Study On The Responsibility Between International Organizations And Their Members

International legal personality constitutes one of the essential elements of international organizations on the responsibility law. Whether an international organization possesses its own international legal personality determines whether it can bear the international responsibility independently or not. In theory and practice, there has been formed some standards which were cited and reiterated in different cases to determine whether an international organization has international legal personality.Issues about the responsibility between international organizations and their members are governed by internal law of the international organization, domestic legal orders and international law. Rules of an international organization which include the constituent instruments as the core constitute the important parts of the internal law of the international organization. It is essential of the rules of an international organization to determine issues whether the organization possesses the international legal personality, whether it can bear the external responsibility independently, as well as whether it should share the responsibility with its members. That is particularly obvious on the issue whether the EU should share responsibility with its member states. Although there have been emerged some cases in which the domestic courts apply the domestic law to resolve disputes on the responsibility between international organizations and their members, approaches in such cases are not enough to resolve responsibility issues of international organizations. Limitations of domestic law need to be made up by international law. However, international law rules relating to the responsibility of international organizations are still forming and developing at the preliminary stage. It is still controversial for how to resolve issues on responsibility between international organizations and their members.In2011, the UN International Law Commission deliberated and adopted the Draft Articles on the Responsibility of International Organizations, which will guide the direction of development of the relating international law rules and system and which is also a compilation and summary of existing relating theory and practice of international law. Drawn lessons from the Draft Articles on the Responsibility of States for International Wrongful Acts, the draft provides international law rules and system of the responsibility of international organizations, which constitute the general rules that can also applicable to the responsibility issues between international organizations and their members. It is particular concerned that the rules and system about internal relations of international organizations,"piercing the veil" of international organizations, external responsibility of members, applications of countermeasures and other aspects are initial innovations and developments which are laid down in the draft.There are some challenges for the development of responsibility law of international organizations in future such as theory lagging behind rules, initial system, lacking of practice and so on. From the academic oriented to the rule oriented, from the state oriented to the international organization oriented and enriching, deepening and improvement of the system constitute some trends of the development of responsibility law of international organizations in future. The development of responsibility law of international organizations will also have some far-reaching impacts to the international organizations practice of China which requires China to enhance the sense of responsibility and comply with international law rules, to be "responsible" to participate activities of international organizations and to guide "responsibly" development of international organizations.