A legal study of promoting crewed lunar research station activities under the common interest principle

Abstract

Existing space law research awaits a systematic theoretical study on the international legal regulation of the forthcoming establishment of lunar stations. This thesis argues that the common interest principle should be revisited and further developed in the legal regulations governing and promoting crewed lunar research station activities. The normative content and theoretical structure of the common interest principle of space law are developed in this legal study on crewed lunar research stations by adopting space ethical studies and the Global Public Good theory to illustrate the rationale and strategy of pursuing the common interest in such activities. Legal aspects of the legal status, jurisdiction and person rescue, and science priority in such activities are addressed. Doctrinal legal research is adopted as the main methodology, supplemented by a comparative method.

Crewed lunar research stations should serve as the gateway to the sustainability of humanity on the Moon, which is an ethical connotation of the common interest principle in the lunar activity context. A strategy for pursuing the common interest in crewed lunar research station activities as a global public good is that states participating in the early phase of such activities should cooperate and promote the development of international law on such new and fast-moving activities. A lunar station has the legal status of a group of space objects, and its technical aspects, including purpose, range of activities, mobility, duration, and information updating, should be considered for the duty of non-appropriation. States conducting early crewed lunar research station activities should promote international cooperation on lunar rescue, and states retaining jurisdiction over lunar stations can play an important role in the rescue legal mechanism. Lunar scientific investigations should be prioritized by legal regulations, and international cooperation among different lunar station projects on scientific information exchange and lunar environmental preservation can be considered.