Publicomos

Réf.

42483

Type

thesis

Titre

UNESCO and the Preah Vihear Dispute: Challenges Facing Cosmopolitan Minded International Institutions in Dispute Resolution

Langues

English

Auteurs

Robison, Paul

Date

05/02/2013

Pages

Mots-clés

World Heritage / World Heritage Convention / World Heritage List / World Heritage Sites / UNESCO / historical surveys / legal framework / international organizations / international standards / international cooperation / law / doctrine / theoretical aspects / operational guidelines / management plans / boundaries / conflicts / conflict resolution / temples

Pays mentionnés

Cambodia / Thailand

Monuments et sites

Temple of Preah Vihear, Cambodia

N° Patrimoine mondial

1224

Résumé en anglais

The thesis examines the border dispute between Thailand and Cambodia over the Temple of Preah Vihear that was ignited when the site was inscribed on the UNESCO World Heritage List in 2008. The principle research question asked is why did the involvement of an international organization, with a cosmopolitan mandate to preserve the universal heritage of mankind and promote peaceful relations between member states, result in an intermittently violent border dispute that the UNESCO been unable to successfully mediate?The thesis first describes UNESCO, the World Heritage Convention, and the World Heritage Actors constituent parts of a “cosmopolitan international organization” that is tasked with advancing a cosmopolitan normative agenda according to a Kantian federation of states model. It then presents the Preah Vihear dispute by focusing on the creation of the Thai-Cambodian border during the French colonial period, the legal dispute about the temple that was argued before the International Court of Justice following Cambodian independence, and the current crisis triggered by the addition of the site to the World Heritage List. The final section argues that the normal technical/legal logic used by international organizational actors is unable to resolve fundamentally political disputes, and in the case of Preah Vihear it further aggravated the crisis and prompted a Thai backlash against the whole World Heritage cosmopolitan project.
The thesis concludes by saying institutional actors seeking cosmopolitan outcomes need to take responsibility and initiative to go beyond legal interpretations in order to craft viable political solutions to political disputes.

Document joint

Preah_Vihear_Thesis_AUP_Paul_Robison.pdf

Licence

Creative Commons Attribution-Non Commercial-No Derivatives (BY-NC-ND)