The State’s Sovereign Right to Existence

Abstract

Modern International Law doctrine has a reified approach to territorial integrity. This has led to the perception that territorial integrity is the completeness/unity of state territory. Such an approach has proven to be irrelevant in understanding the real nature, content and legal consequences of territorial integrity. Amazingly International legal and political scholars as well as political geography specialists have never enquired about the link between territorial integrity and territoriality. In fact, territorial integrity is in essence the elaborated and sophisticated legal expres-sion of territoriality. It is intimately linked to the state as a legal entity the main objective of which is to ensure its perennial existence within a specific territory whose borders have been established in accordance with International Law. There-fore, a new approach is needed in order to better understand territorial integrity, a principle that can be considered as the cornerstone of International Law.