The Obligations Of States In The Diplomatic Protection Research

Diplomatic Protection traces its roots to customary international legal principles. Historically, it has often been misused by Western powers as a pretext to intervene in the affairs of less powerful nations for several centuries since the use of force was not yet declared unlawful at its emergence. Consequently, there have been many occasions of exercising diplomatic protection by way of war, which is not a good tactics from the perspective of solving the disputes but leads to much more serious disputes. To prevent the abuse of Diplomatic Protection, some Latin American states have always advocated "Calvo Doctrine" to avoid the invocation of diplomatic protection, which was a good means for developing countries to maintain their sovereignty while the individuals were deprived of their rights to relieve their damage. For a balanced consideration of the above-mentioned purposes, two important customary international legal principles have been gradually developed regarding Diplomatic Protection: Exhaustion of Local Remedies and Principle of Nationality. After the Second World War, the use of force has been outlawed, which further defined the peaceful means to exercise Diplomatic Protection, thus making the rights of diplomatic protection easily recognized by all the states.Although there have been ample practice and precedents in respect of diplomatic protection, it remains a most controversial international legal issue. Western countries have a thorough study on it while the studies in China is still very inadequate, which lies in China's incapability to exercise diplomatic protection in the past and insufficient state practice regarding this area at present. Under the present background of more and more Chinese citizens going abroad and being internationalized with the ongoing reform, the studies regarding diplomatic protection is also becoming extremely important.The present paper consists of five parts which are respectively: Part I, the definition and history of diplomatic protection; Part II, the basic theories for diplomatic protection; Part III, a comparative analysis to diplomatic protection and other means for protecting the overseas citizens; Part IV, a review to the case of "Kaunda V. President of Republic of South Africa" and its illustration to a state's obligations; Part V, development trend for diplomatic protection and it implications to China.The studies methods in the present paper are mainly case study, comparative study, value evaluation and history consideration. The development of diplomatic protection are discussed from the studies on the history of diplomatic protection combined with the analysis on the typical and recent cases; The obligations of the states for diplomatic protection are also indentified by the comparative analysis and value evaluation between the public benefits and private benefits that may occur during the exercise of diplomatic protection.