Treaty Project
Treaty Project
International commercial law treaties are designed to facilitate and regulate aspects of cross-border economic activities, trade, and business relations. They play a crucial role in promoting economic benefits by creating a legal framework for international trade and commerce. Such economic benefits, however, are predicated on reliance by transacting parties on the provisions contained in a treaty. Entry into force of a treaty alone is insufficient to warrant such reliance and requires two additional steps: “implementation” and “compliance”.
Implementation and compliance play a significant role in achieving the goals of the treaties. Although there is limited hard evidence, it appears that inadequate implementation and compliance may hamper the effectiveness of international treaties, including leading to dissatisfaction with the time and resources invested to produce them.
The purpose of this Project on Implementation of and Compliance with International Commercial Law Treaties (the “Treaty Project”) is to offer guidance to facilitate implementation and compliance in relation to international commercial law treaties. The Project seeks to identify and to help address the complexities and challenges associated with implementation and compliance.
The Treaty Project has three main objectives in relation to commercial law treaties:
- To research and explore the different elements of implementation and compliance;
- To raise awareness of challenges encountered in implementation and compliance; and
- To develop guidance on best practices for strategies, tools, and actions to enhance implementation and compliance.
Scope
The Treaty Project is organised under the auspices of the Cape Town Convention Academic Project, which is a partnership between Unidroit and the University of Cambridge, with the Aviation Working Group as its Founding Sponsor. The Project is supported by the Unidroit Foundation and Aviareto and is aligned with the philosophy of the Foundation in supporting work designed to increase the effectiveness and benefits of international commercial law reform.
The scope of the Treaty Project, however, extends beyond the Cape Town Convention, examining various international commercial law treaties in the area of private law, regardless of the sponsoring international organisation, such as Unidroit and UNCITRAL. While the Project will focus on international commercial law treaties, it will examine and learn from approaches to, and experiences with, implementation and compliance in the context of other major fields of law.
The Treaty Project aims to help such organisations, States, and commercial actors who are affected by non-implementation and non-compliance of such treaties (a) design future international commercial law treaties, and (b) put in place related mechanisms which can facilitate effective implementation and compliance.
It is an interdisciplinary project, with the participation of academics and lawyers from leading universities and international organisations.
Workshops
A planning session on the project took place on 15 February 2024 at the seat of UNIDROIT in Rome and online. The session was attended by 12 participants. The session developed a basic methodology whereby experts from various fields of treaty law would address implementation and compliance issues in their fields, permitting comparative analysis and an assessment of elements relevant to international commercial law treaties. This was achieved by completion of a common questionnaire tailored to each target treaty area.
The 1st Workshop took place from 21 to 22 January 2025 at the Lauterpacht Centre for International Law, University of Cambridge, a key collaborator in the Treaty Project. The session was attended by 20 participants, including academics from leading universities. The Workshop focused on target treaty areas which can present examples of, and comparisons for, providing implementation and compliance incentives. Experts from different treaty areas had previously provided responses to targeted Questionnaires. During the Workshop, the experts shared insights based on their findings, comparing compliance strategies across treaty areas and discussing how these approaches can inform commercial law treaties. Building on these discussions, the Workshop helped determine the next steps for the Treaty Project, which will proceed on two levels: a) The development of a Best Practices Guide for Implementation of and Compliance with International Commercial Law Treaties; b) Further academic research into different treaty areas, extending beyond commercial law.
The 2nd Workshop was held on 4 September 2025 at the Lauterpacht Centre, and brought together 18 participants, including academics from leading universities. The Workshop focused on the Discussion Paper prepared by the UNIDROIT Secretariat, drawing on insights and conclusions from the first session. The paper was intended to lay the groundwork for a forthcoming Best Practices Guide on the implementation of, and compliance with, international commercial law treaties. Guided by a Discussion List that outlined key questions for consideration, the participants examined conceptual aspects and reasons for non-compliance, as well as factors that facilitate compliance in commercial law treaties. The discussion also drew inspiration from mechanisms in related treaty areas such as investment, trade, maritime, and air law. The participants further considered the scope of the project, in particular which categories of commercial law treaties should be included. Building on these discussions, the participants agreed to develop a Best Practices Guide for Implementation of and Compliance with International Commercial Law Treaties. The Guide will be discussed at the next experts’ workshop and is scheduled for launch in 2026.
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