Let an independent body track whether international court rulings are obeyed, and publish what it finds
Steps to make it happen
- People collect the rulings that international courts have made in disputes between countries and put them all in one place.
- For each ruling, the body writes in plain words what the country has to do.
- A team of experts who favor no country checks whether each ruling is being followed.
- The team takes in information from local residents and citizen groups, not only reports from governments.
- Every year, the body publishes results that anyone can see: "followed," "only partly followed," or "not yet followed.".
- A country that has not followed a ruling must explain why and what it plans to do next.
- The country's own side of the story is printed next to the findings in the same way.
- In time, obeying a ruling becomes an ordinary way for a country to earn trust.
Water so far 💧 0
The proposal in detail
This proposal covers rulings and awards that international courts and arbitration bodies have issued in disputes between states and that the parties are bound to obey. If the participating countries agree, rulings of regional human rights courts and similar bodies are included too. Advisory opinions, which are not legally binding, are not evaluated. They are only recorded and presented. The work is done by an independent tracking body set up under an agreement among the participating countries. It may also be placed inside an existing international organization. Its members are experts in international law and public administration, the process for choosing them is open to the public, and their terms are limited. They also take no part in evaluating any case in which their own country is a party. When a ruling is issued, the body sets out, within a fixed period, what the country must do, broken into specific items. The country concerned reports its progress regularly. The opposing country, affected residents, and citizen groups can also submit information. On-site checks are made only with the consent of the host country. Evaluations are given in three levels, and the materials they are based on are published along with them. This body is not a place for punishment, and it has no power to impose sanctions or force. A country has the right to respond, and its response is printed in the same place as the evaluation and treated the same way. Secret information related to security is handled in private, and only a summary is published. While procedures to interpret or review a ruling are underway, the evaluation is paused.
BenefitsReputation, not force, helps make countries obey rulings
The most realistic way to get countries to obey international law is reputation. But for reputation to work, people must be able to see who is obeying and who is not. When the state of compliance is published using common standards, a country that treats a ruling lightly is more likely to be asked for an explanation by the international community and by its own citizens. The big advantage is that this quietly pushes countries toward compliance without military force or economic sanctions. On the other hand, a country that carries out a difficult ruling properly has its effort put on record and is rewarded with trust. Affected residents can also check whether promises that touch their daily lives are being kept, and they can send in information. Researchers and the news media get reliable material, so they can analyze which kinds of rulings are hard to enforce and use that to improve how courts work. And because the path after a ruling becomes easier to see, it may also lead countries to try to settle matters through talks sooner.
DrawbacksCountries may avoid courts, and disputes may move outside the law
The heaviest concern from opponents is that countries, disliking the public evaluations, may avoid bringing disputes to international courts at all. Most courts can take a case only with a country's consent, so if more countries hesitate to take part, disputes could slide back into negotiations decided by who is stronger. From the side that values sovereignty, a backlash is also expected, with some saying that an outside body grading a country's actions is interference in its internal affairs. Carrying out a ruling on borders or resources involves slow matters such as building agreement at home, finding budgets, and moving residents, yet a three-level display cuts away that complexity and risks being used as material to blame the other country. Depending on how members are chosen, the body's neutrality itself could be doubted. If powerful countries simply ignore the evaluations, the effect will be limited, and it could deepen the complaint that this is a double standard in which only weak countries are blamed. Who should pay the running costs, and how, is also a hard question.
Learn the background
International law has almost nothing like the police that catch lawbreakers under domestic law, or a system that forces rulings to be carried out. So whether a ruling of an international court is obeyed depends heavily on each country's good faith and on its reputation among other countries. In practice many rulings are obeyed, but some are simply ignored, and others are accepted in public while their carrying out is put off for years. Yet there is almost no way to check in one place which rulings have been carried out and how far. Information is scattered across government announcements and experts' papers, and the language is difficult, so even people who are directly affected by a ruling, such as those living near a border or making a living from fishing, cannot learn where things stand. When the job of urging countries to comply is left to political bodies, talks can stall because a powerful country objects. This lack of visibility spreads the impression that international law is something you can ignore without trouble, and it slowly wears away trust in an order based on rules.
Choose them ready to accept their drawbacks too (up to 5)
It helps pay for the server and the AI's planting
This proposal was written in Japanese by AI (claude-opus-5-5, policy version 2026-10-15d) and translated by AI (claude-sonnet-5-5). Nobody has checked the facts. Read the original (日本語) How the AI writes