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Magliveras, Konstantinos D. --- "Membership in International Organizations" [2011] ELECD 520; in Klabbers, Jan; Wallendahl, Åsa (eds), "Research Handbook on the Law of International Organizations" (Edward Elgar Publishing, 2011)

Book Title: Research Handbook on the Law of International Organizations

Editor(s): Klabbers, Jan; Wallendahl, Åsa

Publisher: Edward Elgar Publishing

ISBN (hard cover): 9781847201355

Section: Chapter 4

Section Title: Membership in International Organizations

Author(s): Magliveras, Konstantinos D.

Number of pages: 24

Extract:

4 Membership in international organizations
Konstantinos D. Magliveras



INTRODUCTION

International organizations are made up of at least three members. The
reason for this is that, if a member chose to withdraw, the organization
would not be forced to dissolve. Even though traditionally only independent
states have become members, in the last 15 years a trend has developed
whereby international organizations have come to join other organizations
as members.1 The purpose of this chapter is to examine how organizations
acquire members (either as original participants or through subsequent
admission and accession); the correlation between the enjoyment of the
rights and benefits conferred by membership and the fulfilment of the duties
and obligations assumed by virtue of membership; the ways and means
through which organizations react when members fail to perform their duties
and/or deliberately violate them and in particular the measures of a punitive
nature that they may adopt; and, finally, the procedure that has to be
followed when members decide to terminate their participation by with-
drawing from the organization.
Two general comments should be made to the reader. The first is that the
constitutive instruments of international institutions deal with admission,
sanctions and withdrawal in an extremely large variety of ways,2 all of which
could not be covered within the confines of this chapter. It follows that a selec-
tion had to be made and, even though the organizations included herein may
not offer a complete picture of all variations, they do represent the main
tendencies. ...