Is the Antarctic Treaty a Model to Prevent an Arctic Oil Race?
by Rene Wadlow In an earlier article Arctic Oil and the Law of the Seize, I mentioned that some such as Scott Borgerson, who teaches maritime studies at the US Coast Guard Academy and is a fellow at the Council on Foreign Relations, are looking to the Antarctic Treaty of 1959 as a model to prevent an Arctic race for oil by avoiding the provisions of the Law of the Sea Convention which the USA has not signed. Since the Antarctic Treaty is bedside reading for only a few, it is useful to look at its provisions and to see if it can be a useful precedent.(1) The Antarctic Treaty was drafted largely as a way to avoid a clash of sovereignty among seven states, some of whose claims to territory in Antarctica overlap, in particular Chile, Argentina and the United Kingdom. The claims were highlighted in 1958 which the United Nations proclaimed as International Geophysical Year, and there were at least twelve national expeditions that year in the Antarctic. It is believed that the Antarctic conti
