12.6 How maritime laws are made
The need for standardization
We need to look in more detail at the procedures by which countries develop their
maritime law, and in particular the system of international maritime conventions.
Because ships trade internationally, there is a strong incentive to standardize those
aspects of national maritime law that relate to the international operation of ships.
In the nineteenth century, British law was used almost universally as the framework
for national maritime law and this provided a common base. More recently,
governments of maritime nations have taken more formal steps to standardize
maritime law. This is achieved by means of international ‘conventions’, which are
jointly drawn up between maritime states, setting out agreed objectives for legislation
on particular issues. Each country can, if it wishes, introduce the measures set out
in these conventions into its own national law. All nations that do this (known as
signatories to the convention) have the same law on the subject covered by the
convention.