disappear or that national sovereignty needs to be abandoned.

While state sovereignty is the prevailing order in international relations, it is not absolute. Global economic interdependence, exemplified in the globalization process (Chapter 1), has a strong bearing on national policymaking in this field. States have also entered into agreements that foresee a certain balance of interest among the parties regarding their respective regulation of international labour mobility or the treatment of migrant workers.

Globalisation brings with it an increasing blurring of boundaries that is challenging the notion of state sovereignty and transforming traditional forms of international co-operation into a more complex system of global governance (Zürn, 2013: 408).

If consent is withheld for arbitrary reasons, perhaps counter-intuitively, unauthorised operations are not automatically lawful. If carried out by a state or international organisation they would violate the affected state’s sovereignty and territorial integrity. However their wrongfulness might be precluded in exceptional circumstances by the legal principle of necessity.2 An example could be a one-off relief operation to bring lifesaving supplies to a population in a specific location in extreme need, when no alternative exists. NGOs are not subjects of international law so cannot violate a state’s sovereignty or territorial integrity. Instead, unauthorised operations do not benefit from the safeguards of International Humanitarian Law (IHL) and staff may face proceedings under national law.

What are the biggest challenges associated with mediating between parties in conflict? The biggest single obstacle is national sovereignty – unwillingness to have outsiders interfering in the internal affairs of a country, unwillingness to accept that external help is needed, sometimes unwillingness to accept there's a serious problem that needs treating if violent conflict is not to erupt.

While the increasing complexity of major crises and their impact on affected people pose multiple challenges to humanitarian actors, perhaps the greatest challenge lies within the changing landscape of humanitarian assistance itself. On the one hand, we are seeing a marked resurgence in state-based assertions of sovereignty, with increasing numbers of host states actively blocking, restricting or controlling humanitarian response on their territory. Non-Western host states increasingly want to be seen to deal with their own political and humanitarian crises – partly in line with their own responsibilities, and partly because they are sceptical about the effectiveness and intentions of the international humanitarian community.

The chart below represents the distribution of sovereignty between 2005 and 2019 in terms of the number of occurrences and relative frequency of occurrences. It also allows you to view the distribution across Regions, Organisations and Document types.

National sovereignty as opportunity Some progress has been made in mainstreaming internal displacement into domestic policy.

Sovereignty means responsibility, faith means compassion: protecting people from harm, owning the risks and vulnerabilities of citizens and neighbours, providing refuge and ensuring humanitarian access.

At the same time, the United Nations has “almost no means at its disposal to effectively motivate or urge Member States to implement sustainable development measures” (Beisheim, 2015). Inge Kaul notes that despite increasing globalisation, states’ reactions to global challenges remain bounded by traditional notions of sovereignty. This results in a “sovereignty paradox” in which states hold on to conventional strategies of international co-operation such as bilateral North-South development co-operation via project approaches. She notes that this kind of behaviour undermines policy-making capacity and suggests a new approach to global governance, based on “smart sovereignty” (Box 1.1; Kaul, 2013).

Box 1.1. Six principles of smart sovereignty

1. Discourage free-riding.

2. Correct fairness deficits through incentives and sanctions.

3. Consider the external effects of state and non-state decisions.

4. Focus on producing results using innovative mechanisms.

5. Recognise, promote and use synergies to address global challenges and modernise the UN system.

6. Recognise and manage the interdependence of policies.

The intellectual and jurisprudential system must be reorganised in such a way that sovereignty (wilaya) means quite simply citizenship and that women are no longer a "problem" but partners in the formulation and manufacture of the entire "thesis".

This Report has interpreted food security not in terms of absolute sovereignty in food production, a goal impractical in light of regional water scarcities, but rather in terms of sufficiency for all members of society in essential commodities.

Increasing food sovereignty has to be a priority if the poorest in this world are to realise their fundamental right to food, to assist development and to protect from civil unrest.

More communities now realize the implications of land grabbing, toxic dumping and the challenge Genetically Modified Seeds pose to their food sovereignty, water sources, land and way of life.

Perhaps one of the biggest challenges faced by most States is that of striking the delicate balance between maintaining national sovereignty on migration issues and engaging in a whole spectrum of supranational initiatives, ranging from informal dialogues to international legal instruments.

A number of factors have impeded progress in establishing a more coherent system of global migration governance. The first is concern articulated by a number of States about the effect on their sovereignty. Migration is understood to affect sovereignty directly by its impact on the integrity of borders, economic growth, social relationships, demography, cultural values and – in rare cases – political stability. These impacts are felt not only by countries of destination, but also by origin and transit countries.

Concerns about loss of sovereignty in the context of international cooperation are significant, but often misconstrue the nature of global governance systems.

In some circumstances, the media have played a part in developing or exacerbating unsubstantiated ideas that migration threatens national sovereignty and national social cohesion, as well as in promoting uninformed stereotypes regarding migrants, while failing to report the positive dimensions.

This continued exclusion of internal displacement from the global discourse on migration in 2016 was symptomatic of the failure to protect and assist displaced citizens within country borders, and of a global political and diplomatic environment that invokes sovereignty as immunity rather than responsibility.

There is strong political resistance by a number of states (and some UN agencies) to creating a new agency or expanding the mandate of an existing one to cover all situations of internal displacement. Given the sovereignty issues that are at stake, this resistance is unlikely to be overcome in the near future. The sheer scope of the global internal displacement crisis goes far beyond the capacity and expertise of a single agency, and thus necessarily requires a broader inter-agency effort. This does not preclude nationwide, regional or sectoral lead agency arrangements, provided that the procedures agreed in the inter-agency IDP policy are adhered to. With the stronger involvement of UNHCR in IDP situations, such lead agency arrangements may become increasingly relevant

"It is unlikely that IDPs will ever get a legal status similar to that of refugees, mainly because governments fear this would weaken the principles of state sovereignty and non-interference in internal affairs," Jens-Hagen Eschenbaecher of the International Displacement Monitoring Centre told IPS.

States invoked national sovereignty to prevent outsiders, including humanitarian organizations, from interfering in internal affairs, yet were often not as assertive in assuming their responsibility to deliver key services.

First, the national sovereignty agenda has been gaining ground in relation to the human rights agenda, and this is something that has to be reversed. The guiding principles are very important, but when it comes to internal displacement national sovereignty is treated as paramount and therefore enormous difficulties are faced in providing basic support. The fundamental question is how to rebalance the discussion between national sovereignty and human rights; and the Summit has to address this.

Asked whether the WHS could be a truly multi-stakeholder process if governments insisted on remaining in full control and were not willing to delegate responsibilities to other actors, Mr. Ul Haq noted that governments in each country normally had clear guidelines as to how humanitarian action should be undertaken. Governments delegated powers to different organizations to carry out certain functions, but also needed to ensure they retained some control, as this was seen to be critical for the sovereignty of the country.

NDMA interviewees revealed a significant degree of satisfaction with improvements in the international system, specifically its performance in recent emergencies and capacity to coordinate. Despite this, they also expressed frustration with the international system's lack of deference to national authority. They noted a lack of respect for national capacities, customs and sovereignty and an ongoing 'tendency for agencies to bypass national authorities and to directly engage at local levels.

The relationship between donors, non-government actors and recipient states can often be strained. For instance, the focus of some governments on sovereignty and self-reliance in the face of disasters has seen increasing refusals to issue the 'standard emergency' appeals that have traditionally triggered the international system's response. For their part, host-government representatives are frustrated by the 'artificial' division between relief and development aid in the international aid architecture.

Previously, there had been too little predictability in the way that the UN would respond to situations of internal displacement where the government was unable or unwilling to meet the protection and assistance needs of internally displaced persons (IDPs). The very reason for which the clusters were put into place – to ensure a more predictable and accountable response from the UN side – was sometimes pushed aside because of political considerations. The clusters, after all, are not meant to challenge State sovereignty, but are meant to help make humanitarian response better coordinated and more effective. This message needs to be better sold to governments.

Whereas the power sharing in the General Assembly of the United Nations is based on ́one country one vote ́, the real power of the UN is vested in the Security Council, dominated by an increasingly outdated configuration of five permanent members with veto rights, who are in this position for no other reason than that they happened to be powerful after the Second World War. If we look at other international organisations, like the Bretton Woods Institutions, their democratic quality is usually even worse. What we end up with is a fundamental contradiction in the normative basis of anything that looks like global governance. Intervention in the domestic affairs of states, undermining sovereignty, is justified on the basis of democratic principles, including the defence of human rights and the protection of civilians. However, the organisation of multilateralism itself is profoundly undemocratic. There is no easy solution to this problem.