We
started this series of posts by defining territorial disputes. In relation to
this point, Merrills tells us that a “dispute may be defined as a specific
disagreement concerning a matter of fact, law or policy in which the claim or
assertion of one party is met with refusal, counter-claim or denial by another.”
Merrills,
J.G. 2017. International Dispute Settlement. Cambridge: Cambridge University
Press.We have already seen that territorial disputes have to do with two key concepts: STATE and SOVEREIGNTY.
We preliminary defined State as a group of people (population) that live in a certain territory and have in common a government and a system of norms (law).
Although
population, territory, government and law are the essential components in order
to have a State, there are others elements (or sub-elements) that give it flesh:
currency, market, defence, language, religion, etc.
For
clarity in the exposition, we shall divide the analysis into the main four
requirements and start from them:
a) population: the
people that are the nation, the subjective element of the State. If we wanted
to reduce the issue to its normative existence, we could say that the
population of a State is determined by its law (for example, national citizen
and foreigners).
As
the intention as this point is to deconstruct the concept, we shall follow
another approach by revising what characteristics may/may not be necessary in
order to develop a group of people into a nation.
Is
it necessary for a nation to have people from the same ethnic origin,
professing the same religion or speaking the same language? We shall see these
points separately:
- Language:
There
are several cases in which although the State has one official language, its
inhabitants speak others (Argentina’s official language is Spanish but the
Welsh community in the Patagonia learns both, Spanish and Welsh at school).
Moreover,
there are several States around the globe with more than one official language
(South Africa, Montenegro, Israel, India, Perú, United Kingdom, to name a few).
-
Ethnicity:
Is
to be black or white a requisite to be part of a community? Is it an African or
Asian background necessary? Once again, there are several examples that have a
direct answer to the question. In nowadays world, we observe most (if not all)
States in which their population is conformed by individuals from various races
and many different cultural backgrounds. Our vocabulary has even a word for
such a phenomenon: cosmopolitan. The perfect example of a cosmopolitan society
is the United Kingdom. Another one that reflects a harmonious merge between
civilizations is Mexico. It appears that a common ethnicity is not fundamental
so to constitute a nation.
- Religion:
Nevertheless,
there are several that are considered secular States; in other words, without
any official State religion: Bolivia, France, United States, etc.
Moreover,
those States that do have an official religion usually recognize in their
Constitutions freedom of religion so although they do have an official one,
their inhabitants are able to profess the religion of their choice.
As
we have seen, the individuals that integrate the population of a certain State
may have (and in most cases they do have) diverse beliefs, ethnic background,
languages, etc. but they still can perfectly be considered as an integrated
group of people able to be a nation and therefore, constitute a State.
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