The article explores the current stagnation in multilateral law-making based on an analysis of recent treaty attempts across various subfields of international law. It further examines why the law of the sea has continued to evolve despite this trend. The article demonstrates that states still regularly seek multilateral treaties to address new challenges. While there is some evidence of general treaty saturation, it is the current inability of traditional great powers to negotiate new binding norms which is the most constraining factor on multilateral law-making. This in turn is related to deeper geopolitical shifts by which traditional great powers, notably the United States and its allies, have seen their relative influence decline. Until the current great power competition ends or settles into a new mode of international co-operation, new multilateral treaties with actual regulatory effect will rarely emerge. The law of the sea has avoided the current trend of stagnation for primarily three reasons (i) a global commitment to the basic tenets of the law of the sea; (ii) a legal framework that affords rights and obligations somewhat evenly disbursed, allowing less powerful states to use their collective leverage to advance multilateral negotiations, despite intermittent great power opposition; and (iii) the avoidance of entrenched multilateral forums where decisions are reached by consensus only.

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多边立法停滞分析——以及海洋法为何超越停滞趋势

本文基于对国际法各个子领域最近的条约尝试的分析，探讨了当前多边立法的停滞。它进一步研究了为什么尽管有这种趋势，海洋法仍在继续发展。这篇文章表明，各国仍然经常寻求多边条约来应对新的挑战。虽然有一些证据表明条约普遍饱和，但传统大国目前无法谈判新的具有约束力的规范，这是多边立法的最大制约因素。这反过来又与更深层次的地缘政治转变有关，传统大国，尤其是美国及其盟国，已经看到其相对影响力下降。在当前大国竞争结束或进入新的国际合作模式之前，很少会出现具有实际监管效果的新多边条约。海洋法避免了当前的停滞趋势，主要有三个原因： (i) 全球致力于海洋法的基本原则；(ii) 一个法律框架，赋予权利和义务在一定程度上平均分配，允许较弱的国家利用其集体影响力推进多边谈判，尽管间歇性的大国反对；(iii) 避免只通过协商一致作出决定的根深蒂固的多边论坛。(ii) 一个法律框架，赋予权利和义务在一定程度上平均分配，允许较弱的国家利用其集体影响力推进多边谈判，尽管间歇性的大国反对；(iii) 避免只通过协商一致作出决定的根深蒂固的多边论坛。(ii) 一个法律框架，赋予权利和义务在一定程度上平均分配，允许较弱的国家利用其集体影响力推进多边谈判，尽管间歇性的大国反对；(iii) 避免只通过协商一致作出决定的根深蒂固的多边论坛。