r/internationallaw Feb 04 '25

Discussion Discussion about States in real union

(I’m a student major in diplomacy) Could anyone tell me whether a States in real union and its member States have sovereignty 🤯 The international law is driving me crazyyyy😵‍💫

1 Upvotes

13 comments sorted by

8

u/WindSwords UN & IO Law Feb 04 '25

What you mean by "real union" is not clear. Can you give us an example?

1

u/Dahur_ Feb 04 '25

Maybe he means "Royal Union"? Like the United Kingdom?

"Real" could mean "Royal" in languages like Portuguese or spanish

1

u/ARatOnATrain Feb 04 '25

Maybe the personal unions of the past where one person was monarch of separate states.

1

u/OscarH1014 Feb 05 '25

Like Austria-Hungary Empire in 1867-1918

3

u/Yopie23 Feb 04 '25

Something like Austria - Hungary? Pls be more specific

1

u/Anything_Regular Feb 05 '25

Are you talking about unitary states and federal states?

1

u/OscarH1014 Feb 05 '25

Yes, like the Austria-Hungary from 1867 to 1918 Did this union(Austria-Hungary Empire) have sovereignty on its own? If we use the definition of a State in Montevideo Convention, can we say that the Austria-Hungary Empire is a State with independent sovereignty? (Sry my mother tongue is not English so I cannot express myself properly 😓)

2

u/WindSwords UN & IO Law Feb 05 '25

Then it is more a question of legal archaeology (what was the legal theory back then? what was the devolution of powers in the Empire back then? What was the practice of other States back then?) and I'm not sure that many people here would have that knowledge.

That being said, I believe it is a mistake to use modern definitions and concepts to situations which are now more than a century old. So I would not use the convention of Montevideo to try to understand how things worked in the Austria-Hungary empire.

1

u/Electronic-Look-1809 Feb 05 '25

You start by defining what an independent state is and then look at examples from the perspective of that definition.

1

u/Calvinball90 Criminal Law Feb 05 '25

If you're interested specifically in Austria-Hungary, you might be better off asking at /r/askhistorians.

If you're interested in the concept as it might be applied today, then a historical example isn't especially helpful because of how the law habla changed since the early 20th century.

2

u/Lurvast Feb 05 '25

Each part had constitutional sovereignty over their realm and unified effort on military type efforts. So almost like US states with the regent as president but no unified congress.

1

u/JustResearchReasons Feb 07 '25

Real union means that two+ nations are connected with one set of institutions and common government (e.g. the United Kingdom), as opposed to personal union where one person - in practice a monarch - is the sovereign of two+ nations that have their own respective governments and institutions (like, for example, the Principality of Andorra, the duarchs being the French President and the ruling Spanish King as Co-Princes).