The IMLI Treatise on Global Ocean Governance is a result of the IMLI – Nippon Foundation Project on Global Ocean Governance as a follow-up to the address of Dr Yohei Sasakawa (Chairman of The Nippon Foundation) to the International Maritime Organization (IMO), where he mentioned the need to establish a new framework for ocean governance that will effectively solve the problems of the oceans and ensure that our finite oceans are passed on to the future generations. Thus, the IMLI Treatise is designed to assess the current state of ocean governance to ensure that proposals on the same are based on reliable information.

To guarantee its reflection of the latest state of global ocean governance, fifty-eight (58) leading experts were chosen to contribute to the Treatise on the basis of their eminence and expertise. Each expert approached the designated topic from a policy-oriented perspective and took the discourse from the current state of ocean governance, its limitations including the lacunae and weaknesses, to charting a future governance strategy with realizable and sustainable goals as integrated solutions to the current challenges of global ocean governance.

The Treatise covers the vast spectrum of global ocean governance in three volumes and has Professor David Joseph Attard as the General Academic Coordinator and Editor.

Volume I deals with the United Nations (UN) and Global Ocean Governance. It focuses on how the UN has performed its role as the principal intergovernmental organization responsible for global ocean governance. It also analyzes the current global ocean governance challenges and how they have been addressed by the present legal, policy and institutional framework of the UN. The Volume has Professor David Ong as the Academic Coordinator and Professor Dino Kritsiotis as the Editor.

Volume II focuses on the UN Specialized Agencies and Global Ocean Governance. This Volume evaluates the contribution to global ocean governance of the UN Specialized Agencies established as autonomous organizations operating within the institutional system of the UN.  Professor Malgosia Fitzmaurice and Dr. Alexandros X.M. Ntovas are the Volume’s Academic Coordinator and Editor, respectively.

Volume III, entitled “IMO and Global Ocean Governance” examines how the Organization, the world’s main institutional source of international maritime law with over 50 multilateral conventions and hundreds of legal instruments, contributes to global ocean governance.  Dr. Rosalie P. Balkin and Professor Donald Greig are the Volume’s Academic Coordinator and Editor, respectively.

The Treatise was published by Oxford University Press (OUP) on 26 July 2018.