POKING AT HOLES IN A NET: CHALLENGING CONTENTIONS OF INTERNATIONAL DISPUTE RESOLUTION By Daniel Kang I INTRODUCTION
Scholars highlight the adjudication of international disputes through arbitration and judicial settlement as the most effective mechanism for achieving enduring settlements on controversial issues. Despite smaller states favouring adjudication – which attenuates power disparities in their disputes with larger states – adjudication remains flawed and ineffective, failing to achieve accountability from larger states which continue to defy adjudicated outcomes and enjoy impunity. This essay challenges this perception of international dispute resolution (IDR) mechanisms as ineffectual in achieving accountability from large states, and highlights that small states and individuals may also avoid being held accountable. Concurrently, it seeks to challenge accountability as the defining metric in evaluating IDR mechanisms. It first analyses the Philippines v China arbitration, where a major power has been held accountable for its transgressions. Next, demonstrating that adjudication may fail to achieve accountability from small states and individuals, the essay explores the International Criminal Court’s (ICC) failure to administer international criminal justice through judicial settlement and prosecution of Sudanese president Al-Bashir following the UN Security Council’s referral of Sudan under Chapter VII of the UN Charter. II PHILIPPINES V CHINA
Arbitration has been identified as the most ‘efficient’ dispute resolution procedure due to its success in resolving complex issues authoritatively, comprehensively, and in less time than other mechanisms. A The Dispute
In 2014, the Philippines launched arbitration against China under Annex VII of The United Nations Convention on the Law of the Sea (UNCLOS) as ‘a last resort’, challenging China’s 32
