International Law: Hungary and Slovakia
True Law requires some executive agency, with potentially overwhelming power, able and willing to use sufficient force to
enforce a decision. Law means judicial decisions which are enforced. Without decisions, or without enforcement, there is no
law. UN sanctions on Iraq show insufficient force, to change behavior, so it is not quite law".
My comment: Tom is right; law without enforcement is meaningless. But even that does not ensure success. Cf. the motorist
who pays a parking ticket but goes on parking illegally.
Ronald Hilton - 8/13/02
From Bratislava,Tom Grey writes: "The example of Slovakia and Hungary, in the case of the Gabcikova- Nagymaros Dam,
shows that there is NO real, international law. After Czechoslovakia and Hungary signed legally binding contracts to build a dam
complex together in 1977, and after the first part was 80% done, almost all in Slovakia, Hungary stopped work in 1989. After a
couple of years of failed negotiations, Slovakia did as much as it could alone in 1991 through 1993 (splitting from Czechia in
1992). In 1993, the two countries submitted the case to the International Court in The Hague. The (predictably useless?) results: Hungary was wrong to stop; Slovakia was
wrong to finish their side alone; no binding decision; both sides should continue to negotiate in good faith ; all financial claims
should probably cancel out . See http://ecolu-info.unige.ch/archives/envcee97/0475.html
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