These papers represent the chief topics of discussion at the European Air Law Association's annual conference for 1997 in Madrid. These include the last remaining qualifications for a fully liberalised EC air transport market, and increasing signs that liberalisation is stimulating structural changes and producing significant benefits for passengers. The text discusses the focus of regulatory attention moving from liberalisation to safety matters, with initiatives in the field of foreign safety oversight, the reformation of Eurocontrol and the creation of a single European aviation safety authority. Also included are EC and US issues regarding transatlantic airline alliances (particularly British Airways/American Airlines) and the Commission's reaction to the Boeing/McDonnell Douglas merger.

This volume is about the sweeping technical and regulatory changes which have moulded the regulatory framework of space communications. WARC-92 introduced the LEO systems, WRC-5 confirmed the access of large international corporations to negotiating tables with member state representatives, and WRC-97 saw the first exchanges of rounds between North America and Western Europe in the global quest for new business markets. The forthcoming conferences of the 21st century promise to be challenging. The legal and institutional process, which charts such unprecedented technical revolution, is still primarily in the domain of international law experts. However, several other legal specialities also tackle space-based communications - trade, air navigation, culture, education - in intimate contact with legitimate profit-making concerns and strategic interest considerations. The text is organized around the traditional distinction between international satellite regulations (Part One) and regional satellite regulations; this second level deals with North American and Western European regulations (Parts Two and Three). The outcome of this research is, first, to present the evolution of the regulatory framework of space-based communications, second, to underline the mounting importance of administrative regulations which tend to be granted a de facto status of standard laws and, third, to draw the attention of the public to the win-lose type of trans-Atlantic competition that is taking place on the global stage, that should change into a win-win scenario in the end.

This book embarks on a contemporary analysis of the interaction of economics and law relating to air transport, delving into the major issues that plague the industry. It shows how some of the thorny and frustrating issues could be approached sensibly. Among the issues discussed are the anomaly of exponential growth of air transport which makes airline profitability continue to be poor; the legislative impediments in most countries that preclude direct foreign investment in the industry; the confounding and muddled mess behind the economics of aircraft engine emissions; and the inexplicable reality that, although civil aviation is primarily meant to meet the needs of the people of the world, State regulators have upended the equation and given priority to national interests over the interests of the passenger. The book will be of interest to economists and lawyers alike who deal with air transport issues, and also to academics and students in the area of transportation as well as regulators and airlines.

1998 had seen further efforts by the European Commission to reduce the number of natural monopolies in the air transport market. The Council of the EU discussed a directive aimed at regulating airport practices by limiting the level of charges, putting an end to unfair practices and improving transparency for users. At the same time, the Commission set conditions on airline alliances after having carried out investigations into several alliances between EU and US carriers. Another significant issue in 1998 has been the review of conditions of carriage and tickets in consultation with the Commission and with consumer organisations, as well as the proposal for a revision of Regulation No. 895/91 regarding denied boarding compensation. Also in high profile during 1998 has been the proposal for a multilateral treaty between the EU and Eastern European countries regarding the adoption of the air law regime of the EU and EU competition law, which would create a common European aviation area. These various developments have provided the principal topics for discussion at the Association's annual conference for 1998. The Association is grateful to Austrian Airlines Osterreichische Luftverkehrs AG and Bank Austria Aktiengesellschaft for their generous contribution towards the cost of the seminar.

Launch activities performed by private entities deal with a complex legal environment. The Space Treaties provide a general liability framework. Launch participants are subject to regulatory or institutional control, and to domestic liability laws. Specific contractual practice has developed due to insurance limitations, the inter-participants' waivers of liability and claims. This book synthesizes information on the norms of play, to allow the grasp of their relative weight and interactions in the assessment of liability risk for launch activities. It reveals a legal framework presently lacking sufficient predictability for an efficient liability risk management: the waivers of liability suffer weaknesses as do all such clauses, and lack uniformity and reliability; and the Space Treaties contain ambiguous terms preventing predictable determination of the States responsible for authorizing and supervising launch activities and for damage compensation, and do not reflect the liability of launch operators. This book offers suggestions of new approaches for: harmonizing waivers of liability to improve their consistency, validity and flow-down; and improving the Space Treaties for their implementation to non-governmental launch activities. In the launch community, the need for lawmaking is less compelling than in fields such as aviation. Nevertheless, adjustments to the present framework are proposed through model clauses and an international instrument, for further thinking and contribution by those sharing the opinion that creative lawmaking is needed now to prepare for tomorrow's endeavors.

There is little doubt that robotic and automated systems in space will contribute considerably to the future commercialisation of the space environment. This text provides a systems eye view of robotic spacecraft design with an emphasis on control systems.The first half of the book introduces the techniques of robotics and robotic control, and is the most mathematical part of the book. The second half of the book deals with spacecraft systems themselves, and how a robotic-type payload influences them, including consideration of financial and legal issues which are often left out of technical texts.Running through the book is the implementation of a freeflying robotic spacecraft called ATLAS (Advanced TeLerobotic Actuation System). However, the techniques presented in the book are completely general and the ATLAS spacecraft just serves as an example, albeit a very useful and economically viable space system.

This volume presents an analysis of the historical background, current status, and future development of space law by noted legal scholars. It focuses on a distinct and growing field of international law that incorporates both public and private law. Specific areas covered are scientific and technical aspects of space and space law; the United Nations and other institutional arrangements; national regulatory aspects; satellite applications; commercialization; dispute settlement; and case law.

Since the establishment of a special law-making body at the United Nations in 1958, there has been a steady expansion of laws and regulations pertaining to space activities. The result has been the development of a distinct and mature discipline of international law. This analysis of space law by recognized experts in the field will interest scholars, practitioners, and policy-makers involved in the regulation of space use and exploration.

This is a policy oriented and comparatively oriented textbook on air and space law for students and practitioners. It covers the history and development of air and space law; their interrelationships; their relationships with the law of the seas and the law of Antarctica; institutions working in the field of air and space law; sovereignty in national airspace; freedom of exploration and use of outer space; public international air law; penal air law; private international air law, especially liability law; and public and private space law. Much attention is devoted to the law of air commerce: bilateral air services agreements; inter-airline co-operation; the effects of competition, antitrust and European Union law; deregulation, privatisation and commercialisation of air transport; ownership and control of airlines, and airline alliances; multilateralisation of air transport; and congestion and environmental controls. The last chapter of the book briefly deals with the legal aspects of commercial outer space applications. Increasingly, air transport, both in fact and in law, is becoming an ordinary industry like any other and is being treated as such. Rapidly, commercial outer space activities are being privatised and commercialised.

The United Nations currently has five effective international space treaties, namely the Outer Space Treaty of 1967, Space Rescue Agreement of 1968, Space Liability Convention of 1972, Space Registration Convention of 1975, and Moon Agreement of 1979. However, with recent competition and movements to mine and exploit natural resources from such entities as the moon, asteroids, etc., these outdated treaties no longer address current advancements. It is imperative that new research is undertaken to urge and progress new space laws and policies that strengthen international cooperation and joint undertakings into the exploitation of natural resources from outer space. Global Issues Surrounding Outer Space Law and Policy grants a general understanding for the current issues and methods of solution in the field of outer space law and policy in the global society. It suggests a revision of the five international space treaties and presents a new International Space Agency (ISA) that would use international cooperation and an International Court of Air and Space Law to promote the speed of work and fairness in trials of air and space law cases. Additionally, solutions for the cooperation of the global community towards joint undertakings and exploitation of natural resources in celestial bodies is explored. This book is ideal for lawyers, professors, government officials, space agencies, academicians, researchers, students, and anyone looking to understand the complicated problems and methods of solution in international space law and policy.

While outer space itself remains out of reach for most of us, the results of space activities and developments from space technology are becoming increasingly integrated in our daily lives. Recognising the importance of these technologies, this book explores how existing legal protection methods may be enforced if the unauthorised use takes place beyond conventional territorial borders in outer space. In this detailed and considered study, Tosaporn Leepuengtham examines the problems which may arise in terms of the protection of intellectual property rights in space activities under two national jurisdictions; the US and the UK. She explores the conflict between intellectual property law's scheme of private exclusive rights and the fundamental principle of space law, which is the common heritage of mankind. Furthermore, this book offers potential solutions to this conflict, including suggestions for best practice implementation of law and policy recommendations for balancing and better protecting the interest of rights holders and the public in space activities. Raising pertinent questions, it eloquently provides a springboard for future study. Novel and engaging, this book will appeal to scholars and students of Intellectual Property Law and various related topics including patent and copyright law, space law, private international law and technology law. Government agencies, policy makers and officials, in particular those responsible for issuing and implementing law, regulations and policies governing space industry will also find a wealth of knowledge herein.

Flight is inherently a risky venture, carried out in a hostile environment at great speed. Realistically and regrettably, a commitment to aviation safety can achieve no more than 'as few accidents as possible'. Moreover, the tragic events of 11 September 2001 have conclusively demonstrated that aviation safety goes beyond accident prevention from a technical point of view and extends to more profound political, strategic and legal dimensions. Accordingly, aviation safety requires a multidisciplinary approach: technical, economic, managerial, and legal. This ground-breaking study analyzes, from a legal point of view, the mandate of the International Civil Aviation Organization (ICAO) relating to aviation safety in the light of changes which have taken place since the conclusion of the Chicago Convention, including the expansion of the international civil aviation community, the liberalization of the aviation industry, the introduction of new technology, and existing as well as new and emerging terrorist threats. The author clearly demonstrates that ICAO, as the worldwide governmental organization for international civil aviation, should be allowed a more proactive role in enhancing aviation safety. Describing in great detail the contributions of ICAO to the global safety regime and mechanisms, he submits effective ways to rationalize ICAO's quasi-legislative and enforcement functions in order to enhance aviation safety through the rule of law. Among the important topics arising in the course of the analysis are the following: - global ramifications of national and regional initiatives; - auditing of state compliance with international standards; - characterization of crimes against the safety of civil aviation; - importance of ensuring that safety requirements are not compromised by profit considerations; - burgeoning of airline alliances, code-sharing and outsourcing activities; - demands for simplification and unification of certain regulatory procedures; - prohibition of the use of weapons against civil aircraft in flight; and - development of new technology, such as satellite-based navigation systems; - importance of the rule of law and the system of checks and balances in international organizations. As a plea to consider civil aviation safety obligations not only as merely contractual obligations between States but as obligations owed to the international community as a whole, this book is sure to give rise to far-reaching discussions and follow-up among policymakers and the interested legal community in the years to come.

The structure of air cargo claims is highly complex. Claimants may often have difficulty in establishing against whom they should make their claim. With the emphasis on practicality, this text is aimed at the entire air cargo industry from airlines and their insurers to freight forwarders, and importers and exporters. It illustrates the demarcation of responsibilites and liabilities of the various key players in the aviation market, and the contractual responsibilites and the liability implications between the various parties.

In the new space age after the end of the Cold War, orbit and frequency allocations, traffic control, safety, and a number of support services such as space weather forecast and orbital debris monitoring need to be coordinated transparently and effectively by clear rules at an international level. The establishment of an international civil space regulatory framework is the central theme of this book, in particular, the possible extension to space of the international regulatory framework model adopted for aviation more than 60 years ago with the establishment of the International Civil Aviation Organization (ICAO).

The book also highlights the increased reliance of aviation safety on space-based navigation and communication systems, the increasing space systems traffic through the international airspace under the jurisdiction of the ICAO, and the emerging hybrid systems such as aero-spacecraft and space planes, to advocate the practical benefits of directly expanding the ICAO Convention domain beyond the airspace to include outer space up to the geostationary orbits.

In the only analysis of its kind, Dr. Maria-Vittoria "Giugi" Carminati asks the question: if a commercial space operator kills or injures one of its spaceflight participants or a crewmember, what is the extent of the operator's liability? In the United States, that question has no clear answer. Dr. Carminati explores the way the United States manages liability, at state and federal level, and from state to state. Tort law in the United States exists at the state level. However, commercial spaceflight and its regulation are creatures of federal law. Understanding how these two systems interact and, often, conflict is critical to understanding how commercial spaceflight operators can manage exposure.

Space is no longer the domain of national space agencies. Today, a significant majority of space activities are carried out by non-governmental entities, resulting in the accelerated evolution of space technologies and their applications. This operational shift from public to private does not mean, however, that governments are no longer relevant in this era of New Space. On the contrary: as the operational role of the state has diminished, its regulatory role has grown correspondingly. Acknowledging that the commercial landscape in space is an ever-changing one, this book explores how the Canadian government has adapted to the new commercial space landscape and whether it is prepared to fulfil its authorisation and supervision responsibilities as the regulator of Canada's space industry. The fundamental research question posed, therefore, is whether Canada's regulatory framework is appropriate given the increasing commercialisation of space. To best answer this question, the book provides a doctrinal analysis of Canada's historical space policy and current space laws, an empirical survey of the perspectives of those currently interacting with Canada's regulatory framework, and a comparative exploration of how other jurisdictions oversee commercial space activities. Motivated by legal, moral and economic considerations, the book recommends that Canada enact a comprehensive national space law and provides an annotated draft law for this purpose. By doing so, the book intends to spark a meaningful conversation on how Canada ought to fulfil its regulatory responsibilities, a topic previously unaddressed in public and academic discourse.

An analysis of the European Union's external competence and external relations in air transport. The adoption of the third air transport package means that the major challenge to the EU is to develop external relations in air transport. Part I of the book provides a detailed analysis of the EU's internal and external competence in air transport and in matters including air transport within their scope. The amendments introduced by the Single European Act and the Treaty on European Union are fully taken into consideration. A different vision is proposed of the development of external competence in air transport and a new classification of the Community's secondary legislative measures in this area. It includes a complete list of the political, legal and economic obstacles to the acquisition by the EU of external competence in air transport. Part II offers a detailed analysis of the EU's external relations in air transport, dealing with relations with non-member states, including Norway and Sweden, some EFTA countries and Central and Eastern Europe. The many problems facing external relations, and the future prospects, are analyzed. Relations with internal organizations are analyzed in terms of the various forms of actual and future Community participation in civil aviation organizations.

This study takes a keen look at the problems facing the international community due to conflicts arising from applications of varying competition laws by different competition authorities to international airline alliances. As a result of privatization, deregulation, liberalization and globalization, international air carriers form alliances with one another in order to cope with growing competition in the international air transport market. This book clearly provides an introduction to the background to and origin of airline alliances, different models of alliances and the related anti-competitive practices resulting from existing international airline alliances. The potential anti-competitive practices resulting from these cross-border alliances trigger a great deal of concern from various competition authorities. Thus, this study goes on to provide a detailed analysis regarding the relevant EC competition law and US antitrust law and their applications to alliance activities. The comparison of different applications of EC competition law and US antitrust law to international airline alliances provides leading research results first-hand. In the conclusion, the essential elements regarding establishing a level playing field in the international air transport market are identified and the author provides possible solutions for the harmonisation of different applications of competition law to international airline alliances.

This book proposes a framework for assessing countries' levels of compliance with international space law and norms. It begins by exploring the development of two movements - the evidence-based policymaking and programming movement, and the rise of ratings and rankings research - and their growth across various disciplines. The analysis suggests that such efforts are useful in gauging the behavior of countries in space according to how well they adhere to existing space law and norms. To date, there is no comprehensive, periodic, and systematic measure of countries' efforts to comply with space law and norms; this work endeavors to fill that gap by offering a framework in which to assess compliance. Applying the framework results in five possible ratings that a country may be assigned, ranging from highly compliant to non-compliant. Ideally, the proposed framework can be used to promote compliance, and with it, space security and sustainability.

The governing international space law regime has been locked in a norm-creation stalemate for over 40 years. This stalemate endangers the preservation of established, guiding legal principles, as well as the sustainability of the parts of outer space that humans utilize. The discrepancy between norm creation, technological advancement and the ecosystem of novel actors could generate serious consequences for future space activities and the nature of international relations. Besides the return of old rivalries in a New Cold War, new activities and actors emerging amidst a legal void emphasizes the risks of the stalemate: unstable peace, fragile cooperation, uneven technological development and uncertain eco-sustainability. Therefore, the prolonged legal stalemate cannot be treated simply as an academic question for it has broader political and economic implications of growing strategic relevance. Unresolved issues in international space law could threaten the survival of space as a global common, thus it is essential that the ability of the norm-creation mechanism of UN COPUOS is equipped to address the ongoing changes and provide for adequate global governance. This book conducts an evaluation of the current legal state and sheds light on potential future prospects, offering an overview of the political context within which it developed, providing an assessment of the selected successful examples in international law, analysing lessons learned and makes recommendations for how the UN COPUOS legal apparatus should be modified in order to ensure that future space activities are possible beyond anarchy, greed, ecological irresponsibility, and to ensure that the principle of the peaceful uses of outer space remains the governing norm.

The governing international space law regime has been locked in a norm-creation stalemate for over 40 years. This stalemate endangers the preservation of established, guiding legal principles, as well as the sustainability of the parts of outer space that humans utilize. The discrepancy between norm creation, technological advancement and the ecosystem of novel actors could generate serious consequences for future space activities and the nature of international relations. Besides the return of old rivalries in a New Cold War, new activities and actors emerging amidst a legal void emphasizes the risks of the stalemate: unstable peace, fragile cooperation, uneven technological development and uncertain eco-sustainability. Therefore, the prolonged legal stalemate cannot be treated simply as an academic question for it has broader political and economic implications of growing strategic relevance. Unresolved issues in international space law could threaten the survival of space as a global common, thus it is essential that the ability of the norm-creation mechanism of UN COPUOS is equipped to address the ongoing changes and provide for adequate global governance. This book conducts an evaluation of the current legal state and sheds light on potential future prospects, offering an overview of the political context within which it developed, providing an assessment of the selected successful examples in international law, analysing lessons learned and makes recommendations for how the UN COPUOS legal apparatus should be modified in order to ensure that future space activities are possible beyond anarchy, greed, ecological irresponsibility, and to ensure that the principle of the peaceful uses of outer space remains the governing norm.