Tonight’s episode of The Space Show, a radio/podcast program, is devoted to a panel discussion on space law topics, in particular space property rights. The guests on the show are Jim Dunstan, Rosanna Sattler, Berin Szoka, and Wayne White, all lawyers with significant expertise on space law topics. The program airs live at 10 pm EST and a recording of it should be available online shortly thereafter.
Thanks Jeff! I grabbed the link.
By the way, any plans for some Space Politics podcasting?
Space Politics podcasting? I don’t know if I have the time to do that any time soon. In addition, some people are perhaps better read than heard…
I listened to much of the 2-hour broadcast (I had sufficient caffeine on hand to not fall asleep–space law is DULL). For those who are primarily interested about the impact of the Outer Space Treaty on lunar development and property rights, the second half of the program focuses on this issue, so I suggest skipping ahead to that point.
To summarize (for those who cannot tolerate panels of lawyers discussing arcane subjects), there was generally a consensus that the Outer Space Treaty is NOT an impediment to lunar development. One speaker noted that there are similar international legal regulations regarding the sea and they clearly do not prevent commercial fishing or oil exploration. One speaker also noted that international law accepts a “zone of safety” around oil rigs in international waters, and there is also international recognition of “economic exclusion zones” around countries’ coastlines to protect fishing resources. Similar concepts can therefore be easily applied to the Moon or areas of space, if needed, and there is no reason to believe that the Outer Space Treaty is any more problematic to property rights than other similar international laws on Earth.
Another speaker also noted that there have been NO claims against the United States for the lunar rocks that the Apollo astronauts returned–not even from signatories of the Moon Treaty. The United States, and apparently the rest of the world, believe that the United States “owns” those lunar resources. The same is true for the Russian lunar samples as well. Therefore, if a private company went to the Moon and extracted resources, it would “own” them as well under current international law. So nothing is preventing a company from going to the Moon and doing what the United States and Russia have already done. Put another way–if “Lunar Development Inc.” went to the Moon and extracted resources, and Bolivia or some other country challenged its ownership of those resources, the United States government would have to support Lunar Development’s claim to those resources. If it did not, then the US government would also be admitting that it had no right to own the Apollo samples either.
The speakers also connected the discussion of the Moon and property rights to other aspects of space law, such as satellites in geosynchronous orbit or experiments conducted onboard the ISS, where private property rights are also respected. They noted that international law and precedents clearly recognize private property in these cases. Nobody claims that because a privately-owned satellite occupies a geosynchronous slot it is therefore jointly owned by the whole planet, or that its owner has to share its profits. Similarly, if a country, or a company, develops a technology or medicine or similar property on the ISS, they “own” it (subject to the legal requirements of their host country)–not even one of the other space station partners can lay claim to that property. This precedent would extend to the Moon and no developer would be expected to share profits made from lunar resources.
So it appears that those in the blogosphere who get so upset about the Outer Space Treaty and believe that it is an impediment to lunar development have nothing to worry about.
Good job staying awake, Dwayne!
space law is DULL
Hmm. Maybe that’s why lawyers like Shana Dale go watch Ultimate Fighting after business hours?
Well, I would agree with you. In fact, to sort of borrow from Winston Churchill, I would submit that space law is the dullest legal specialty of all, except for all those other legal specialties “that have been tried from time to time.”
(My problem is, I fell asleep in law school when we were doing the rule against perpetuities, so now I’m stuck liking space law. Oh well. In any case, if you’re really adverse to “dull,” I’d strongly advise you to steer clear of any panels discussing, say, estate tax law, or like, ERISA litigation. Yikes.)
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Btw, Jeff, if you podcast, they will come
“Space law is DULL.”
Admittedly, I work in space _policy_, so maybe I am being a hypocrite. I know that I can put people to sleep with discussions of political maneuvering over how to allocate NASA funding.
The lawyers themselves argued that what is most interesting about their field is that it is wide open. They can really take the best legal principles and apply them, leaving the bad and unworkable ones behind. So for them it represents a place where the legal profession can innovate and is not bogged down in a lot of prior precedents.