The Status of International Civil Servants in National Law
| Published date | 01 March 1959 |
| Date | 01 March 1959 |
| Author | Paul Marie Gaudemet |
| DOI | 10.1177/002085235902500105 |
| Subject Matter | Articles |
The
Status
of
International
Civil
Servants
in
National
Law
(*)
by
Paul
Marie
GAUDEMET,
Professor
in
the
Faculty
of
Law,
Nancy.
UDC
341.783.08
In
the
same
way
as
States,
international
in-
stitutions
were
very
soon
concerned
with
pro-
viding
officials
with
regulations
to
specify
their
duties
and
obligations.
Thus,
as
early
as
its
sixth
session,
the
General
Assembly
of
the
United
Nations
provided
the
Secretariat
with
Staff
Regulations,
which
came
into
force
on
1
March
1952.
Similarly,
ECSC
adopted
its
present-day
regulations
after
several
years’
careful
work.
Draft
personnel
regulations
for
the
European
Defence
Community
were
pains-
takingly
drafted,
though
the
organisation
was
never
set
up.
While
regulations
were
being
prepared
by
the
international
organisations,
several
research
institutions,
including
the
In-
ternational
Institute
of
Administrative
Scien-
ces,
placed
the
study
of
the
legal
position
of
international
civil
servants
on
their
program-
mes.
The
problem
seems
to
belong
primarily
to
international
administrative
law,
without
af-
fecting
national
law.
International
civil
ser-
vants
expect
the
international,
agency
that
employs
them
to
provide
them
with
a
status.
The
regulations,
whether
they
are
the
result
of
a
resolution
of
the
General
Assembly
of
the
United
Nations
or
the
work
of
the
Committee
of
Four
Presidents of
ECSC,
have
an
inter-
national
scope.
They
do
not
come
under
na-
tional
law.
A
definition
of
the
status
of
international
civil
servants
exclusively
based
on
internation-
al
acts
is,
however,
very
rapidly
shown
to
be
inadequate.
Although
an
international
civil
servant
must
be
entirely
at
the
disposal
of
the
international
organisation
which
employs
him
and
’may
receive
no
instructions
from
his
na-
tional
government,
he
nevertheless
retains
his
nationality.
It
is,
of
course,
hardly
possible,
in
the
present
state
of
development
of
society
and
of
its
national
law,
to
insist
that
civil
ser-
vants
should
be
denationalised
and
belong
to
no
particular
State.
Hitherto,
< citizenship
of
the
world
has
been
a
well-meaning
uto-
pianism.
An
international
civil
servant
thus
remains
subject
to
the
legal
system
of
the
State
of
which
he
is
a
national.
At
the
same
time,
the
international
civil
servant
has
to
perform
his
duties
in
the
terri-
tory
of
a
State,
since
the
extraterritoriality
of
international
agencies
has
until
now
only
been
recognized
in
very
few
exceptional
cases.
The
national
legal
system
of
the
State
in
which
the
agency
has
its
headquarters
nor-
mally
governs
the
international
civil
servant
in
the
performance
of
his
work.
And
so,
far
from
being
governed
only
by
the
legal
provi-
sions
laid
down
by
the
international
organisa-
tions,
the
international
civil
servant
is
sur-
rounded
by
a
complex
network
of
national
le-
gal
rules,
both
by
virtue
of
the
jus
sanguinis
of
the
county
whose
nationality
he
retains
and
the
jus
soli
of
the
State
in
whose
terri-
tory
he
works.
The
problem
consequently
arises
whether
the
duties
of
international
civil
servants
do
not
render
it
essential
to
make
special
provision
for
them
in
the
national
legal
system,
and whether
the
status
given
them
by
the
international
organisation
to
which
they
belong
is
such
that
they
are
able
to
per-
form
their
duties
efficiently,
or
should
be
supplemented
by
national
legal
provisions.
The
problem
is
not
entirely
a
new
one.
The
position
of
international
civil
servants
has
often
been
compared
with
that
of
diplo-
matic
agents.
They
have
even
been
granted
similar
immunities.
The
Covenant
of
the
League
of
Nations
provided,
under
Article
7,
paragraph
4,
that
a Representatives
of
the
Members
of
the
League
and
officials
of
the
League
when
engaged
on
the
business
of
the
League
shall
enjoy
diplomatic
privileges
and
immunities
~.
The
analogy
is
attractive
but
far
from
accurate.
A
diplomat
is
answerable
only
to
his
national
State,
and
not
to
an
in-
(*)
Lecture
delivered
in
French
at
the
Institut
Belge
des
Sciences
Administratives,
on
3
November
1958.
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