Introduction
In July 2016, an Arbitral Tribunal formed under Annex VII of the United Nations Convention on the Law of the Sea (LOS Convention) published its Award in the South China Sea case between the Philippines and China. Among the several issues in dispute in the case was the legality of a series of nine dashes – the ‘nine-dash line’ – that China uses as a cartographical depiction of unspecified claims to historic rights in the South China Sea and its features. On this issue, the Tribunal famously declared that the LOS Convention has ‘superseded any historic rights or other sovereign rights or jurisdiction in excess of the limits imposed therein’.
Nearly a decade after the Award, the making of historical narratives continues to play a critical role in the contest for dominance over the South China Sea. In July 2024, several historians and legal academics gathered in China’s southern province of Hainan for a seminar on ‘narrative construction and discourse building’ in the South China Sea. Wu Shicun, the historian who leads China’s National Institute for South China Sea Studies, reportedly warned attendees that China faces ‘an increasingly arduous battle over public perception and opinion’ as its neighbours cooperate ‘with extraterritorial forces in the study of historical and legal issues’. Alongside the recent escalation of confrontation at sea, the parallel battle for hearts and minds enlists history in an attempt to strengthen competing maritime claims. This renewed interest in history suggests that, in contrast to the South China Sea Tribunal’s declaration, the LOS Convention has not completely suppressed appeals to history as a tool of legal argument. If the LOS Convention is said to have extinguished such claims, how are we to make sense of continued national efforts to mobilise historically grounded arguments in the law of the sea post-2016?
In this article, I critically describe the relationship between the LOS Convention and the construction of historical narratives to support maritime claims.
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