ADMINISTRATIVE UNIONS. - This designation covers those unions of States for specific purposes of international cooperation that are governed by pacts of union. These determine the purposes of the cooperation, which induce the contracting States to establish "unions" or institutes (unionist States) with a permanent character, and the means for achieving them, and thus give life to organs intended to produce effects on the internal legal orders of the unionist States.
The union is therefore international, inasmuch as it is established on the basis of an international agreement; but the norms of that agreement do not take into consideration the external activity of the States, but their internal activity, with a view to coordinating, harmonizing or even unifying the internal legal orders, for the attainment of the purposes for which the Union was established. The unionist organs are therefore organs of cooperation common to the various unionist States, but their activity cannot be assessed for the purposes of international legal orders, and therefore they lack "international personality." Nevertheless, attempts have not been lacking in doctrine nor even in practice to recognize international personality in at least certain unions (e.g., BIT = Bureau Intern. du Travail) or in certain unionist organs (e.g., the Danube Commission).
A typical case of an a. u. is the postal one: one of the oldest and most universal. The purpose that the States set for themselves in establishing the union is to arrive at an internal unification of the postal legal orders (without touching the administrative organization of the services, which remains governed by national laws) in order to render postal services easy, rapid and expeditious, by virtue of the very uniformity of the regulation, considering them as one of the fundamental services of an economic and social nature. The bureau of Bern is a common organ of the unionist States, with the function of coordination, information, and propulsion for the improvement of agreements, etc. What is regulated is the postal service, which, even when it is international, has a national origin. Such is, in fact, its origin at the outset, even if the mail is destined, upon arrival, for another State.
The institution and constitution of the unions or institutes, their purposes, functioning and legal regulation are governed by international agreements, which, while varying according to the particular needs and the functions entrusted to the unionist organs, have in substance an essentially uniform ordering, according to a "type" that expresses the needs of the time.
In the second half of the last century many fundamental unions were created according to the single conception that it was fitting for the organ of the Union (bureau) to be in a central and neutral country of Europe, wherefore Switzerland was predominantly chosen and the Swiss government was allowed to control the bureau and the latter to live according to Swiss law. Thus there were established in Bern the International Office for Literary and Artistic Property and that for Industrial Property, that for Posts, for Telepaths (later for Telecommunications), for Railways, etc. Other unions were established in other countries, according to analogous principles, especially in Paris.
When the League of Nations (v.) was established, there was no lack of some tendency to bring the existing unions - already numerous - into the framework of the League, but in the end they were respected, also in deference to the merits of the countries that had hosted them, and numerous other new ones were created, which took the name of institutes or organizations, and which were also modeled on a single and uniform type. They fell with the League of Nations (1st gen. 1947), but the UN (v.) has taken them up and multiplied them, with a very pronounced tendency to absorb the previous initiatives, instituting and establishing the new ones according to a substantially uniform ordering, and according to the following fundamental principles: 1) all member States of the UN are members by right (automatic adherence), but non-members may also be members, by way of adherence (which becomes admission for the ex-enemy States of the United Nations); 2) the relations between organizations and member States are governed by the norms of a statute adopted by conventional means; 3) the organizations enjoy a broad autonomy, despite the interference of the UN; 4) the relations between the UN and the organizations are governed by specific conventions; 5) each organization has its own seat (in Europe or in America, at present), its own organs, its own regulations, its own means (assembly, executive organ, secretariat). The tendency to confer international legal personality on the organizations is increasingly accentuated, not without doctrinal and political disagreements.
On the basis of these principles there have been regulated the International Labour Organization (v.), abbreviated ILO, the Food and Agriculture Organization, abbreviated FAO (v. ORGANIZZAZIONE INTERNAZ. PER L'AGRICOLTURA), the World Health Organization (WHO), the United Nations Relief and Rehabilitation Administration (UNRRA), the International Civil Aviation Organization (ICAO), the United Nations Educational, Scientific and Cultural Organization (UNESCO [v.]), etc. They increase continuously, now covering almost all possible forms of international cooperation.
From the formal point of view the organization of the Unions is either governed, especially for those that arose within the framework of the League of Nations or of the UN, by special agreements (autonomous pact of union) or by agreements that govern specific services or matters (literary property, industrial property, railways, etc.) and also deal with the unionist office.
Attempts have been made several times to make a classification of a. u. But they always turn out to be approximate and useless. It may be said that there is no possibility of cooperation among peoples in the scientific, technical, cultural, educational, economic, agricultural, communications, transport fields, etc., that has not given rise to the formation of unions. The more cooperation among peoples becomes alive and takes root, the more the need is felt to invigorate the cooperation, by regulating it and subjecting it to the interference of organs of coordination and propulsion, with the tendency to attribute to them functions of initiative and essentially active functions.
Bibliography
Amedeo Giannini