Recognized on the Map, Rejected in Law

As protests persist throughout the globe on account of the contested sovereignty of a Palestinian state, conflict rages on in the Gaza Strip with no resolution in sight. The issue of statehood for Palestine has been discussed since 1988, when the Palestine Liberation Organization declared the region’s sovereignty. In September 2025, a wave of UN member states recognized the State of Palestine, including Security Council members France and the United Kingdom. Both Russia and China, two other members of the exclusive UN body containing only five members in total, recognized Palestine in 1988 when it declared its independence. Only the United States has not recognized the sovereignty of a Palestinian state. Yet, the modern consensus seems to emphasize the lack of importance of such recognition, which it claims only useful for diplomacy, and highlights the value of meeting established legal criteria such as the Montevideo Convention. However, even as countries meet these legal requirements, barriers continue to appear in their path to full statehood. 

Derived from the Montevideo Convention on the Rights and Duties of States, the criteria for statehood can be defined with four simple requirements: “a permanent population, a defined territory, government, and the capacity to enter into relations with the other States.” The last of these requirements, and a deeply controversial one, is generally understood to indicate the ability to engage in foreign policy and diplomacy, but to what degree is unclear. Indeed, this unclear degree is an issue with all four of the statehood conditions, making the Montevideo Convention a qualified, albeit respectable, form of confirming statehood. Can one define exactly what a defined territory or a government entails? There are great variances in how countries, even those that have been recognized states for centuries, seem to meet these criteria. A nation such as Kosovo meets all of these criteria of the treaty, yet is still not recognized by major Security Council members, such as Russia and China, as well as the UN member state of Serbia from whom Kosovo emerged from. Those who believe the Montevideo Convention alone is the basis for statehood believe in the Declaratory Theory. 

For some nations, however, the Declaratory Theory falls short. Somaliland, a region currently a part of the sovereign nation of Somalia, meets all four of the criteria by the Montevideo Criteria. Somaliland was once independent after it had been freed from British rule in 1960; it was then recognized by thirty five nations, including all five members of the UN Security Council. However, the state chose to unite with what became the nation of Somalia, until it sought independence in 1991 due to perceptions of marginalization. Still, even with a history of recognition provided and having met all four criteria for statehood, Somaliland has not been recognized by a single nation today. The region functions as a democracy with peaceful elections and transfers of power, with a de facto autonomous leadership that meets the requirements for government. Additionally, Somaliland also has no Security Council relevancy, as there are no proxy wars or significant relationships that must be considered, such as those comparable to ones involving Israel and the United States or Serbia and Russia. Yet, still, not one nation recognizes it. A clear conclusion can be drawn: the Montevideo Convention does not have quite as much weight as scholars claim it to. Thus, the Declaratory Theory, based upon the treaty exclusively, cannot apply to the realities of statehood. 

As borders have grown in complexity, one must look at more than a treaty signed in 1933 by only nineteen countries exclusively from the Americas. If the Montevideo Convention was regarded as the supreme authority on statehood, perhaps nations like Kosovo would achieve their goal, but this is not the case for those who believe in the Constitutive Theory. The International Court of Justice coins the precedent as simply “customary law” for the Montevideo criteria, optimizing for a more nuanced viewpoint on statehood involving both customary law, but also what it considers to be more important factors. The International Court of Justice claims “the actions of the UN General Assembly, the UN Security Council, the constitutive recognition of new states by other states and the establishment of self-determination as a fundamental principle of international human rights law” to be of greater value. The first of these factors, the actions of the UN could also be interpreted as policies by the UN and preestablished UN precedents, the most important of which are found in its Charter. 

For a state to be recognized, the territorial integrity of another sovereign nation must be violated. Consequently, this conviction is another aspect of the deeply faceted international law, since Article 2(4) of the United Nations Charter emphasizes the importance of proper treatment of a UN member. Serbia is a member of the United Nations; Kosovo is not. Israel is a member of the United Nations; Palestine is not. China is a member of the United Nations; Taiwan is not. Morocco is a member of the United Nations; Western Sahara is not. By the standards set by Article 2(4), none of the aforementioned non-members have a right to secession, as it would violate the territorial integrity of a recognized United Nations member state. However, even in United Nations history, nations have been permitted to secede. In many of these examples, there is one key difference: a conventional war. The nation of Bangladesh was permitted to secede from Pakistan after the Bangladesh Liberation War, born from disputes on underrepresentation of the East Pakistani people, a group that was ethnically and linguistically unique from Pakistanis in the West. This new nation, after emerging victorious in a bloody war, was quickly granted sovereignty and became a UN member state three years later—a privilege only granted to sovereign nations. Yet, there is an ongoing conflict in the Gaza Strip where secession seems far less likely. When one compares these two situations, it is difficult to ascertain the exact reason that differentiates Bangladesh and Palestine. However, it could be where the Constitutive Theory of statehood, and its valuation of recognition, returns to the spotlight. 

A key player in the fight for Bangladeshi sovereignty was the nation of India, which itself had only become sovereign approximately thirty years prior. However, India had already established itself as a regional power and a future superpower with growing influence—evidenced by its success in nuclear weapon development within the same decade. When the new nation of Bangladesh declared its independence, it received immediate support. It was then quickly supported within months by Poland, Australia, Japan, the United Kingdom and France—all major established powers in the world stage and some members of the UN Security Council. The Security Council has been repeatedly cited as the deciding factor in many discussions on recognition, but its role is beyond the General Assembly’s simple yes-or-no recognition of a state; with its members’ veto power, one of the five countries alone can completely annihilate the ability to achieve statehood. By 1975, Bangladesh received the recognition of all five members of the Security Council and secured UN membership, confirming its sovereignty. The nation of Palestine cannot boast of similar support. As aforementioned, it declared independence decades ago yet still has not received the recognition of all five members of the Security Council. Evidently, recognition was deeply valuable to the nation of Bangladesh, and could be one of the things that has barred the country of Palestine from statehood. 

However, the identity of those recognizing a state may be more valuable than one might think. The true power of the United Nations’ Security Council is backed by its members’ veto power, as opposed to the rest of the General Assembly which generally lacks capability to make enforceable decisions. The most deeply affected by this immense event is the contested region of Taiwan. Unlike the previously discussed Somaliland, a region that is not enormously convoluted with a Security Council member, Taiwan is in direct opposition to China. China has a history of permitting the existence of autonomous or semi-autonomous regions within its borders, but it views Taiwan as somewhat of a renegade province. The people of Taiwan believe in their independence from China, even if they are still permitted to maintain their economic system distinct from China, but the global consensus is largely not in their favor. Only eleven nations recognize the sovereignty of Taiwan, with some—Nauru and Honduras—having redacted their recognition. However, many, including Security Council members in the United States, want to simply see a continuation of the current situation. Unfortunately for both Taiwan and China, that equates to neither unification nor Taiwanese independence, which would satisfy neither nation’s intentions for a One China. In regard to the legalities of Taiwanese sovereignty, it meets the first three of the Montevideo criteria, but does not have the capability to engage in foreign policy due to Chinese resistance. Likely due to the Security Council status of China, which is a position that stems from China’s position as an immensely valuable global superpower, Taiwan simply cannot stand a chance. Even as a region of independent rule, it cannot meet the final Montevideo requirement due to the majority of the world’s acceptance of the One China doctrine and the whims of a nation of the caliber of China. If the legal requirements of the Montevideo Convention cannot be fulfilled due to the lack of recognition, it further eliminates the capability of the Declaratory Theory to have effect. The barriers to statehood are far more multifaceted, as recognized by the International Court of Justice, who specifically referenced “the actions of [...] the UN Security Council,” its members’ recognition, as having greater impact than the precedent of the Montevideo Convention. Legal requirements cannot be the only definition to statehood if recognition influences the ability to satisfy those requirements.