This chapter challenges the dominant paradigm of a ‘use of force’ in article 2(4) of the UN Charter as a coherent concept by giving examples from the subsequent agreement and subsequent practice of States showing that none of the elements of a ‘use of force’ is strictly necessary for the definition to be met. It examines anomalous examples which lack the elements of physical means, physical effects, gravity or hostile intent, taking as a basis of analysis certain acts listed in the 1974 Definition of Aggression: military occupation (article 3(a)), blockade (article 3(c)), mere presence in violation of a Status of Forces Agreement (article 3(e)) and indirect use of force through inter-State assistance (article 3(f)) or through non-State armed groups (article 3(g)). It also examines anomalous examples of non-‘use of force’: acts which appear to meet the criteria but are not characterised as such by States in their subsequent practice. These include forcible response to aerial incursion and purported maritime law enforcement. This chapter then offers possible explanations for these anomalous examples and discusses the implications for the interpretation of a prohibited ‘use of force’.

This chapter examines the meaning of a ‘use of force’ under article 2(4) of the UN Charter, focusing on its required means. It analyses whether ‘force’ in article 2(4) is restricted to particular means, namely, if it refers to physical/armed force only, if a weapon must be employed, what is considered a ‘weapon’ and if a release of kinetic energy is required. In doing so, it discusses subsequent agreements on the meaning of a ‘use of force’ in article 2(4), including the 1970 Friendly Relations Declaration, the General Assembly’s 1974 Definition of Aggression, 1987 Resolution 42/22 and the 2005 World Summit Outcome Document. It also examines in detail the travaux préparatoires of the Friendly Relations Declaration regarding the definition of ‘force’ in article 2(4) and arguments for and against a broad interpretation. This chapter concludes that ‘use of force’ article 2(4) refers only to physical force and not to non-physical forms of coercion, that it is not necessary that a ‘weapon’ be used nor is it required that kinetic energy be released, and that physical means are not essential for an act to constitute a ‘use of force’, as what counts are its physical effects.

This chapter presents and applies an original framework – type theory – to identify a prohibited ‘use of force’ between States under article 2(4) of the UN Charter, focusing on the meaning of ‘use of force’ and the contextual element of ‘international relations’. The theory of ‘type’ is firstly set out before explaining how it applies to the prohibition of the use of force. This chapter argues that a prohibited ‘use of force’ between States is characterised by a basket of elements, not all of which must be present for an act to meet the definition. Instead, these elements – including certain effects, gravity and intention – are identified and weighed to determine whether the definition of a ‘use of force’ is met. Illustrative examples are given from State practice including targeted killing and excessive or unlawful maritime law enforcement. Finally, this chapter applies the type theory framework to the testing of anti-satellite (ASAT) weapons in outer space to show how it can be applied in novel contexts. Through these case studies, this chapter draws definitive conclusions regarding the definition of a ‘use of force’ and demonstrates how to apply this framework in practice.

State parties to multilateral environmental agreements establish secretariats to undertake tasks required for the efficient operation of the treaty body. A key area of responsibility for secretariats is the organization of meetings of Conferences of the Parties (COPs), during which state parties negotiate the ongoing work and focus of the treaty, including the budget that the secretariat can access for its activities during the subsequent year(s). A close examination of the decision-making process and structures for these budgets offers a window into the principal–agent relationship between member states and secretariats. This examination explores a mechanism through which the principals (states) exercise authority over the cognitive, normative, and executive influence of secretariats (agents), while at the same time demonstrating that these agents are seeking such influence in the first place. The chapter explores the negotiation dynamics regarding the budgets for the Rio Conventions – the United Nations Framework Convention on Climate Change, the Convention of Biological Diversity, and the United Nations Convention to Combat Desertification – as well as budget dilemmas faced by two multilateral scientific bodies to explore the accountability mechanism that are brought to the relationship between member states and secretariats.

This conclusion sets out a definitional framework for a prohibited ‘use of force’ under article 2(4) of the UN Charter according to the type theory developed in this monograph. It sets out the contextual elements of that provision and the elements of a ‘use of force’ that are identified and discussed in greater detail in earlier parts of the monograph. Finally, it offers some reflections on the legal nature of this framework and its potential as a tool for scholars and practitioners to assess whether forcible incidents meet the threshold of a prohibited ‘use of force’ between States under international law.

Focusing on three initiatives of the United Nations Framework Convention on Climate Change (UNFCCC) Secretariat – the Momentum for Change Initiative, the Lima–Paris Action Agenda, and the Non-state Actor Zone for Climate Action – this chapter studies how an international environmental bureaucracy can evolve from a low-key and servant-like secretariat to an actor in its own right. It argues that international environmental secretariats increasingly take on the role of an orchestrator that seeks to shape policy outcomes through changing the behavior of others. Using orchestration as a conceptual lens, the chapter identifies new types of influence of international bureaucracies. The forms of influence that the UNFCCC Secretariat exerts include in particular (i) awareness-raising, (ii) norm-building, and (iii) mobilization. This new way of how soft power is deployed underscores the increasingly proactive role of the UNFCCC Secretariat. The chapter concludes that the UNFCCC Secretariat is currently “loosening its straitjacket” by gradually expanding its original mandate and spectrum of activity. It is no longer a passive bystander but has adopted new roles and functions in the global endeavor to cope with climate change.

The concept of a global administrative space (GAS) denotes the emergence of administrative structures beyond the territory of the nation state that underpin processes of global governance. Against this backdrop, this chapter argues that an environmental GAS is emerging, which combines the development of independent administrative capacities at the international level with an increasing integration of a broad range of governmental and nongovernmental organizations at different levels of government. The GAS constitutes a complex multilevel and multiactor structure. Based on an original dataset covering issue-specific collaboration and communication flows between organizations operating in the fields of global climate and biodiversity governance, this chapter uses techniques of social network analysis to describe and analyze the structure and composition of administrative networks. It finds a relatively stable pattern of mutual interaction among international environmental bureaucracies, international organizations, national and subnational bureaucracies, research institutes and nongovernmental organizations that can be interpreted as an indicator for the emergence of a GAS in environmental governance.

This chapter conceptualizes international public administrations (IPAs) as attention-seeking bureaucracies whose goal is to actively feed their policy-relevant information into the multilateral decision-making process. It suggests two avenues through which international treaty secretariats can attempt to influence international negotiations: (a) Secretariats may attempt to supply policy-relevant information to negotiators from the inside via their close cooperation with the chairs of multilateral negotiations or (b) they may attempt to build support for their preferred policy outputs by engaging with and communicatively connecting actors within the broader transnational policy network in order to exert pressure on negotiators from the outside. Taking the secretariats of the Convention of Biological Diversity and the United Nations Framework Convention on Climate Change as examples, these potential pathways of secretariat influence are illustrated and explored empirically. The findings contribute to a growing body of literature that studies the role of national and international public administrations as agenda-setters, policy entrepreneurs, or policy brokers at the interface of public policy analysis and public administration.

This concluding chapter summarizes key findings of the chapters in this book and relates them to the seminal work Managers of Global Change: The Influence of International Environmental Bureaucracies by Frank Biermann and Bernd Siebenhüner. The chapter highlights changes in the strategies and causal mechanisms of international public administration influence in the environmental field and in the analytic concepts used to study international bureaucracies. It concludes by outlining the contours of future research in this still expanding academic field.

This chapter focuses on the United Nation’s largest development entity, the United Nations Development Programme (UNDP), and asks: When and why has it integrated climate adaptation into its mandate? It traces UNDP’s evolving adaptation mandate from 1990 to 2015, drawing on over fifty interviews and an extensive analysis of primary documents. It argues that UNDP Administrators, rather than states, played a critical role in mandate expansion. Administrators decided whether and how to integrate adaptation into UNDP’s mandate and subsequently lobbied states to endorse any expansion. It also suggests that UNDP’s expansion was facilitated by its early access to multilateral climate trust funds. This chapter makes an important contribution to existing theories of international bureaucracies, which often assume that organizational change is state-driven (statist explanations) or that bureaucracies will always seek to expand (principal–agent and constructivism). Overall, it suggests scholars should look at how leaders navigate financial, ideational, and normative environment to understand change and influence in international institutions.

This introduction highlights the prevailing uncertainty regarding the meaning of a ‘use of force’ under article 2(4) of the UN Charter and customary international law. It sets out the key research questions that this monograph addresses regarding the meaning of ‘use of force’ under jus ad bellum, including if ‘force’ means physical/armed force only and whether kinetic means or the use of particular weapons required, if a (potential) physical effect is required and the required nature of such effects, if there is a de minimis gravity threshold, and if a coercive or hostile intent is required. It also explains why the definition of prohibited force matters and its consequences under international law, including with respect to the gap between ‘use of force’ under article 2(4) and ‘armed attack’ under article 51 as well as the rise of grey zone operations. Finally, it sets out the aims and contributions of this monograph and an outline of its structure.

This chapter examines two ways the customary norm could have emerged post-1945: the two-element approach or that article 2(4) gave rise to a new customary rule of its own impact, following the approach of the ICJ in the North Sea Continental Shelf Cases. It demonstrates the challenges of applying the two-element approach to the customary prohibition of the use of force due to the presence of the parallel and near-universal treaty obligation in article 2(4) of the UN Charter, which makes it difficult to identify sufficient relevant State practice and opinio juris outside the treaty. Establishing evidence of the customary rule and its content in this way depends on a number of theoretical issues that remain unsettled or over which significant controversy exists. This chapter then applies the criteria set out by the ICJ in the North Sea Continental Shelf Cases to article 2(4) and argues that article 2(4) meets this test. This chapter concludes that, in contrast to the right to self-defence in article 51 of the UN Charter which explicitly has its origins in customary international law, article 2(4) is itself the origin of the customary international law prohibition of the use of force.