by Perry McCarney

Created on: July 14, 2009   Last Updated: July 19, 2010

There are no laws protecting whales. There are no laws protecting people. While we may wish it to be otherwise, the reality is that laws do not stop people from doing things; at best they deter potential violators, but all they are capable of actually doing is to ensure punishment for those caught and convicted of breaking them.

This does not constitute protection to potential victims, whether human or animal. It just offers the possibility of revenge. If the punishment decreed is sufficiently severe, such as resulting in the lifelong incarceration or death of the perpetrator, then it does protect those who might otherwise have been future victims of violent perpetrators. It may not be a pleasant reality, but If laws actually protected anyone there would be nobody occupying our prisons.

Whales live in the seas and oceans of our world. Human international politics have agreed coastal boundaries, ultimate legal dominance in territorial waters and less stringent rights further from shore, a nation's exclusive economic zone. Beyond these are international waters, vaguely regulated under various international treaties and less binding agreements.

Many nations have animal welfare legislation. The legal constraints placed on people's interaction with animals, whether domestic pets, farm animals or wild animals including all cetacean species are extremely varied. Punishments for offenders convicted of appalling evil acts of cruelty on defenseless animals are abysmally weak in many of the world's nations. That research shows many who treat animals viciously in their youth do similar or worse to people later in life apparently fails to register with those legislating our laws or the judges determining sentences.

While a nation's animal welfare legislation applies to their territorial waters and their exclusive economic zone, its potency is dependent on enforcement. If naval or coastguard forces are inadequate to patrol or otherwise cover such marine expanses, then that nation's laws are ineffective and virtually irrelevant.

International waters are not subject to laws. There are no international laws; even the United Nations does not have the authority to make laws binding to its membership, let alone nations that are not members of the United Nations. International politics relies on agreements, conventions and treaties, rather than laws, and rarely is there significant punishment for a nation that breaks them.

The strongest deterrent to harmful human behaviors towards whales in international waters is the International Whaling Commission's moratorium on commercial whaling, instigated in 1986. While this theoretically applies to all member nations of the IWC, it is not enforceable. The IWC is empowered to make regulations with regard to commercial whaling, but it has never been granted any powers of enforcement by its member nations. Both member and non-member nations can do as they will, their actions are only limited by their perceptions of how they will impact their foreign relations with other nations.

The two other international treaties relevant to the continuance of whale species, primarily those most endangered, are the Convention on International Trade in Endangered Species of Wild Fauna and Flora (CITES) and the Convention on Biological Diversity. Both of these conventions recommend and encourage the member states of the United Nations to protect and conserve endangered species, and where possible act to increase populations and/or maintain areas of appropriate natural habitat.

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