Recourse to International Courts and Tribunals in the 2017–2021 Gulf Dispute

Abstract

One of the broadest international disputes in recent years is the perfect case to test Judge Yusuf’s assertion that “there can be no rule of law without a court to apply it.” From 2017 to 2021, Bahrain, Egypt, Saudi Arabia, and the United Arab Emirates (the “Quartet”), on one hand, and Qatar, on the other, were engaged in a standoff, severing nearly all diplomatic and economic relations and lodging a number of legal challenges in various fora. These proceedings collectively touched on treaty interpretation, State responsibility, countermeasures and non-coercive sanctions, human rights, investment and trade, aviation law, and still other legal issues. By comparing the jurisdiction, reasoning, and dispositions of the different modalities of dispute resolution, this article demonstrates that international courts were neither sufficient nor necessary for resolving the macro dispute among the parties, particularly in light of non-judicial alternative proceedings. It illustrates, with respect to Judge Yusuf, that non- judicial dispute resolution fora are just as important as international courts for upholding the international rule of law.